Speaker 1: Alright, so I'm making this video because if anybody finds this,
Speaker 1: I really don't know what I'm trying to say, and
Speaker 1: I'm breathtaking at what I've done.
Speaker 2: That's it. In the heart of central Virginia, Formville has
Speaker 2: been a quiet center of trade and education since its
Speaker 2: founding in seventeen ninety eight. This small town, which is
Speaker 2: situated between Richmond and Lynchburg, carries the weight of American
Speaker 2: history in its streets, from Civil War battles to the
Speaker 2: birthplace of the modern civil rights movement. First Avenue Cut Street,
Speaker 2: one of Formville's most established residential neighborhoods, a street where
Speaker 2: mature oak trees tore over modest colonial homes and well
Speaker 2: kept cape CODs. The houses along here tell stories of
Speaker 2: generations families who have watched their children grow up playing
Speaker 2: in yards bordered by white picket fences. It is the
Speaker 2: epitome of small town America, where front porches still serve
Speaker 2: their intended purpose. A neighbors wave as they pass by.
Speaker 2: The white colonial at the end of the block fit
Speaker 2: perfectly with its traditional clap board siding and rust red
Speaker 2: shutters framing each window. It really could have been lifted
Speaker 2: from a postcard. The mature tree surrounding the property provided
Speaker 2: natural privacy. Multiple editions over the years had given the
Speaker 2: house character, each section telling the story of a family
Speaker 2: that had grown and adopted within its walls. But one
Speaker 2: September afternoon in two thousand and nine, it became apparent
Speaker 2: that something was wrong. A woman had been trying to
Speaker 2: reach her daughter, who had been staying over at the house.
Speaker 2: She eventually called police and asked them to do a
Speaker 2: welfare check.
Speaker 3: I don't know who I need to talk to or
Speaker 3: my daughter is one of the family in Farmville, Virginia,
Speaker 3: and he's he's been basically living for the two and
Speaker 3: a half days. I can get ahold of burn himself
Speaker 3: and turned off with work. As the girl that she
Speaker 3: was staying with, nobody knows where she is. Herself has
Speaker 3: turned off. This daughter's boyfriend has came there, and I've
Speaker 3: talked him several times today and I've gotten different stories
Speaker 3: and different stories. But my husband went down He was
Speaker 3: the husband looked at my daughter yesterday and he went
Speaker 3: down there. He arrived about eleven o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 3: He factored for eight hours up fid the house and
Speaker 3: nobody showed up nobody is a bore. I mean, what
Speaker 3: about four hours lay here and and but I don't know.
Speaker 4: What else to do.
Speaker 2: The home at five oh five First Avenue in Farmville,
Speaker 2: Virginia belonged to Deborah Kelly. Inside its walls, Daborah shared
Speaker 2: her life with her sixteen year old daughter, Emma. The
Speaker 2: hoist reflected a kind of quiet normalcy, a family that,
Speaker 2: despite change, still worked hard to remain connected. Deborah and
Speaker 2: Emma's father, Mark Allan Niederbrock, had divorced years earlier, but
Speaker 2: theirs hadn't been a bitter split. Instead, it was the
Speaker 2: rare kind of divorce that people speak of in admiration.
Speaker 2: They remained friends, often still gathering together for outings and
Speaker 2: family time with Emma. Mark was still a fixture in
Speaker 2: the house, still part of Deborah's life in meaningful ways.
Speaker 2: By two thousand and nine, Mark had been serving for
Speaker 2: six years as pastor at Walker's Presbyterian Church in Hicksburg,
Speaker 2: a small, tight knit congregation where bonds between church and
Speaker 2: community ran deep. He was beloved not just as a pastor,
Speaker 2: but as a friend. Reverend Jason Winnaker, who knew him well,
Speaker 2: later said he was a very genuine servant of God.
Speaker 2: He genuinely loved his Savior, and he genuinely loved his church.
Speaker 2: Mark's story was one of faith, but also of reinventation.
Speaker 2: Born in Illinois, he had once pursued a different path,
Speaker 2: working as a graphic designer before answering the call to ministry.
Speaker 2: His decision to ender the ministry was completely out of
Speaker 2: the blue. An Eagle Scout and a graduate of the
Speaker 2: University of Illinois, Mark's life had been built on service
Speaker 2: and creativity, and those who knew him admired his sincerity.
