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Speaker 1: You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking
Speaker 1: killers in true crime history and the authors that have
Speaker 1: written about them Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker DTK. Every
Speaker 1: week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
Speaker 1: infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your
Speaker 1: host journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Speaker 5: Good Evening, a young bride drowns in her bathtub. Her
Speaker 5: husband of four months is accused of murder. What happened
Speaker 5: in their tiny suburban bathroom and why it was never
Speaker 5: result A compelling true crime drama based on exclusive new information,
Speaker 5: Submerged exposes hidden angles of the case that captivated and
Speaker 5: divided an ordinary American community to re part two families
Speaker 5: and tested the criminal justice system, compelled by conscience and curiosity.
Speaker 5: Former Cincinnati Inquirer reporter Janice morse Heisel, who covered the
Speaker 5: sag of Ryan and Sarah Widmer from the start, returns
Speaker 5: ten years later to dig deep to tell the untold story.
Speaker 5: Dozens of interviews, six thousand pages of trial transcripts, and
Speaker 5: previously unrevealed records such as Ryan's first written statement about
Speaker 5: Sarah's death, attorney's notes and trial preparation documents, Ryan's personal
Speaker 5: journal notes, and correspondents, more than a thousand pages of
Speaker 5: police notes and reports. Submerged will draw you into the
Speaker 5: depths of a stranger than fiction story that you will
Speaker 5: ponder long after turning the final page. The book that
Speaker 5: we're featuring this evening is Submerged, Ryan Widmer, his drowned Bride,
Speaker 5: and the justice system, with my special guest journalist and author,
Speaker 5: Janice Heisel. Welcome to the program, and thank you very
Speaker 5: much for agreeing to this interview. It's Janice Heisel.
Speaker 2: Thanks Dan, it's good to be on the show.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much. Incredible story and already I had
Speaker 5: not known of this case. I see that this is
Speaker 5: an incredible following right from the very beginning of this
Speaker 5: case in two thousand and eight, yes believe.
Speaker 2: It's in yeah, ten years, more than ten now.
Speaker 5: Absolutely, Let's talk about where this crime is and story
Speaker 5: is centered, which is Cincinnati, Ohio. And when you talk
Speaker 5: about the Hopewell Valley subdivision and little bit of some
Speaker 5: of the communities that are involved in this set the
Speaker 5: stage for where the community that this occurred where in Cincinnati,
Speaker 5: and tell us a little bit about this Hopeful Valley subdivision.
Speaker 2: Sure, okay, So Hopeful Valley is kind of an ordinary
Speaker 2: mostly vinyl and brick houses, you know, valued around maybe
Speaker 2: one hundred thousand, two hundred thousand, kind of you know,
Speaker 2: nice starter homes. And Ryan and Sarah actually had built
Speaker 2: a house there together before they got married, or actually
Speaker 2: they bought a house that was already constructed. And one
Speaker 2: of the reasons that I became so enthralled with this
Speaker 2: case is that this subdivision is near where I live,
Speaker 2: which is right about forty five minutes north of Cincinnati, Ohio.
Speaker 2: It's kind of a smallish town, and a lot of
Speaker 2: people started to start to wonder whether quote unquote small
Speaker 2: town justice was at work here. Because it was a
Speaker 2: smaller police department, they only had one detective to investigate
Speaker 2: this unusual death. And that was part of what kind
Speaker 2: of wrapped everybody into this. This is a weird way
Speaker 2: to die, drowning in a bathtub age twenty four. How
Speaker 2: does this happen when there's no sign of drugs in
Speaker 2: her body or around the scene, There was no sign
Speaker 2: of an intruder. Husband must have done it. Seemed kind
Speaker 2: of like an open and shut case right from the start.
Speaker 2: But the more people found out about this, the less
Speaker 2: that seemed true in some people's minds.
