Speaker 1: This is a studio both and production. As you know,
Speaker 1: we are celebrating my tenth year in podcasting and we're
Speaker 1: capping that celebration off with a three day event here
Speaker 1: in the Berkshires over the weekend of September twenty fifth.
Speaker 1: There will be studio sessions, live shows, a Bravo town hall,
Speaker 1: Berkshire activities like foraging, wine tasting, museum visits and more,
Speaker 1: and tons of special guests. Will do the Karen and
Speaker 1: Ellen Letters Live starring Amanda Jacobson from Wine and Crime,
Speaker 1: Tawny plattis famous renowned voice actress, and Chris Brayton from
Speaker 1: the More Gooder Than podcast. I'll be doing a very special,
Speaker 1: first time ever live show of the Pact with special
Speaker 1: guest Patrick Hines from True Crime Obsessed. We'll do a
Speaker 1: panel discussion on Unsafe Spaces featuring me, Kaz, Charlie Wirrel
Speaker 1: from Crime Lines, and Justin and Aaron from Generation Why.
Speaker 1: There will even be a live episode of Our Americana
Speaker 1: and a very cool Playlist by TCB episode featuring me
Speaker 1: and the entire research team. Guests, we'll get to check
Speaker 1: out my new speakeasy, the green Room, tour the studio
Speaker 1: and get elbow deep in the research process. This is
Speaker 1: a once in a lifetime event where you'll get to
Speaker 1: enjoy the berkshers, share fun activities with the podcast hosts
Speaker 1: you love the most, and really dig into podcasting and
Speaker 1: all the shows I have produced along with my friends.
Speaker 1: Book your tickets today by clicking the link in the
Speaker 1: show notes. And if that doesn't work for you, why
Speaker 1: don't you think about? If not now when? For example,
Speaker 1: we are going to the Galapagos Islands January eleventh through seventeenth.
Speaker 1: Haven't you always wanted to go? And if not now,
Speaker 1: when will you go? And wouldn't you go during the
Speaker 1: winter here in the States to escape to the warmth
Speaker 1: with like minded new friends who love true crime bullshit
Speaker 1: as much as you do, but also love the experience
Speaker 1: of travel, seeing animals and getting away from it all.
Speaker 1: These Trova trips have made me lifelong friends. They are
Speaker 1: such a great way to meet new people, get out
Speaker 1: of your world and shake things up. And like I said,
Speaker 1: if you're not going to go to the Galopagos now,
Speaker 1: will you ever? Book your trip today by clicking the
Speaker 1: link in the show notes, And now here's the show.
Speaker 1: This is a studio both and production the first season
Speaker 1: of True Crime Bolo Bullshit was a very strange time
Speaker 1: in my life. I found that I was using the
Speaker 1: show to work through a lot of my own experiences,
Speaker 1: while also using many of those same experiences to work
Speaker 1: through the show. Following my mental health crisis and years
Speaker 1: of pouring myself into the Keys Case, I found myself
Speaker 1: needing space and separation from just about everything. I decided
Speaker 1: to estrange myself from my mother, who in my opinion,
Speaker 1: is a malignant narcissist who created an incredibly toxic environment
Speaker 1: growing up and beyond. I stopped drinking, I started therapy
Speaker 1: literally and actually through betterhelp, and I left my apartment
Speaker 1: in Brooklyn with my partner to live alone for a
Speaker 1: few months up in the Berkshires. I needed to be
Speaker 1: alone with my thoughts and away from the world. This
Speaker 1: was at the height of the success of the Karen
Speaker 1: and Ellen Letters, and just as True Crime Bullshit was
Speaker 1: finding an audience. People were loving both shows. Each show
Speaker 1: was building a strong community, and yet I had never
Speaker 1: felt more isolated. April of twenty nineteen, five months after
Speaker 1: the launch of TCB and three years into podcasting, was
Speaker 1: the first month that my podcasting career garnered more than
Speaker 1: five hundred dollars. I was still thousands of dollars in
Speaker 1: the whole and now adding a monthly Airbnb to that debt.
Speaker 1: So I replaced my healing time with hyper focusing on podcasting,
Speaker 1: because for once I could almost see the financial light
Speaker 1: at the end of the debt tunnel. The Karen and
Speaker 1: Ellen letters had just ended, and I was trying to
Speaker 1: find a way to extend its success by creating a
Speaker 1: third season, while also working on a new season of
Speaker 1: Our Americana, which would become its last for a while,
Speaker 1: its shortest and also its best season. And I was
Speaker 1: recording weekly new episodes of Playlist and still deep in
Speaker 1: the trenches of all Things israel Keys, but still half
Speaker 1: of season one to finish. I am dumbfounded now by
Speaker 1: how much I was able to get done and even
Speaker 1: attempt to take on at that specific time in my life,
Speaker 1: let alone ever I'd been writing into and working up
Speaker 1: to the season one finale of TCB. I Don't Want
Speaker 1: Your Voice to Move Me, named after a song by
Speaker 1: Laura Gibson that I'd been listening to at nausea to
Speaker 1: both help me deal with my estrangement from my mother
Speaker 1: and get into the headspaces of the women in Keysa's life.