Speaker 2: He loved his daughter. A member of the church, Barbara Dickerson,
Speaker 2: said her daddy would have done anything for her. Debor
Speaker 2: two had carved out her own impressive path. At fifty
Speaker 2: three years old, she was an associate professor of sociology
Speaker 2: and criminal justice studies at Longward University, where she had
Speaker 2: worked since nineteen ninety four after earning her doctorate from Illinois.
Speaker 2: She was respected by her colleagues and beloved by her students,
Speaker 2: no not only for her expertise, but also her warmth
Speaker 2: and willingness to listen. Their daughter, Emma, was a teenager
Speaker 2: straddling two worlds, one shaped by the expectations of her parents,
Speaker 2: the other by the subculture she had discovered online. After
Speaker 2: being bullied, Emma was homeskilled by her mother. She was curious, artistic.
Speaker 2: Unlike many teenagers, she found herself drawn into music as
Speaker 2: a form of identity. Her chosen genre was horror core rap,
Speaker 2: a niche often controversial subculture of hip hop with lyrics
Speaker 2: steeped in violence, death, and macabs storytelling. To outsiders, it
Speaker 2: was troubling, even dangerous, but to Emma it was a community,
Speaker 2: a place where she felt understood. Through forms and social media,
Speaker 2: she found others who shared her passion. Among them was
Speaker 2: eighteen year old Melanie Wells. The two bonded quickly over
Speaker 2: the music, their friendship blossoming across state lines. Melanie's life
Speaker 2: had taken its own winding course. She was originally from
Speaker 2: Louisville and Kentucky, but her family had relocated to West
Speaker 2: Virginia just as she was about to start high school.
Speaker 2: Melanie struggled to that, eventually dropping out and working towards
Speaker 2: her equivalency diploma, but those who knew Melanie described her
Speaker 2: as kind and unassuming. One friend, Laura, remembered her fondly.
Speaker 2: She was one of the few who talked to me
Speaker 2: because I was a freshman. For Deborah and Mark, Emma's
Speaker 2: fascination with Horrorcore raised concern. The violent lyrics, the fixation
Speaker 2: on death. It all seemed so far away from the
Speaker 2: world that they had built around her, But they were
Speaker 2: also careful not to dismiss it outright. They wanted to
Speaker 2: protect their daughter, but they also wanted to support her.
Speaker 2: Their compromise was simple. Emma could go to concerts, but
Speaker 2: only if they went with her. It was a condition
Speaker 2: that Emma accepted and won. Deborah summed up bess when
Speaker 2: she confided to a friend, She's either going to go
Speaker 2: on her own or I go with her and make
Speaker 2: sure she's okay. It was a balance between freedom and safety,
Speaker 2: rebellion and protection, a balance thought for the Kellys seemed
Speaker 2: to keep the family steady, But beneath it all was
Speaker 2: a quiet unease, the kind that lingers when parents sense
Speaker 2: their child is stepping into a world they don't fully understand.
Speaker 2: Like many teenagers of that era, Emma built an online
Speaker 2: identity through MySpace under the nickname Ragdoll. She shared pieces
Speaker 2: of herself with the growing online community of friends who
Speaker 2: like her felt most understood through music. Melanie Wells had
Speaker 2: her own profile as well, where she described herself and
Speaker 2: even listed her religion as Levene's Satanist. It was a
Speaker 2: detail that seemed rebellious on the surface, but also spoke
Speaker 2: to the way that teenagers often used the Internet to
Speaker 2: experiment with who they were. It was on my Space
Speaker 2: that Emma and Melanie struck up a friendship with a
Speaker 2: young man named Richard Samuel Alden Maccrofsky the Third. Richard
Speaker 2: was twenty years old and lived across the country in
Speaker 2: Castro Valley, California. Online, though he went by two different
Speaker 2: personas Lil dem Ondog his personal page and Psycho Sam,
Speaker 2: the name under which he promoted his horror core music.
Speaker 2: His my Space read like a manifesto of a young
Speaker 2: man drank to both impress and reassure. Under fun facts,
Speaker 2: he wrote, I am the Sam a web designer, a
Speaker 2: graphic designer, a musician, a photographer, a gamer, a promoter,
Speaker 2: a juggaloo. I'm not a creeper, a stalker, a rapist,
Speaker 2: a serial killer, a zombie. He described himself as a
Speaker 2: nerd somebody whose life revolved around music. On his music page,
Speaker 2: he was more direct about his ambitions writing. Psycho Sam
Speaker 2: is a new musician in the underground and only been
Speaker 2: rapping for a few months now. His songs bore titles
Speaker 2: such as Murderous Rage and Sick Minds Think Alike, dark,
Speaker 2: violent themes that mirrored the genre that Emma and Melanie
Speaker 2: had gravitated towards. Here's some samples of his songs.