Speaker 5: Now, tell us you were a news reporter, tell us
Speaker 5: who you were working for at that time, and the
Speaker 5: website as well as you worked on, and tell us
Speaker 5: how you heard first of this story and what you
Speaker 5: did actually hear about it.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yes, So I worked for this Sinnati Enquirer and
Speaker 2: the website is known as Cincinnati dot com, and it
Speaker 2: was my job to keep tabs on everything happening in
Speaker 2: a couple of counties in the northern suburbs, both Butler
Speaker 2: and Warren Counties. Warren County is where this particular incident
Speaker 2: occurred and happens to be where I live, So I
Speaker 2: remember hearing as part of my job, I would make
Speaker 2: regular checks with various sources, police, coroner's office, secretaries, people
Speaker 2: like that, oftentimes by phone because my territory was so big.
Speaker 2: But I remember hearing a little bit of scuttle but
Speaker 2: just there was something weird that happened down the road,
Speaker 2: but nobody would really come out and tell me exactly
Speaker 2: what this was at first, and then finally we heard
Speaker 2: that maybe it was a drowning, and if I recall correctly,
Speaker 2: one of my editors said, well, let's just wait and
Speaker 2: see what happens. And then sure enough, then next day
Speaker 2: after we first heard about it, is when this press
Speaker 2: conference was called and the media just flocked to this
Speaker 2: small courthouse so we could hear what was this mysterious case,
Speaker 2: because it wasn't very often that you would hear about
Speaker 2: any kind of incident of a big consequence in this
Speaker 2: little town. In fact, this was the first quote unquote
Speaker 2: fresh homicide in a decade in this community.
Speaker 5: Now you talk about right away in that press conference
Speaker 5: that Rachel Hutzel, prosecutor and Lieutenant Jeff Brayley. So what's
Speaker 5: surprising about this to you and other people that are
Speaker 5: seasoned reporters. What's unusual about this? And what is the
Speaker 5: content of what they have to say in this who
Speaker 5: is tell us about those.
Speaker 2: Well, one of the unusual thing was I remember in
Speaker 2: the press release there was a statement along the lines of,
Speaker 2: you know, we won't be answering questions, you know, until
Speaker 2: way after this press conference, or something to that effect.
Speaker 2: That so kind of like, if you wanted to get
Speaker 2: this news, you had to physically be there. I remember
Speaker 2: something along those lines. And what was very unusual about
Speaker 2: the content of the press conference was the prosecutor and
Speaker 2: the detective Jeff Brayley, both kind of concurred that there
Speaker 2: was evidence of a violent struggle at this scene. And
Speaker 2: that was the thing that left everybody really wondering what
Speaker 2: was this mystery evidence? Now? I was kind of known
Speaker 2: for being that annoying reporter at the press conference who
Speaker 2: wouldn't let the public officials off very easily. So I
Speaker 2: kept grilling them and saying, well, how did you you know?
Speaker 2: Was this something obvious? Was it at the scene? Well,
Speaker 2: it was something that required the skills of the coroner
Speaker 2: to reveal. And I thought, wow, So it wasn't something
Speaker 2: on the outside of the body. It was something on
Speaker 2: the inside of the body. What could that be? And
Speaker 2: that was the thing that made everybody wonder really deeply
Speaker 2: about what is this mystery evidence of a violent struggle.
Speaker 5: Now, as you are clamoring and others are clamoring for information,
Speaker 5: the prosecution is going ahead. So who are these members
Speaker 5: of the prosecution and tell us some of the players
Speaker 5: that line up soon after investigative wise and prosecution and
Speaker 5: defense wise.
Speaker 2: Okay, So again, because of my role in being what
Speaker 2: we call cops and courts report or covering these suburban communities,
Speaker 2: it was my job to know some of the movers
Speaker 2: and shakers, the people who tended to make headlines when
Speaker 2: there were headlines to be made. Again, some of these
Speaker 2: communities and a small and not a lot of really
Speaker 2: big shocking crime going on. So Rachel Hudzell, the county prosecutor,
Speaker 2: she was someone who she really kind of catapulted up
Speaker 2: the ranks in the county government. It was kind of unusual,
Speaker 2: I hate to say this, the kind of the good
Speaker 2: old boy network for a female. She became the first
Speaker 2: female prosecutor in this county, and a lot of people
Speaker 2: thought that she had a lot of ambitions to become
Speaker 2: a judge, and she eventually did become a judge. Now,
Speaker 2: I had a very good relationship, I would say, a
Speaker 2: very good working relationship with both Rachel Hutzell and with
Speaker 2: the lead investigator, Jeff Brailey. Now, neither of them were
Speaker 2: the kind of people that I would you know, go
Speaker 2: out with socially, and I think this was a professional relationship.