Speaker 1: From the outset of writing the first season, I'd always
Speaker 1: known that the finale was going to be the most
Speaker 1: critical episode. It had to once and for all exonerate
Speaker 1: and at least empathetically emancipate Sarah, Tammy and Kimberly while
Speaker 1: also highlighting how deep and far trauma extends, which was
Speaker 1: both based on actuality and my own projections. Throughout the
Speaker 1: late stages of research an entire writing process, I'd been
Speaker 1: racked with guilt over Sarah, Tammy, Kimberly, and all the
Speaker 1: families of all the potential victims. I would be dredging
Speaker 1: up their worst moments. I would be bringing them into
Speaker 1: the light, and I would arguably partially at least be
Speaker 1: responsible for how people strangers would perceive them. And I
Speaker 1: could never know nor control how they would take those
Speaker 1: perceptions out into the world. And it wasn't even something
Speaker 1: I ever considered until I was already all the way in.
Speaker 1: Through all my research, I developed parasocial relationships with all
Speaker 1: of them. I cared for them, I worried about them,
Speaker 1: I rooted for them. I loved them, or some version
Speaker 1: of love, and yet week after week I was still
Speaker 1: pressing publish. My need for answers, my deep empathy, and
Speaker 1: my pursuit of success were competing with one another and
Speaker 1: eating me alive. I am not a journalist by trade,
Speaker 1: and never could be. I get too attached, I care
Speaker 1: too much. I keep the stories with me. I try
Speaker 1: to take on all the pain. And please don't mistake
Speaker 1: this for altruism or heroism. It is an often reckless
Speaker 1: need to understand and experience that is not my own,
Speaker 1: and then a reckless need to help someone I cannot help.
Speaker 1: To me. The song I don't want your Voice to
Speaker 1: Move Me is many things at once. It is loving
Speaker 1: someone so much that their absence will destroy you if
Speaker 1: you give it even a moment. It is loving someone
Speaker 1: who is complicated. It is having your idea of what
Speaker 1: love is shaped by someone who doesn't entirely know how
Speaker 1: to experience love themselves. It is having the best person
Speaker 1: in your life be the worst person in someone else's.
Speaker 1: Is trying to separate someone you love from who they
Speaker 1: are to others from their worst parts. It is trying
Speaker 1: desperately not to become the terrible person you love. It
Speaker 1: is trying to separate yourself from the worst parts of
Speaker 1: the person you love. It is all the pain you
Speaker 1: can never quite articulate. It is forgiveness at best, an
Speaker 1: attempt to reconcile at worst, and it is lost in
Speaker 1: almost every form. I listened to that song through the
Speaker 1: ears of Tammy Sarah Kimberly, myself, through the lens of keys,
Speaker 1: my mother, my partner, my work, over and over again.
Speaker 1: I listened as I researched, I listened as I wrote,
Speaker 1: I listened as I thought about out what this episode
Speaker 1: would do for my career, for the people within it,
Speaker 1: for the case, for the listeners. Both the episode and
Speaker 1: the song became my obsession. And the bridge, which both
Speaker 1: evokes all these feelings and sets you firmly in the
Speaker 1: Pacific Northwest, breaks me every time, still to this day.
Speaker 2: I don't want your boys to move. I don't want
Speaker 2: to be cracked open. I don't want the broken headline
Speaker 2: flicker the right hinds, the silver side of the moon
Speaker 2: behind you. When I find you, Frog and Storm, we
Speaker 2: only spoke and never sorry, those of us by loss.
Speaker 3: I don't want you.
Speaker 1: I've become someone quite comfortably comfortable in sadness, and I
Speaker 1: think that's what got me through the first few years
Speaker 1: of TCB sadness, isolation, unrelenting and often damaging empathy, and
Speaker 1: the episode I Don't Want Your Voice to Move Me
Speaker 1: is one that lives in me because the goal of
Speaker 1: the show has always been to identify keys as victims,
Speaker 1: but the show itself has always been about Sarah and
Speaker 1: Tammy and Kim and complicated love. Here is the season
Speaker 1: one finale of True Crime bullshit, I Don't Want Your
Speaker 1: Voice to Move Me. We've ever had one of those incredible, amazing,
Speaker 1: legendary nights with your friends, the kind you'll be retelling
Speaker 1: for years, where there's laughter, honesty, everyone dropping their guard
Speaker 1: at the same time. That's exactly what happened to me
Speaker 1: the first time I've tried psilocybin from Schedule thirty five.