Speaker 5: Night Now, I Got Existed, Nice, held me through, I
Speaker 5: love you you fine as I get your mouth and did.
Speaker 2: Over time, the online friendship between Emma and Richard turned
Speaker 2: into something more. They swapped phone numbers, talking almost every
Speaker 2: single day, sometimes for ours. For Emma, it was the
Speaker 2: rush of first love, exciting, private and all consuming. It
Speaker 2: was a time before video calls, so they sent each
Speaker 2: other recorded videos.
Speaker 1: All right, so you wanted a video and you made
Speaker 1: me videos so and he said, please, So I'll make
Speaker 1: you this video even though I'm not gonna like do
Speaker 1: anything because my room's kind of dirty, and yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't want to show you my dirty room.
Speaker 6: But this video is for Emma.
Speaker 1: Because you just told me to say your name, So
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'll make you another video once clean promise,
Speaker 1: unless you just want to see my wall because that's
Speaker 1: not dirty, but behind me is dirty, so that's not good.
Speaker 1: All right, This video is for you, Emma, the rag doll, amazing,
Speaker 1: amazing rag doll. And I really don't know what to
Speaker 1: do for you on video, so I guess I'll like
Speaker 1: show you my room a little bit if that's what you.
Speaker 6: Want to see.
Speaker 4: First off, we got my door, and then we got
Speaker 4: my addiction for energy drinks. And then we got my
Speaker 4: small underground CD collection going on right here.
Speaker 6: And then I've got my wall of awesomeness that I
Speaker 6: call it. Lots of posters and flyers and I had
Speaker 6: you man shot them and random stuff.
Speaker 5: I hat you.
Speaker 4: Oh now the battery is dye.
Speaker 2: My September of two thousand to nine, They're long distance
Speaker 2: relationship is all to take a major step. On the
Speaker 2: morning of the seventh, Emma posted a message on Richard's
Speaker 2: MySpace page. Her excitement spilled across the screen. Oh baby,
Speaker 2: the next time you check your MySpace, you'll be at
Speaker 2: my house. I love you so so much, baby, forever
Speaker 2: and for always. She explained that she'd been awake since
Speaker 2: four a m. Too restless to sleep. It was the
Speaker 2: day that they were finally going to meet in person.
Speaker 2: The plan was simple. Emma, Richard, and Melanie would travel
Speaker 2: together to Southgate and Michigan for a horror core music
Speaker 2: festival called Strictly for the Wicked. Scheduled for the twelfth
Speaker 2: of September. The all day event promised a lineup of
Speaker 2: underground ox such as mantle Ward Scum and Dismembered Fetus.
Speaker 2: To Emma and her friends, this wasn't just a concert,
Speaker 2: it was a pilgrimage. Richard flew in from California, and
Speaker 2: Emma arrived at the airport with her parents to meet him.
Speaker 2: She would later say that she knew noticed his shyness instantly,
Speaker 2: but his first thought was how pretty her smile was. Mark, ever,
Speaker 2: the steady presence, thought that Richard seemed like a nice
Speaker 2: enough young man. Deborah extended the kind of hospitality that
Speaker 2: came naturally to her. She allowed Richard to stay at
Speaker 2: the family home for the weekend, welcoming him as her
Speaker 2: daughter Emma's guest. Melanie's parents also agreed to let her
Speaker 2: spend the weekend at the Kelly's house so that she
Speaker 2: could attend the festival as well. When the weekend arrived,
Speaker 2: Debora volunteered to drive the group to Michigan, with Mark
Speaker 2: deciding to tag along. Emma wasn't thrilled about her father
Speaker 2: shop ruining the trip, venting online talk about a long
Speaker 2: ass drive sharing the car with a fucking preacher. It's
Speaker 2: gonna suck, but no doubt is it worth it. The
Speaker 2: group booked rooms at a motel near the venue Deborah,
Speaker 2: with Emma and Melanie in one, Mark in another, and
Speaker 2: Richard in his own. On the night before the festival,
Speaker 2: they met up with friends from in the horrorcore community,
Speaker 2: including a rapper known as Sectanic and his girlfriend, Mizkiel.