Speaker 2: They were my trusted sources. However, in Rachel's case, she
Speaker 2: played a lot of things very close to the vest,
Speaker 2: and I had a hard time ever getting to really
Speaker 2: go off the record and speak candidly to me. But Jeff,
Speaker 2: on the other hand, he was somebody who, even though
Speaker 2: he worked for a very small police department, he was
Speaker 2: somebody who I had the impression and so did many
Speaker 2: other people, that he kind of liked being in the
Speaker 2: limelight when he could be, and he was actually a
Speaker 2: very good interview and I considered our relationship to be
Speaker 2: pretty what I would call symbiotic, meaning, Hey, I need stories,
Speaker 2: he wants to be in them and give good quotes.
Speaker 2: So that's a good relationship when you're a news reporter.
Speaker 2: So Jeff also it was kind of interesting he was
Speaker 2: a minister on the side, and in fact, his role
Speaker 2: as being a minister was what led him to be
Speaker 2: on the police department. As odd as that might found.
Speaker 2: Jeff had been the chaplain for the local fire department,
Speaker 2: and that kind of his responsibilities morphed over the years
Speaker 2: until he became part of the police department, and there
Speaker 2: are a whole lot of questions that were raised, especially later.
Speaker 2: I didn't know him very well until he ascended higher
Speaker 2: into the ranks about how that happened, So it was
Speaker 2: kind of an interesting progression from his career.
Speaker 5: Tell us, as you write in the book, a little
Speaker 5: bit about Ryan Widmer and also Sarah Stewart, tell us
Speaker 5: about how they met, but first a little bit about
Speaker 5: their backgrounds, who they were.
Speaker 2: Okay, so I had no idea who these people were,
Speaker 2: and in fact, most people had no idea who these
Speaker 2: people were until after all of this brought them out
Speaker 2: into the public eye, unwittingly, of course. So I'll start
Speaker 2: with Sarah. He actually seemed like the kind of person
Speaker 2: I would have loved to have known, because I tend
Speaker 2: to be kind of a little bit of a social
Speaker 2: butterfly and state my opinion fairly strongly when I have one,
Speaker 2: and it sounded like she was like that as well.
Speaker 2: It was just sad to me that I never got
Speaker 2: to know her, and the more I spoke to people,
Speaker 2: the more I had wished I had had the opportunity
Speaker 2: to know her. She was described as being very feisty,
Speaker 2: but also had a little bit of sweetness tor the
Speaker 2: kind of person who would make cookies for someone who
Speaker 2: was sick or at Christmas time or whatever. Just a
Speaker 2: sweet touch tour but don't cross her kind of thing.
Speaker 2: And she grew up in a town called Trenton near Trenton, Ohio,
Speaker 2: where there's like the Miller Brewery. It's kind of very
Speaker 2: blue collar area. And likewise, Ryan Ryan Widmer, who later
Speaker 2: became her husband, he grew up in a very blue
Speaker 2: collar community as well, but his was a larger blue
Speaker 2: collar community known as Cole Raine Township. And this is
Speaker 2: on the west side of Cincinnati. And Ryan was a
Speaker 2: very talented athlete. From what I've heard, he was the
Speaker 2: kind of guy after I got to talk to him,
Speaker 2: that doesn't like to kind of toot his own horn
Speaker 2: very much. But a lot of people thought he was
Speaker 2: a pretty talented athlete. He ended up going to college
Speaker 2: and the playing baseball in college, and that is where
Speaker 2: he met a man named Chris Kissed and Chris was
Speaker 2: his college roommate, and Chris was married to a woman
Speaker 2: named Dana Well. Dana ends up working with Sarah Stewart
Speaker 2: at a dental office, and Sarah and Dana became very
Speaker 2: good friends. So Dana and her husband Chris thought, you
Speaker 2: know what, their personalities, Ryan and Sarah's personalities are very
Speaker 2: similar to ours, where Ryan's kind of reserved and laid back,
Speaker 2: and you know, Sarah's more feisty and likewise, the same
Speaker 2: could be said of Chris and Dana, and they thought, well,
Speaker 2: since we get along so well, hmm, they're both single,
Speaker 2: why don't we play matchmaker? So they kind of arranged
Speaker 2: a safe double date, so to speak, in case it
Speaker 2: didn't work out. It was that the four of them
Speaker 2: went out to have a few drinks and some appetizers
Speaker 2: kind of thing, and they were amazed to see how
Speaker 2: well that Ryan and Sarah really hit it off from
Speaker 2: the start.