Speaker 1: It wasn't about tripping at all. It was about connecting.
Speaker 1: We were listening to each other, laughing until our face
Speaker 1: is hurt, and remembering what it feels like to be
Speaker 1: fully present with the people you love, kind of like
Speaker 1: just being with your friends without all the other bullshit
Speaker 1: that lives inside your head. Ninety percent of the time
Speaker 1: since then, I've microdosed on heavy days to find clarity
Speaker 1: and take in recreational doses when I need to reset
Speaker 1: and feel human again. Schedule thirty five doses every product precisely,
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Speaker 1: It's August and it is the perfect time to hit
Speaker 1: reset before the autumn rush begins. And honestly, I can't
Speaker 1: think of a better place to start than my closet.
Speaker 1: And that's why I love shopping at Quints, because Quin's
Speaker 1: is all about fewer, better pieces. Their clothes are made
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Speaker 3: Everybody I've known.
Speaker 1: To a certain extent, you could say they're my victims too,
Speaker 1: because they're going to have to pay for this for
Speaker 1: five years.
Speaker 4: To come somewhere. This is true crime bullshit.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Josh Hallmark, and this is a serialized
Speaker 1: story of Israel Keys. When I started this podcast, I
Speaker 1: had a razor sharp focus on Keys and identifying his victims.
Speaker 1: The further endo the research and the story that I got,
Speaker 1: the more grounded I became in the stories of those
Speaker 1: he left behind. How does a family survive something like this?
Speaker 1: How did his family survive this? He seemed to actually
Speaker 1: genuinely care about Kristen and trying to get her car back.
Speaker 1: Was that just a ploy for control or do you
Speaker 1: think that there were pieces of him who genuinely cared
Speaker 1: about his family?
Speaker 5: You know, I think of all the questions about Keys,
Speaker 5: that's that's the one that's either most interesting or at
Speaker 5: least to me, most perplexing is and I kind of
Speaker 5: I'll admit, I flips up on this. I go back
Speaker 5: and forth on it. You know, like I said, on
Speaker 5: some levels, he is a living, breathing human being. He
Speaker 5: has a brain, he has a hearty has a livery
Speaker 5: and lung, you know, all of those things that, yeah,
Speaker 5: physically he has. Now obviously he's a stone cold psychopath,
Speaker 5: So his brain doesn't work the same way yours are
Speaker 5: mind does. But you know there are people who struggle
Speaker 5: with that. Hey, he had a daughter, he braided her hair,
Speaker 5: he got her to school, and and so those are
Speaker 5: the things that are the most difficult to square with
Speaker 5: what we know was his behavior on other occasions. And
Speaker 5: I said at one point that I think psychopath like keys,
Speaker 5: who are you to me? Born and raised evil, What
Speaker 5: they do as they grow up is they realize that
Speaker 5: they're different. And he realized. One of the seminal moments
Speaker 5: in his life was when he brought one of his
Speaker 5: friends out into the woods to torture that cat and
Speaker 5: set it on fire. They had a tie tour reopened
Speaker 5: when the friend threw up. You know, he says, well,
Speaker 5: I learned not to take anybody into the woods anymore.
Speaker 5: So that's the beginning of him saying I'm different than
Speaker 5: everybody else. Now they rarely find each other, thankfully, Psychopaths
Speaker 5: like him rarely find each other, So they basically operate
Speaker 5: on their own most of the time, and they know
Speaker 5: that they are different than the rest of the world,
Speaker 5: but they also know that they have to survive in
Speaker 5: that world if they are to carry out their you know,
Speaker 5: blood lust and their urges to kill. They can't walk
Speaker 5: her in the middle of the day on main street
Speaker 5: in a small town and kill somebody in front of everybody.
Speaker 5: They know they have to maintain an appearance of being
Speaker 5: like everybody else, even though they know they're not like
Speaker 5: everybody else. So they get into relationships, and they have children,
Speaker 5: and they get jobs, and they go to work and
Speaker 5: they do all those things. And in my mind, to
Speaker 5: some extent, they're acting. They have observed what the rest
Speaker 5: of us do, and they go, oh, that's how people
Speaker 5: act to be able to live their lives, and that's
Speaker 5: the way I need to act, so that in the
Speaker 5: darkest moments, in the moments that I you know, take
Speaker 5: for myself and I'm careful, I can go out and
Speaker 5: I can do this thing that something deep down inside
Speaker 5: me drives me to do. And so, you know, there
Speaker 5: are people that are of the opinion that, yeah, there
Speaker 5: is an inkling. It's a minor, you know, minuscule amount
Speaker 5: of conscience in him or fatherly impulse in him when
Speaker 5: he's braiding his daughter's hair and sending her off to school.