Speaker 2: The teenagers hung out, laughing and trading stories. Mesicel even
Speaker 2: braided Melanie's hair. The next day, the festival grounds filled
Speaker 2: with roughly two hundred and fifty people. The group watched performances,
Speaker 2: met friends, and immersed themselves in the aggressive theatrical energy
Speaker 2: of horror core. It was loud, chaotic, but alive. By
Speaker 2: the time the festival ended, the group was buzzing with
Speaker 2: the shared high of the music. Melanie logged onto hermize
Speaker 2: space to update her friends, sft W was fucking amazing
Speaker 2: back in Virginia. Now be back in West Virginia on Wednesday.
Speaker 2: I miss everyone, But Melanie never made it back to
Speaker 2: West Virginia and Richard never made it back to California.
Speaker 2: The next day, Richard placed a phone call. His voice
Speaker 2: was quiet, almost tentative, as he left a message for
Speaker 2: his family. I just wanted to make sure that everyone
Speaker 2: was okay. I love you guys. On the afternoon of
Speaker 2: the eighteenth of September, Melanie's father, Thomas Wells, was preparing
Speaker 2: to drive from West Virginia to Formville. He'd arranged to
Speaker 2: pick up his daughter from Emma's house and bring her
Speaker 2: home and or Before setting off, he called Melanie to
Speaker 2: let her know that he was on the way, but
Speaker 2: his call went unanswered. When Thomas arrived at five o
Speaker 2: five First Avenue, he walked up to the door and knocked.
Speaker 2: Nobody came. He tried Melanie's cell phone again and again,
Speaker 2: but it only rang. He waited outside for seven hours,
Speaker 2: clinging to the hope that his daughter would appear or
Speaker 2: at least call back, But as daylight slipped away, he
Speaker 2: eventually got into his car and returned home, empty handled
Speaker 2: and unsettled. Back in West Virginia, Melanie's mother, Kathleen became
Speaker 2: more anxious. She reached out to Emma's father, Mark. Something
Speaker 2: was wrong, she explained, Melanie wasn't answering, and neither was
Speaker 2: anybody else inside the Kelly home. Mark reassured her that
Speaker 2: he would go over and check, but ours ticked past
Speaker 2: and he never called back. When Kathleen tried calling him directly,
Speaker 2: he too wasn't answering. With dread mounting, Melanie's parents finally
Speaker 2: called the Farmfield Police Department and requested a welfare check.
Speaker 2: When officers arrived at the Kelley home, everything appeared ordinary.
Speaker 2: The lawn was neatly trimmed, the house well kept, and
Speaker 2: the lights glowing softly. Inside. They knocked on the front
Speaker 2: door and was surprised when it opened. Standing before more
Speaker 2: than was a young man. It was Richard mccrofsky. Calm
Speaker 2: and on assuming, he explained that Amma and Melanie had
Speaker 2: gone to the movies. He added that he'd already spoken
Speaker 2: with Melanie's mother and told her the same thing. The
Speaker 2: officers had no reason to doubt him. They left, noting
Speaker 2: nothing out of the ordinary as.
Speaker 7: Well, Yeah, this is a Carmel police department. Okay, did
Speaker 7: you just speak with somebody at the residence.
Speaker 3: Ah, yes, I just spoke with I guess the daughter's boyfriend.
Speaker 7: Okay, well, I don't know. As my sergeant went over
Speaker 7: there and he said that it was a young kid boy.
Speaker 7: And then Melanie and the girl she's staying with her
Speaker 7: at the movies. Now, yesterday they went to Richmond. Vehicles
Speaker 7: had broken down and his cell phone dead and that
Speaker 7: kind of thing. So is that when he talked to
Speaker 7: you about somebody.
Speaker 3: Told me yeah, And like I said, I but I
Speaker 3: don't know where the mother is. I don't know where.
Speaker 3: I mean usually that I give she drives them around,
Speaker 3: and she's here. I haven't spoken to her at all.
Speaker 3: The father I talked to you earlier on today, right,
Speaker 3: he said that he was wanting he was gone to
Speaker 3: play even knew. A matter of fact, he was on
Speaker 3: the red line talk. He's going through farmability because she
Speaker 3: prop at the house. I haven't heard from resern Okay,
Speaker 3: like I said, I've just turned this be idle. Now
Speaker 3: I'm not on the thing at all.
Speaker 2: But by the next morning, Kathleen's fear had only sharpened.
Speaker 2: She still hadn't heard from her daughter. Melanie had never
Speaker 2: gone this long without calling, and now the silence felt suffocating.
Speaker 2: She called police again and begged them to check once more.
Speaker 2: When officers pulled up to the house for a second time,
Speaker 2: things felt different. As they approached the front door, a
Speaker 2: foul odor hung in the air. The closer they got,
Speaker 2: the strong grip became. It was the unmistakable stench of decomposition.