Speaker 5: Right now, you talk about that, it was a whirlwind
Speaker 5: of romance. It was soon after that he was he
Speaker 5: was proposing for marriage, and that was a very interesting,
Speaker 5: I guess, and very romantic story as well. Tell us
Speaker 5: a little bit about this marriage and what the families
Speaker 5: thought of each other, a little bit about the families
Speaker 5: some of the members, but what each thought of this union.
Speaker 2: Well, from what I understand, the families, you know, they
Speaker 2: didn't they didn't know each other super well at the
Speaker 2: time that this uple got married, but they seemed to
Speaker 2: get along just fine from everything that I had had
Speaker 2: gleaned from interviews after the fact. However, you start. There
Speaker 2: were some records that I was able to obtain later
Speaker 2: that started to give me some insight that Sarah's mother
Speaker 2: may not have been entirely thrilled with the idea of
Speaker 2: her daughter marrying Ryan, And it didn't seem like there
Speaker 2: was anything personality wise or relationship wise that she didn't like,
Speaker 2: but rather, according to the documents that I saw, she
Speaker 2: expressed misgivings that her daughter was making more money than
Speaker 2: her husband to be and kind of had a belief,
Speaker 2: I think that the man should be the breadwinner. So,
Speaker 2: as far as I could tell, though, the families got
Speaker 2: along pretty well, in fact very well. There was never
Speaker 2: any no one ever brought to my attention any kind
Speaker 2: of friction between these families, and it seemed to be
Speaker 2: two big, happy families melding together as a result of
Speaker 2: this romantic wedding, and you know, people were thrilled. The
Speaker 2: wedding pictures show a lot of exuberance and joy, and
Speaker 2: it was really sad later on for me to get
Speaker 2: to see those and know what the eventual outcome would be.
Speaker 2: Only four months after that wedding day.
Speaker 5: Yeah, tell us about the nine to one one call
Speaker 5: from Ryan Windler August eleventh of that year. What was
Speaker 5: what was said?
Speaker 2: Well, on this nine one one call.
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Speaker 2: First thing that is stated by Ryan Widmer, after the
Speaker 2: dispatcher answers nine to one one, what is your emergency?
Speaker 2: Ryan says, my wife fall asleep in the bathtub, and
Speaker 2: I think she's dead. That particular sentence and the fact
Speaker 2: that it was the first thing that he said, automatically
Speaker 2: set off a bunch of alarm bells, so to speak,
Speaker 2: questions as to why would you offer a quote unquote
Speaker 2: explanation or excuse instead of giving more information you heard
Speaker 2: the excuse being that she fell asleep in the bathtub,
Speaker 2: and what a seemingly preposterous thing to say. So, but
Speaker 2: then it might not seem as preposterous if you're a
Speaker 2: reporter like I am, and you start to talk to
Speaker 2: friends and they tell you that they were concerned about
Speaker 2: Sarah's health, that she would fall asleep in odd places.
Speaker 2: They would say, what kind of twenty four year old
Speaker 2: woman falls asleep at a tailgate party in the daytime?