Speaker 5: You know, my opinion is probably he doesn't love as
Speaker 5: the rest of us love, and so the feeling he
Speaker 5: has for that kid isn't what we would have for
Speaker 5: our own kids. And so I think that he is
Speaker 5: simply maintaining a facade that he knows he needs to
Speaker 5: maintain so that he can act on these other overwhelming
Speaker 5: urges that he gets. Sometimes a time, they get them
Speaker 5: at different time, they get them for different reasons. But
Speaker 5: he knows it's going to come back, and he knows
Speaker 5: he's going to kill again, but he can't do it
Speaker 5: if he doesn't uphold this facade and this act of
Speaker 5: being a father or being you know, a carpenter or
Speaker 5: whatever it is that gives him the cloak of you know,
Speaker 5: humanness the rest of us, or that it's just natural
Speaker 5: for the rest of us. And so I think that
Speaker 5: all of those aspects of him to me, and this
Speaker 5: is only my opinion to me or act.
Speaker 1: At eleven forty five am Central Time on December two,
Speaker 1: twenty twelve, a Texas State trooper arrived at the home
Speaker 1: of Heidie Keys and there just minutes after his death.
Speaker 1: He told her that her son was dead. She put
Speaker 1: her head down and asked if she could pray for
Speaker 1: a moment. She walked to the corner of her living
Speaker 1: room and stood silently with her head down. And as
Speaker 1: she stood there in deafening stillness, several people from a
Speaker 1: neighboring house met the trooper at the door. They were
Speaker 1: her church family. They came to comfort her. The trooper
Speaker 1: informed Heidi that at the time he didn't have the
Speaker 1: details of Israel's death and gave her contact information for
Speaker 1: a deputy who could give her those details. Before leaving,
Speaker 1: the trooper told her not to worry that Sarah would
Speaker 1: be well taken care of. You see, when Keyes was
Speaker 1: arrested in Texas, Sarah ended up with Heidie Keys, and
Speaker 1: it seems no one immediately informed Tammy. In fact, she
Speaker 1: only discovered that is was arrested when her son, James,
Speaker 1: covered on the news. Two days later. James, who was
Speaker 1: only nineteen at the time, frantically called the FBI. He
Speaker 1: called himself James Keys and claimed to be Israel's son.
Speaker 1: He said he saw news piece on TV where his
Speaker 1: dad had been arrested in Texas for the disappearance of
Speaker 1: some anthe Konig. According to FBI files, he was hysterical
Speaker 1: and incoherent on this call. He wanted to know who
Speaker 1: had his sister, because his dad had custody of her
Speaker 1: and nobody had contacted him, and his mother knew nothing
Speaker 1: of the arrest or the whereabouts of her daughter. The
Speaker 1: answering agent advised that they could not release any information
Speaker 1: on keys or the whereabouts of his daughter, and so
Speaker 1: James hung up. Shortly after, Tammy's sister, who also lived
Speaker 1: in Anchorage, called the FBI to say that she had
Speaker 1: no specific information about the case, but was deeply concerned
Speaker 1: for Sarah's safety. She said that she had talked with
Speaker 1: James and Tammy, who said that Israel had taken Sarah
Speaker 1: to Texas for a family wedding. According to FBI files,
Speaker 1: she was very cooperative and just wanted someone to let
Speaker 1: her know that her niece was all right. At the
Speaker 1: time of Isza's arrest, Tammy had fallen back into drugs
Speaker 1: and alcohol and was living in a hotel room in
Speaker 1: Port Angelus, Washington. Tammy says it was when her sister
Speaker 1: called with the news of Izza's arrest that she fully
Speaker 1: snapped out of it. The news shook her to her core,
Speaker 1: but also probably saved her life. She had to be
Speaker 1: strong for Sarah, for James for friends and family and
Speaker 1: that meant being sober. Tammy immediately made arrangements to travel
Speaker 1: to Texas to pick up Sarah from Heidie Keys. It
Speaker 1: would be the first time she ever meet Heidi, and
Speaker 1: she immediately wanted to get Sarah back to Washington. She
Speaker 1: didn't want Sarah being raised in the extremest environment is
Speaker 1: had been raised in. Despite Heidi's many failed attempts to
Speaker 1: keep Sarah in Texas, within that same week, Tammy and
Speaker 1: Sarah returned to Washington and moved in short term with
Speaker 1: her mother. Tammy began to clean up her act, and
Speaker 1: the FBI made their first unannounced visit. All in all,
Speaker 1: Tammy would meet with the FBI on more than six occasions,
Speaker 1: talking for close to fifteen hours. In those interviews, Tammy
Speaker 1: shared every piece of information about his and his travels
Speaker 1: that she could remember, and every document from their time
Speaker 1: together that she'd held on to. She gave them travel receipts,
Speaker 1: old phone records, contact info for friends, acquaintances, and family,
Speaker 1: and even searched for their old shared computer, which she
Speaker 1: never could find. She also updated them with the conversation
Speaker 1: she was having with Kristin Heidie Keys. James and Sarah.