Speaker 2: This time, nobody came.
Speaker 1: To the door.
Speaker 2: Officers forced it open and were immediately hit with the
Speaker 2: overwhelming smell, so strong it seemed to cling to their
Speaker 2: clothing and their skin. They followed the odor through the house,
Speaker 2: their boots echoing in the silence, until it led them
Speaker 2: to a downstairs bedroom. The door creaked open, and inside
Speaker 2: was the scene that would stay with them forever. Three
Speaker 2: bodies lay in the room, one sprawled on the bed,
Speaker 2: two more crumpled on the floor. They had been bludgeoned
Speaker 2: so savagely that their faces were destroyed their skulls shattered.
Speaker 2: The victims were later identified as sixteen year old Emma,
Speaker 2: her best friend Melanie, and her father More. But the
Speaker 2: horror didn't end there. Upstairs, in the master bedroom, officers
Speaker 2: found Debra Kelly. Like the others, she too had been
Speaker 2: beaten to death. All of them had been bludgeoned with
Speaker 2: them all. It left injuries so catastrophic that none of
Speaker 2: the victims could be identified visually. Dental records would be
Speaker 2: required to confirm their identities. After the gresome discovery inside
Speaker 2: the Kelly home, detectives already had a suspect in mind,
Speaker 2: twenty year old Richard Samuel Alden mccrosskey. The condition of
Speaker 2: the three bodies revealed something chilling. They had been dead
Speaker 2: for days, decomposing in the very house where mccrotskey had
Speaker 2: calmly answered the door to police and told them that
Speaker 2: Emma and Melanie had gone to the movies. But Mark
Speaker 2: wasn't as decomposed as the others. Detectives theorized he was
Speaker 2: killed when he went to check on the others. Investigators
Speaker 2: quickly noticed something else. Mark's car was missing from the driveway.
Speaker 2: It didn't take them long to track it down. In
Speaker 2: the early morning hours before the bodies were discovered, Prince
Speaker 2: Edward deputies had already received the call about a suspicious
Speaker 2: vehicle on poor House Road. When a deputy responded, he
Speaker 2: found a car stuck in the ditch after somebody had
Speaker 2: tried to back out of a driveway behind the wheel
Speaker 2: was mccrosskey. He didn't have a driver's license, so the
Speaker 2: officer ticketed him and arranged for the car to be toted.
Speaker 2: At the time, nobody realized the vehicle belonged to Mark,
Speaker 2: or that the young man driving it had just left
Speaker 2: behind a crime scene of unspeakable violence. In a college
Speaker 2: town like Farmville, it wasn't unusual for somebody to borrow
Speaker 2: a car. There was nothing at the time to raise
Speaker 2: any suspicion. Tow truck driver Elton Napier later recalled giving
Speaker 2: mccrosskey a ride into town. He recalled, I just asked
Speaker 2: him where he was from, and all he would say
Speaker 2: was he was from California. I said, what in the
Speaker 2: world are you doing down here? He said, my girlfriend
Speaker 2: lives down here. Elton noticed that there were red marks
Speaker 2: across mc crotskey's neck. They were hickeys, and Elton teased,
Speaker 2: she was about to eat you up, wasn't she. McCroskey
Speaker 2: grinned and said they were from his girlfriend. To Elton,
Speaker 2: he didn't seem strange, just quiet, but there was one
Speaker 2: thing he couldn't forget. He later said, he stunk like
Speaker 2: the devil. I'm going to tell you the truth that
Speaker 2: boy was stinking. The smell clinging to mc crotskey wasn't
Speaker 2: sweat or travel It was the stench of decomposition. He'd
Speaker 2: been living inside the Kelly home for days, surrounded by
Speaker 2: the bodies of the people he had killed. After being
Speaker 2: dropped off, McCroskey wandered into a Sheet's convenience store. A
Speaker 2: clerk remembered him saying he was waiting on a ride
Speaker 2: to the airport. That detail proved invaluable. Detectives rushed to
Speaker 2: Richmond International Airport, searching for any sign of him. They
Speaker 2: found him in a boggage claim area, stretched out on
Speaker 2: a bench, fast asleep. When officers surrounded him, Crosskey didn't resist.
Speaker 2: The rast was quiet, almost anti climatic. Troy Bell, and
Speaker 2: airport spokesman later described the moment. He was sitting there, real, calmly,
Speaker 2: almost nonchalant. In his pocket. Police find a ticket to
Speaker 2: California around the right.
Speaker 1: He said.
Speaker 2: You are stead, he writes, and you signed a form.