Speaker 2: And also in a crowded football stadium, and Dana kissed
Speaker 2: the coworker who ended up playing matchmaker. She even justified
Speaker 2: on the witness stand that Sarah would go into a
Speaker 2: darkened room to try to ease her headaches. She would
Speaker 2: get these terrible headaches and see spots. And the day
Speaker 2: that she died, Dana was no longer working there. But
Speaker 2: that very day everyone at the dental office said that
Speaker 2: Sarah didn't feel well, that she had this odd pain
Speaker 2: in the back of her neck, and that her stomach
Speaker 2: was upset. And look, some people might see that as
Speaker 2: being those are kind of everyday complaints, maybe not anything sinister. However,
Speaker 2: there are a lot of people who are familiar with seizures,
Speaker 2: and they say people who have seizures can develop what's
Speaker 2: called an aura, or a collection of symptoms that let
Speaker 2: the person know, hey, I'm about to have a seizure.
Speaker 2: Now they become familiar with this aura. But what if
Speaker 2: this was a first time incident. Maybe the things that
Speaker 2: were happening to Sarah were many seizures, all of those
Speaker 2: sleepiness incidents and the headaches and whatnot. So again, what
Speaker 2: seemed like maybe a little of a clear cut case
Speaker 2: for some people. If you start to layer onto that
Speaker 2: the facts that were coming out about Sarah, maybe.
Speaker 5: Not what were some of the things you talk about
Speaker 5: first responders at a scene, and many many cases that
Speaker 5: we talk about on true murder, it really is first
Speaker 5: responders that question the veracity of that person's account of
Speaker 5: what happened, and based on some of the evidence that's
Speaker 5: right before their eyes. What the first responders find in
Speaker 5: this case, what are some of their questions?
Speaker 2: Well, one of these things that became almost like a
Speaker 2: mantra during Ryan Widmer's court case was her hair was wet,
Speaker 2: her body seemed dry. Also, the scene seemed surprisingly dry
Speaker 2: for a person who had reportedly just been pulled out
Speaker 2: of a bathtub filled with water. Again, however, as odd
Speaker 2: as all of that sounds, and as suspicious as all
Speaker 2: that sounds, what if there's an explanation for that? Ryan
Speaker 2: Widmer would later provide that explanation, and his lawyers would
Speaker 2: through some documents that I saw, But that was a
Speaker 2: fact that didn't come out until the case went to trial.
Speaker 2: About the dryness of the scene, They kept that under
Speaker 2: wrapped pretty well.
Speaker 5: Let's talk about what happens, because right away they put
Speaker 5: this case as you write is explode in the media.
Speaker 5: There's so much interest. You talk about Jess Ryan's bail
Speaker 5: being a million dollars, tell us what happens in that
Speaker 5: is he forced to stay in prison? What about the
Speaker 5: one million dollar bail? Tell us about that.
Speaker 2: Well, what was absolutely heartbreaking and to me, very touching, poignant,
Speaker 2: dramatic was at Ryan's first court hearing, members of Sarah's
Speaker 2: family were there and begging the judge to let him
Speaker 2: out so he could go to her funeral, so they
Speaker 2: could have a funeral for her. And that didn't happen.
Speaker 2: And then the next court appearance, very similar thing. You know,
Speaker 2: we have the brother of Sarah saying, you know, in
Speaker 2: our heart of hearts, I still remember this quote, in
Speaker 2: our heart of hearts, we don't think he did this.
Speaker 2: We don't believe he did this. That that really struck
Speaker 2: with me. It was a very touching and sad thing
Speaker 2: to have the brother, the only brother of this reported
Speaker 2: victim of homicide up there saying, hey, we want this
Speaker 2: guy out. We don't think he did it. And so
Speaker 2: eventually the bond did get released to about four hundred
Speaker 2: thousand if I recall correctly, which then was enough for
Speaker 2: the family to put together. You have to put together
Speaker 2: a ten percent of that and he was allowed out.
Speaker 2: But get this, he was released just a couple hours
Speaker 2: too late. They delayed the memorial service and they were
Speaker 2: trying to get him there, but he was released a
Speaker 2: couple hours too late to attend.
Speaker 5: Yeah, be sad, Yeah, absolutely. Now, what was the theory
Speaker 5: from Rachel Hutzel and the prosecution? What was there just
Speaker 5: their summary of what there was some mystery evidence as
Speaker 5: you write, it wasn't going to be revealed till that trial.