Speaker 1: While he was in jail, Tammy and Sarah kept in
Speaker 1: contact with Is weekly. Tammy was still having a hard
Speaker 1: time reconciling the Is she knew from the Israel she
Speaker 1: was hearing about from the FBI. She was, however, the
Speaker 1: only member of her inner circle who truly believed Is
Speaker 1: was guilty. She did her best to shield Sarah from
Speaker 1: knowing the extent of Isza's crimes, though, and Is repeatedly
Speaker 1: stressed that Tammy should change Sarah's last name, that she
Speaker 1: needed to be protected from him and his crimes. He
Speaker 1: also stressed that things would only get worse, and he
Speaker 1: hoped to Sammy and Sarah could forgive him for what
Speaker 1: he'd done. As more and more information continued to leak out,
Speaker 1: he worried that none of his friends and family would
Speaker 1: be able to forgive him once they heard about the
Speaker 1: extent of his crimes. Throughout these weekly conversations, Tammy consistently
Speaker 1: tried to get Is to open up about his other crimes,
Speaker 1: to get him to share the details to be a
Speaker 1: trusted confidant, but he never did. Tammy said that when
Speaker 1: Is did eventually kill himself, she wasn't surprised. She was
Speaker 1: only surprised that it hadn't happened sooner. It was something
Speaker 1: that worried her throughout his entire incarceration, and she often
Speaker 1: made a point to tell him to fight for his life,
Speaker 1: that he could still be a father to Sarah from
Speaker 1: behind bars. She said that she could tell he was
Speaker 1: depressed in his final days, that while he was always
Speaker 1: upbeat on the phone with Sarah, his tone would take
Speaker 1: a noticeable turn with her. She said, Keys was not
Speaker 1: a man who could be caged. Prior to his death,
Speaker 1: he had been trying to get in touch with her
Speaker 1: and Sarah for about a month, and it was only
Speaker 1: several days after he finally did that he killed himself.
Speaker 1: Around the time of his death, his final letter to
Speaker 1: Sarah arrived. In it, he said that he would always
Speaker 1: love her. Tammy knew it was a goodbye letter, and
Speaker 1: at the age of eleven, after her father being in
Speaker 1: jail for close to a year, Tammy had to explain
Speaker 1: to Sarah that Izz had committed suicide. On December tenth,
Speaker 1: twenty thirteen, the Keys family flew from Texas to Deer Park,
Speaker 1: Washington to hold a funeral for Is. They had initially
Speaker 1: wanted to bury him in Nea Bay, but Tammy refused
Speaker 1: to accept his body there. In fact, Tammy refused to
Speaker 1: attend the funeral. Altogether, only Heidi Keys, her four daughters,
Speaker 1: and three sons in law attended. It was presided over
Speaker 1: by the Church of Wells pastor Jake Gardner, who held
Speaker 1: no punches in his sermon for Israel Keys.
Speaker 4: He is not in a better place. He is in
Speaker 4: a place of eternal torment. Israel rejected the Gospel, and
Speaker 4: thus the outcome of his life is this tragic story.
Speaker 4: It was eleven fifty one am December second, twenty twelve,
Speaker 4: this past Sunday, a week ago from today, that I
Speaker 4: got the call Tanner, son in law, to Miss Heidie Keys,
Speaker 4: the mother of Israel Keys, telling me the news that
Speaker 4: Israel had died. He committed suicide. Do I believe this
Speaker 4: man is in heaven?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 4: Does his family that is present believe that this man
Speaker 4: is in heaven?