Speaker 6: Saying you will and talk to us, and you still
Speaker 6: will and talk to us.
Speaker 1: Yes, but I would like to taste too, lacloye.
Speaker 6: Okay, that that is your option.
Speaker 3: So are you in looking your right to remain sound.
Speaker 2: Yes, the news of the quadruple murder spread through the
Speaker 2: tight knit community like wildfire, but it didn't stop there
Speaker 2: within ours. The story had exploded across the Internet, particularly
Speaker 2: in the niche corners where McCroskey and Emma were known
Speaker 2: figures in the horror core community. Despite the violent nature
Speaker 2: of the music they listened to, people who knew them
Speaker 2: were genuinely stunned. Andrew Schrum, who owned serial Killing Records,
Speaker 2: captured the shock felt by many when he said, this
Speaker 2: is not something from the p SSAM. I knew, this
Speaker 2: is not something that I would ever, ever in a
Speaker 2: million years envision him doing. Almost immediately, the media latched
Speaker 2: onto the horrorcore angle. Local newscasts ran segments on murder music.
Speaker 2: Headlines splashed across front pages tied the brutal killings to
Speaker 2: the dark, violent lyrics of the genre. Reporters stood outside
Speaker 2: the crimescene, warning of the dangerous influence of songs the
Speaker 2: glorified murder Online. McCroskey's favorite tracks were dissected line by line,
Speaker 2: with chilling meaning retroactively imposed on the coverage followed a
Speaker 2: familiar pattern, one that often emerges whenever tragedy collides with
Speaker 2: controversial art forms. Heavy metal was blamed for teen suicides
Speaker 2: in the nineteen eighties. Violent video games became scapegoats after
Speaker 2: school shootings. Now horror core was under the microscope, but
Speaker 2: this narrative, while compelling for news cycles, fundamentally misunderstood the
Speaker 2: relationship between music and behavior. Millions of people consume aggressive,
Speaker 2: violent music across all genres without ever harming another person.
Speaker 2: The horrorcore community itself, citing it and passionate, was horrified
Speaker 2: precisely because they understood the distinction between performance and reality.
Speaker 2: For most listeners, horrorcore was catharsis, not a call to arms.
Speaker 2: While the public debate rage, detectives were still focused on
Speaker 2: something more pressing motive. Mccrotsky's sister, Sarah told the tective
Speaker 2: that she had heard from friends that he and Emma
Speaker 2: had some kind of falling out at the music festival.
Speaker 2: She didn't know the details. Then, detectives spoke with Curtis Gibson,
Speaker 2: a taxi driver who had given mccrosskey a ride to
Speaker 2: the airport. Gibson recalled a chilling conversation. McCroskey had told
Speaker 2: him that he found a text message on Emma's phone
Speaker 2: from a man she had met at the festival, saying
Speaker 2: he loved her and wanted to be with her. When
Speaker 2: McCroskey confronted Emma, she became angry and accused him of
Speaker 2: invading her privacy. According to Gibbson, McCroskey said he hadn't
Speaker 2: wanted to argue. He said he waited for her to
Speaker 2: fall asleep, and then he left the house. He just
Speaker 2: didn't tell Gibbson it was after he slaughtered the entire family.
Speaker 2: On the twenty third of September, McCroskey was formally charged
Speaker 2: with four counts of murder. The next day, Mark was
Speaker 2: led to rest. Friends filled them modest White Church, where
Speaker 2: Mark had spent so many Sundays preaching, guiding and comforting others.
Speaker 2: They described him as a man whose life was centered
Speaker 2: on God, but also as a father who had struggled
Speaker 2: to reconcile his deep faith with his daughter's fascination with
Speaker 2: macab music and imagery. Reverend Joseph mccrutcheen spoke to the crowd,
Speaker 2: acknowledging that those gathered no better than anybody what Mark
Speaker 2: would have said if he were alive To address such
Speaker 2: a tragedy. Mark, he reminded them, was the one who
Speaker 2: had spent his life in service to others, visiting their homes,
Speaker 2: sitting at their bedsides during illness, and presiding over funerals
Speaker 2: when they said goodbye to their loved ones. After the
Speaker 2: service concluded, Mark was buried on the quiet grounds in
Speaker 2: front of the church he had faithfully served for years.
Speaker 2: The following week, services were held for Deborah Kelly and
Speaker 2: her daughter Emma. Farmfully United Methodist Church was filled with mourners,
Speaker 2: many of whom knew Deborah not only as a colleague,
Speaker 2: but as a teacher and mentor who life often enduring impact.