Speaker 5: But what was their basis? What did they assert?
Speaker 2: Well, when you say theory, that's kind of hard to
Speaker 2: pin down because the theories seemed to shift as the
Speaker 2: case for crust in court, which was very strange to
Speaker 2: me as a reporter. Usually I see the prosecution and
Speaker 2: the defense kind of dig their heels into this is
Speaker 2: our theory of the case. This is our version of
Speaker 2: what happened, And in this case there were changes that
Speaker 2: were kind of surprising that occurred. Now, the evidence that
Speaker 2: was referred to as being quote unquote evidence of a
Speaker 2: violent struggle. I write in my book that I remembered thinking, well,
Speaker 2: maybe her head was kind of like bashing and you
Speaker 2: couldn't see it because her hair covered up the damage,
Speaker 2: or you know, something like that. I thought was going
Speaker 2: to be something very very dramatic and clearcut undeniable. This
Speaker 2: guy is going straight to prison. Do not pass go,
Speaker 2: do not collect two hundred dollars if he was going
Speaker 2: to prison. But when it came out in court, the
Speaker 2: corner said that what he thought was evidence of a
Speaker 2: violent struggle was actually bleeding inside her neck and upper
Speaker 2: chest area. And he said he believed that there were
Speaker 2: actually two areas of bleeding. One that was attributable to
Speaker 2: a needle stick that the prosecute that the I'm sorry
Speaker 2: the paramedics made in her neck to try to start
Speaker 2: an IV. But the other part, he says, was most
Speaker 2: likely the result of force, somebody forcing her into the
Speaker 2: water by grabbing her in the neck slash chest area.
Speaker 2: Now the interesting thing though about that is it depends
Speaker 2: whose expert you believe. The defense put on an expert
Speaker 2: witness who is actually world renowned doctor Werner Spitz, and
Speaker 2: doctor Spits wrote what is considered to be the quote
Speaker 2: unquote bible of forensic death investigation, and he actually came
Speaker 2: in unbeknownst to the prosecution and did a second autopsy
Speaker 2: after the coroner's autopsy on Sarah Windmer. He said he
Speaker 2: didn't think there was any way to determine the manner
Speaker 2: of death. Now, a lot of people confuse manner of
Speaker 2: death and cause of death. In this case, the cause
Speaker 2: of death no one disputes is drowning. There was water
Speaker 2: in the lungs and that's the cause. But the manner
Speaker 2: was it accidental? Did she slip and fall, did she
Speaker 2: have a seizure, or was it homicide? Which is what
Speaker 2: that coroner ruled it. However, doctor Spitz said, wait a minute,
Speaker 2: not so fast. He believed remember that in area and
Speaker 2: the neck that I mentioned. He believed that all of
Speaker 2: the bleeding in that neck area was attributable to the
Speaker 2: attempt to save her life with that IV. That it
Speaker 2: was one area of bleeding, not too one caused the
Speaker 2: IV not too So that was a very interesting conflict.
Speaker 2: And there was actually no sign of trauma whatsoever on
Speaker 2: the outside of Sarah Whindmer's body, which was another very
Speaker 2: odd thing. Her nails, her elbows, her knuckles, her knees,
Speaker 2: no damage, no sign of struggle there. So I was
Speaker 2: kind of expecting you again something more dramatic, something bigger,
Speaker 2: other than this neck injury which is disputed and disputed
Speaker 2: by an expert that a lot of people would say
Speaker 2: was extremely credible. So again, which expert do you believe?
Speaker 5: You talk about how the credibility had written what they
Speaker 5: called the Forensic Bible, basically a very revered book on
Speaker 5: forensic procedures, and in his realm of expertise, so they
Speaker 5: landed to and you talk about the thousands of cases
Speaker 5: that he worked on. So his credibility did seem to,
Speaker 5: as you write in this book, seemed to favor the
Speaker 5: defense in that.