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 4: All of his crimes running through his head all the time,
Speaker 4: the Lord pled with this man are running through his
Speaker 4: head and he can't get it out for eternity. And
Speaker 4: if you look at these timelines online chronologically looking upon
Speaker 4: his his murders and looking upon the different crimes of
Speaker 4: this man. You'll see that he had flown to Chicago
Speaker 4: with a pistol and with a silencer, the weapon of
Speaker 4: choice for the murder of the Courier family. He didn't
Speaker 4: have the Courier family in mind at the time, but
Speaker 4: he had the murder in his mind. He had the
Speaker 4: exact plot in his mind what he wanted to do.
Speaker 4: It was all there, It was all in his heart.
Speaker 4: Israel hardened, declaring his atheism, declaring his atheism steadfastly. He
Speaker 4: broke down weeping at the hearing of the testimony of
Speaker 4: the grace of God and the soul of his sister.
Speaker 4: He did not repent. God would have saved Israel Keys.
Speaker 4: I'm sure that God wanted to save this man. This
Speaker 4: man was not only a murderer of others, but a
Speaker 4: murderer of himself.
Speaker 1: Last of all, to this day, the grave marker commemorating
Speaker 1: is his life and death has his name misspelled. While
Speaker 1: Tammy wanted to accept neither is his body nor his
Speaker 1: family in the Abay, she did want to hold a
Speaker 1: memorial service of her own, mostly to help Sarah say
Speaker 1: goodbye and begin healing. She invited one of Isa's sisters
Speaker 1: to help her plan it, But after a month of
Speaker 1: planning and rescheduling it several times, mostly due to media interference,
Speaker 1: Tammy gave up on the idea entirely. The media had
Speaker 1: become a real challenge for Tammy and her own recovery
Speaker 1: and healing. They were constantly bombarding her and her family
Speaker 1: with phone calls and unannounced visits, and she was trying
Speaker 1: desperately to protect Sarah and James from it all. All
Speaker 1: the while, even after his death, Izza's attorneys continued harassing Tammy,
Speaker 1: trying to bully her out of talking to the FBI.
Speaker 1: In a time of mourning and life shattering confusion, Tammy
Speaker 1: was struggling for air, but she continued being strong for
Speaker 1: James and Sarah, and she continued talking to the FBI.
Speaker 1: She wanted to help the families of Izza's victims. She
Speaker 1: wanted to try to bring them closure. She wanted to
Speaker 1: do everything she could to help the FBI identify his
Speaker 1: missing victims. She became a bit of an advocate for
Speaker 1: these families, even as she struggled to advocate for her own.
Speaker 1: She even offered to listen to Israel's confession tapes. So
Speaker 1: one afternoon James drove her to the local FBI field office,
Speaker 1: and the two looked over his suicide letter and listened
Speaker 1: to his interviews. She was searching for clues for AHA
Speaker 1: moments for Israel lying. She listened for hours until she
Speaker 1: became physically sick from listening. She couldn't take hearing him
Speaker 1: discuss the murders in Monotone. The tape showed her aside
Speaker 1: of is she never knew existed, one she didn't want
Speaker 1: to know existed. His laughter disgusted her, and after several
Speaker 1: hours she couldn't take it any more and left. She
Speaker 1: hasn't been able to listen to them since she was
Speaker 1: able to alert authorities to a trip Is took to
Speaker 1: Callville in December of two thousand and one. It was
Speaker 1: a trip she was suspicious of at the time for
Speaker 1: very different reasons, but in hindsight, she's almost certain he
Speaker 1: used that trip to murder someone. Shortly after his death,
Speaker 1: Kristin sold the house she shared with Is and moved
Speaker 1: to Washington. She's kept in touch with Tammy, but little
Speaker 1: else is known about her life. She's done her best
Speaker 1: to stay private and move forward with life. As far
Speaker 1: as I can tell, apart from informal texts and calls
Speaker 1: with Agent Godin. Kristin never gave a formal interview regarding Keys.
Speaker 1: As Tammy and her family continued to grieve, heal, and
Speaker 1: navigate the chaos of Israel's crimes and death, they were
Speaker 1: dealt with another terrible tragedy. On June thirtieth, less than
Speaker 1: eight months after Key's suicide, Tammy's son James killed himself.
Speaker 1: He was only twenty years old. Following is His' arrest,
Speaker 1: James battled severe depression and anxiety. Is had been a
Speaker 1: father figure to him, and his suicide deeply affected James
Speaker 1: and this This was all too much for Tammy. Several
Speaker 1: months later, around what would have been James's twenty first birthday,
Speaker 1: Tammy checked herself into rehab. She stayed through the holidays,
Speaker 1: and in twenty fourteen started working on getting her life
Speaker 1: back together and creating a safe space for her and Sarah.