Speaker 2: Reverend Sylvia Mettros delivered words of comfort, telling those in
Speaker 2: attendance in the face of horror and tragedy, were claiming
Speaker 2: that God is stronger. She spoke of Deborah as a
Speaker 2: tough yet compassionate educator who devoted her professional life to
Speaker 2: understanding criminals and victims alike, often challenging her assurance to
Speaker 2: see the human story behind the crime. Emma was remembered
Speaker 2: in a more complicated light as a teenager who had
Speaker 2: a rebellious strike and an interest in the occult, but
Speaker 2: who also retained the simple joys of adolescence, like her
Speaker 2: love for the Backstreet Boys. Reverend Meadows reminded mourners that
Speaker 2: grief in remembrance often involve embracing both sides of a person,
Speaker 2: the struggles and the joys. She told them, we can
Speaker 2: no longer live as though certain groups don't exist. We
Speaker 2: can no longer pretend that darkness and forces of evil
Speaker 2: aren't right under our noses. Is laid to rest in
Speaker 2: a private service at Brown Funeral Homes, South Berkeley Chapel.
Speaker 2: As a grief lingered over Farmville. The legal proceedings moved forward.
Speaker 2: In November, McCroskey was indicted on six counts of capital murder,
Speaker 2: as well as a charge of grand larceny. In Virginia,
Speaker 2: capital murder is not a single defined crime, but a
Speaker 2: category of offenses that can warrant the death penalty. A
Speaker 2: person can be charged with capital murder for axe tied
Speaker 2: to terrorism, for killing a law enforcement officer, or, as
Speaker 2: in McCroskey's case, for committing multiple murders within a three
Speaker 2: year period. Early the next year, McCroskey's defense attorney, Carrie Bowen,
Speaker 2: filed a motion requesting a change of venue, citing the
Speaker 2: intense publicity surrounding the case in Vornville. He also requested
Speaker 2: that McCroskey undergo of mental evaluation, hoping to determine whether
Speaker 2: psychological factors could play a role in the defense. Meanwhile,
Speaker 2: speculation grew over weather prosecutors would seek the death penalty.
Speaker 2: Among those who followed the case closely were people who
Speaker 2: believed that seeking mccrotsky's execution wouldn't serve justice. Jessica Hence,
Speaker 2: a former student of Deborah's, and her husband Scott, launched
Speaker 2: an online petition urging prosecutors not to seek the death penalty.
Speaker 2: Jessica explained their raisoning, stating, my husband and I both
Speaker 2: have this overwhelming feeling that Deborah wouldn't want her murderer
Speaker 2: to be put to death. She remembered Debra's extraordinary empathy
Speaker 2: and her ability to recognize that people aren't defined by
Speaker 2: a single act. She said, we wanted people to understand
Speaker 2: that we're not just one thing or act, that we
Speaker 2: are all products of a myriad of circumstances and our
Speaker 2: social environment. Such pleas from victim's loved ones can sometimes
Speaker 2: influence prosecutorial decisions, but in this case, None of Debora
Speaker 2: or Mark's family members signed the petition. Support did come
Speaker 2: from an unexpected source, McCroskey's own sister, Sarah. In a statement,
Speaker 2: she expressed her own conflicted feelings, starting, I feel really
Speaker 2: really bad for what happened to the family, whether my
Speaker 2: brother did it or not, but I think that this
Speaker 2: is something we can do for her family. If he's guilty,
Speaker 2: then I think giving him the death penalty is the
Speaker 2: easy way out and he should suffer the consequences for
Speaker 2: what he did. On the nineteenth of September twenty ten,
Speaker 2: Richard McCroskey was escorted into the courtroom. He stood before
Speaker 2: the judge and quietly entered guilty place to two counts
Speaker 2: of capital murder and two counts of first degree murder.
Speaker 2: The decision came as part of a play agreement in
Speaker 2: which prosecutors agreed to take the death penalty off the
Speaker 2: table in exchange for mccrosskey accepting a life sentence. His
Speaker 2: defense attorney, Carrie Bowen, explained that the overwhelming evidence left
Speaker 2: little room for maneuver. He remarked, four bodies are pretty
Speaker 2: compelling evidence. This is the kind of stuff that citizens
Speaker 2: any place in this country are terrified it could happen
Speaker 2: to them. This is the kind of case death penalties
Speaker 2: arise from. Mccrosskey himself declined to make any statement in court,
Speaker 2: though his attorney said that he was preparing a message
Speaker 2: for the victim's families. Bowen described his client's mood as
Speaker 2: somber and subdued, stating, there are four people dead here.