Speaker 1: Her community rallied around her, but it was Tammy's strength
Speaker 1: and drive to overcome the unfathomable hardships she and Sarah
Speaker 1: had faced that finally got her clean and sober. Throughout
Speaker 1: her recovery, Tammy wrote open letters to James, sharing her progress,
Speaker 1: her healing, memorializing him, and showing her growth as both
Speaker 1: a person and a parent.
Speaker 6: Hi, son, It's again been a while since I've been
Speaker 6: on here. I just had to tell you that You've
Speaker 6: been on my mind constantly for the last two weeks straight.
Speaker 6: I'm doing my best to adapt to this earth without
Speaker 6: you on it. I think I'm doing a good job.
Speaker 6: I'm doing my best not to dishonor you are, Sarah.
Speaker 6: I miss you so much, and each day that gets
Speaker 6: closer to your birthday brings me more mixed emotions. Above all,
Speaker 6: I'm proud of the man you was the day you departed.
Speaker 6: I just wish I could have had one last hub,
Speaker 6: one last chance to tell you I love you and
Speaker 6: how proud I am of you. I'm not gonna go,
Speaker 6: and whish I could have talked to you and changed
Speaker 6: your mind. I honestly believe that your departure from Earth
Speaker 6: was predetermined to be that day and that way. Of course,
Speaker 6: I'd changed a lot of the past if I could,
Speaker 6: but I can't. All I can do is ask your forgiveness.
Speaker 6: As far as my shortcomings as a parent and role
Speaker 6: model goes, I do believe you learn from my mistakes
Speaker 6: as well as your own. I wonder how tired you
Speaker 6: really was. I wonder how much pain and stress overall
Speaker 6: you was really feeling to make such a choice. I
Speaker 6: haven't put a whole lot of emphasis that you chose
Speaker 6: to in your own life. I'm beginning to, and that's
Speaker 6: what kind of questions come up. I wonder what could
Speaker 6: have prevented that fatal choice. I struggle not to be
Speaker 6: judgmental or upset with you over it. What's done is done.
Speaker 6: I would, however, like to help a person prevent making
Speaker 6: that choice for themselves if I can. I want to
Speaker 6: be a better parent, a better person, a better woman.
Speaker 6: I'm coming to own and accept my inner strength, and
Speaker 6: your departure has brought me to a strength and a
Speaker 6: faith in God I thought i'd never need. I want
Speaker 6: you to know that I'm determined to take all the
Speaker 6: adversities Sarah and I have suffered and carve out a beautiful, happy,
Speaker 6: prosperous life for us. I'm sorry your death had to
Speaker 6: bring me to that choice, and I couldn't make it
Speaker 6: while you was alive, so you could benefit from the
Speaker 6: human being I'm involving into. Yes, I have a lot
Speaker 6: of guilt and remorse. But I also have qualities that
Speaker 6: are admirable. Through all the ups and downs in life,
Speaker 6: I've never once given up. I have an uncanny ability
Speaker 6: to start my life completely over from scratch, without a penny,
Speaker 6: and usually with people counting me out. I have a
Speaker 6: positive outlook on life. I'm learning to be accountable for
Speaker 6: my actions. I see the good in all people. I'm
Speaker 6: grateful for what I have, and I look forward to
Speaker 6: the next chapter in life. You was and are an
Speaker 6: amazing person, and I'm humbled and grateful to be your mother.
Speaker 6: I would honestly do it all over again, even knowing
Speaker 6: the outcome, knowing the amazing adventures and learning in store
Speaker 6: in closing. Knowing you and parenting you has truly made
Speaker 6: me a better person. Thank you. May you truly rest
Speaker 6: in peace. You deserve all Heaven's best love always. Hey, baby,
Speaker 6: you've been on my mind a lot. I miss you
Speaker 6: so much. I can't believe you're gone. Things are going
Speaker 6: really great for me and Sarah. I'm pretty excited about
Speaker 6: where things are headed. We move into a brand new
Speaker 6: apartment on the twenty fifth. I'm clean and serene. Today
Speaker 6: is bittersweet. I've been having really awesome, happy, and precious
Speaker 6: memories of you lately, more than usual. Sarah came home
Speaker 6: for good yesterday, and nobody can appreciate how amazing it is.
Speaker 6: Besides you and your little sister. You would truly be
Speaker 6: proud of me and excited to have your mom back, happier, healthier,
Speaker 6: and stronger than ever. I miss our witty banter, our
Speaker 6: inside jokes and goofy memories. I haven't had a good,
Speaker 6: heartbreaking cry over you for several months. Looks like today
Speaker 6: is the day. Rest easy, son. I miss everything about
Speaker 6: you right now. I'm filled with sadness, loneliness, and emptiness
Speaker 6: and total gratitude and pride and fulfillment at the same
Speaker 6: time for having all those special memories. I'm still adjusting
Speaker 6: to this world without your physical presence. I should fill
Speaker 6: your spirit though, Love you forever.