Speaker 2: He's not happy at all. Prosecutor James Annis then outlined
Speaker 2: some of the grizzly details that investigators had pieced together.
Speaker 2: In the early hours of the fifteenth of September, McCroskey
Speaker 2: had been drinking beer, smoking marijuana, and taking pain killers
Speaker 2: before launching his attack around three a m Armed with
Speaker 2: a heavy mall, he moved methodically through the home while
Speaker 2: the occupants slept. Melanie Wells was the first to be
Speaker 2: targeted as she slept on a sofa in a downstairs den.
Speaker 2: Mcrotky then crept upstairs and bludgeoned Deborah Kelly in her bed. Afterwards,
Speaker 2: he returned downstairs, entered Emma's bedroom and struck her repeatedly
Speaker 2: as she slept. According to Ennis, none of the three
Speaker 2: stirred during the attacks, and the absence of defensive wounds
Speaker 2: suggested they had never awoken. Later that morning, Mark, Emma's father,
Speaker 2: arrived at the house after being asked by Melanie's parents
Speaker 2: to check on the teenagers. Mccrotsky confronted him in the
Speaker 2: living room and killed him as well. Afterwards, he dragged
Speaker 2: both Melanie and Mark's bodies into Emma's bedroom, leaving all
Speaker 2: three victims together. In the days that followed, McCroskey remained
Speaker 2: inside the house, coexisting with the four bodies as they
Speaker 2: began to decompose. He even recorded a video of himself
Speaker 2: with the digital camera, acknowledging what he had done, confessing
Speaker 2: that he I knew he would have to face justice
Speaker 2: and experissing thought of suicide.
Speaker 1: All right, So I'm making this video because or if
Speaker 1: anybody finds this, I wat don't I'm trying today and
Speaker 1: just I'm breathtaking at what I've done and I apologize
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna pay for my consequences. You know, I
Speaker 1: wish that I could have not done this. I just
Speaker 1: lost my mind. I snapped and I did what I did,
Speaker 1: and I gotta pay for now my consequences. I'm like
Speaker 1: all shaky and stuff, but like to anybody that finds this,
Speaker 1: tell my parents that, like, I love them and I'm
Speaker 1: very sorry for doing this. And uh, there's nothing really
Speaker 1: else to say. To everybody that is probably gonna hate
Speaker 1: me for this. I'm sorry and I had to do it.
Speaker 1: My mind just snaps. I couldn't control anymore. That's it.
Speaker 1: Fuck you to the big world, Fuck everybody in the world.
Speaker 1: I can't stand his place.
Speaker 2: When asked about a possible motive, Annis refused to speculate.
Speaker 2: He said he's a very closed individual. Bowen, however, provided
Speaker 2: some insight, suggesting that mccrotsky's anger had been fueled by
Speaker 2: his turbulent relationship with Emma. Mccrotsky had believed that they
Speaker 2: were in an exclusive relationship, while Emma appeared to see
Speaker 2: things differently. According to some sources, Emma wasn't as attracted
Speaker 2: to McCroskey when she met him in person. He apparently
Speaker 2: didn't look like his MySpace pictures. According to Zekiel, Emma
Speaker 2: texted her and said that she was uncomfortable. She found
Speaker 2: mccrotskey to be immature. After discovering messages on her phone
Speaker 2: that suggested she had been speaking to others. McCroskey's jealousy
Speaker 2: enraged reached a breaking point. There was also questions raised
Speaker 2: about whether his violent interest in music had played any
Speaker 2: role in the killings, but when acknowledged the dark themes
Speaker 2: present and much of mccrotsky's preferred genre, but was careful
Speaker 2: not to draw a direct connection. He stated, much of
Speaker 2: that music is so rampant with this exact kind of behavior,
Speaker 2: you can't help but notice the coincidence. But I don't
Speaker 2: have a sense the music led to this kind of behavior. Well,
Speaker 2: that is it for this episode of Morbidology. As always,
Speaker 2: thank you so much for listening, and I'd like to
Speaker 2: say a massive thank you to my new supporters are Bompaidreon,
Speaker 2: Lisa and Holly. In exchange for your support. Up on Patreon,
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Speaker 2: episodes as well as bonus episodes of Morbidology Plus. Remember
Speaker 2: to check us out at morebiology dot com. For more
Speaker 2: information about this episode and to read some true crime articles.
Speaker 2: Until next time, take care of yourself, stay safe, and
Speaker 2: have an amazing week.