Speaker 1: Sarah is seventeen now. She still struggles reconciling who her
Speaker 1: father was with the childhood he gave her. Until his arrest,
Speaker 1: is was her only constant, her only role model, and
Speaker 1: following his arrest at just ten and eleven years old,
Speaker 1: she had to face the truth about him and then
Speaker 1: his suicide. While her mother struggled with addiction, and her
Speaker 1: brother struggled with and eventually succumbed to depression. Sarah faced
Speaker 1: more heartache in two years than most of us will
Speaker 1: face in a lifetime. Tammy has told Sarah that when
Speaker 1: she's ready, she'll tell her everything about is and his crimes.
Speaker 1: That has warned her that, but once she's heard the truth,
Speaker 1: she can never unhear it. Sarah has decided she's not ready,
Speaker 1: and Tammy's giving her as much time as she needs.
Speaker 1: I often see people say that the only way to
Speaker 1: punish Israel is to make sure his teenage daughter knows
Speaker 1: the extent of his crimes and what a terrible person
Speaker 1: he is. I find it disheartening. Israel Keys is dead,
Speaker 1: he can't be punished. Punishing his daughter doesn't change a thing.
Speaker 1: She's an innocent child who will have to face who
Speaker 1: he was and what he's done for the rest of
Speaker 1: her life. She will learn to question everything about her childhood,
Speaker 1: about her feelings, about her love, about love in general.
Speaker 1: Tammy now questions everything about her relationship with Isz. She
Speaker 1: finds herself looking for signs, events, stories, anything that could
Speaker 1: have been a warning or now a clue. She's continued
Speaker 1: to work closely with the FBI and wants to do
Speaker 1: everything she can to help identify his missing victims and
Speaker 1: bring peace to their families. She says that she still
Speaker 1: has love forz in a strange way that she has
Speaker 1: trouble describing. She loves and respects him for taking care
Speaker 1: of Sarah when she couldn't. She thanks him for giving
Speaker 1: Sarah the life she could not. Tammy and Sarah's story
Speaker 1: has stuck with me throughout the entirety of this podcast.
Speaker 1: It wouldn't be a stretch to say I think about
Speaker 1: them every single day. I read the things Tammy wrote
Speaker 1: about Jane in her recovery. I think about the long
Speaker 1: road ahead that both of them have and healing from this.
Speaker 1: And I guess my hope for Sarah is that she
Speaker 1: can compartmentalize who her father was, That she can, one day,
Speaker 1: when she's ready, face what he did, but that she
Speaker 1: can also find solace in who he was to her,
Speaker 1: That she can mourn her father without feeling guilt, that
Speaker 1: she never has to worry that who he was is
Speaker 1: in some way part of her, That she can recognize
Speaker 1: that his darkness was a disease, one that cannot move her,
Speaker 1: and I am thankful that her mother is one of
Speaker 1: the strongest and most compassionate people on this planet, despite
Speaker 1: the many, many hardships they have both been through.
Speaker 3: Any of your depart sure, I sat beside you're in
Speaker 3: the kitchen floor. You said darkness has no virtue of it,
Speaker 3: so it's all in darkness. What is lost is last
Speaker 3: you were tired night afoor. I once crawled along the
Speaker 3: ruins far, and you are above the timber line where
Speaker 3: the mountains stood be for us like bright, narrow wide.
Speaker 3: The sun was far cold and turned your wide hair gold.
Speaker 3: I don't watch a voice to move me. I don't
Speaker 3: want to be cracked open. I don't want the knoye
Speaker 3: to loosen in my throat, to place to land my
Speaker 3: down rabbit hole. I'm not pair of face same time,
Speaker 3: like a dog always barking a ghost. You know I
Speaker 3: don't go easy. I never made amidst of your disease.
Speaker 3: I hatched my bets with that face, so I ever
Speaker 3: loved to except for one honey, y'all. I know old
Speaker 3: bestowing stones two void. I don't want a bar. I
Speaker 3: don't want to be cracked. I don't want the broken
Speaker 3: head eye flicker, the bright flies, the silver side of
Speaker 3: the moon behind you. When I find to drift with
Speaker 3: books and from.
Speaker 7: Swim poorly, yok and I joke with him. We only
Speaker 7: spoke and nevers those who fels born.
Speaker 3: Boss, you know we only need trust alive double rives.
Speaker 3: When I find you, I w should buy to be
Speaker 3: s