Speaker 2: Regard, right, And in contrast, the defense attorneys did eventually
Speaker 2: point out that the county corner didn't have board certification,
Speaker 2: so they're contrasting their guys credentials against the local guys credentials. However,
Speaker 2: it seems like that from the interviews that I did later,
Speaker 2: that maybe the forensic evidence didn't matter that much to
Speaker 2: the jurors.
Speaker 5: You also talk about, though, that that there was dramatic,
Speaker 5: dramatic things that the prosecution did, like bring in the
Speaker 5: entire tub into the courtroom and merely for dramatic effect.
Speaker 5: And you talked about some of the ways that they
Speaker 5: sort of bent the same information that someone else. Obviously,
Speaker 5: the defense contended tell us a little bit more about
Speaker 5: some of the issues that were in contention at this trial.
Speaker 2: Well, as I mentioned about the wet hair, dry body
Speaker 2: dry conditions. The prosecution's argument is, hey, that's all suspicious.
Speaker 2: My goodness, How in the world does it happen that
Speaker 2: a drowning victim has only her head wet and the
Speaker 2: rest of her body seems dry. Within a few minutes
Speaker 2: of the nine one one call was when the original
Speaker 2: first responders arrived at police in paramedics, but they found
Speaker 2: the police officers found no evidence of cleanup. They went
Speaker 2: to the laundry. They found that there were no drying,
Speaker 2: freshly dried towels in the dryer, for instance, that neither
Speaker 2: of the car's engines or hoods were hot, indicating that
Speaker 2: maybe that the evidence was taken away from the scene,
Speaker 2: so there were no wet towels found anywhere. So the
Speaker 2: defense version of this is this was a silent slipping
Speaker 2: into the water, not a violent gas and that explains
Speaker 2: why there's not water splashed everywhere. If this is a
Speaker 2: violent struggle, as you contend, mister and Ms prosecutor, then
Speaker 2: water would have been splashed everywhere. Correct. So there are
Speaker 2: so many things about this case that you look at
Speaker 2: it one way and you go, wow, that looks really bad,
Speaker 2: But then you hear the explanation and you start to wonder, wow,
Speaker 2: that sounds like that's actually plausible as well. Having been
Speaker 2: a reporter for our gosh over twenty years, I would
Speaker 2: see defense lawyers make arguments that I would call bs on.
Speaker 2: I would like no. But in that case, that made
Speaker 2: a lot of sense to me, and I think to
Speaker 2: a lot of people who followed this case closely. So
Speaker 2: that was, you know, again the wetness versus the dryness.
Speaker 2: As you mentioned about the bathtub being brought into the courtroom,
Speaker 2: it was very interesting to me as I began to
Speaker 2: research this book. I didn't know until I researched the
Speaker 2: book that the defense knew that it the seizure of
Speaker 2: the bathtub by the authorities was actually probably not legal,
Speaker 2: but they chose not to fight that at the time
Speaker 2: because they didn't want the headline in the newspaper or
Speaker 2: online to say defense tries to hide evidence, and so
Speaker 2: it was actually a tactical decision for the defense to
Speaker 2: not fight the inclusion of the bathtub. But as I
Speaker 2: bring out in my book, I really believe that that
Speaker 2: bathtub just became such a tangible, visible piece of evidence
Speaker 2: that the jurors would play over in their head what
Speaker 2: happened in that tub, what happened in that tub? And
Speaker 2: without that bathtub being there, pretty much staring at people,
Speaker 2: if a bathtub can stare that, they may not have
Speaker 2: felt as strongly as they did about the handprints in
Speaker 2: the bathtub. And I know you know about that the
Speaker 2: finger streaks that were found in the bathtub, and the
Speaker 2: inclusion of the bathtub and the finger streaks were very
Speaker 2: much disputed. Later the finger streaks were said to be
Speaker 2: Sarah's as you supposedly clawed out of the tub, and
Speaker 2: then the argument is what she clawed or attacker instead
Speaker 2: of clawing at the tub. So you can, again, you
Speaker 2: can look at this two ways.
Speaker 5: What I meant with my assertion was that it seemed
Speaker 5: that the kind of ploise that say it the defense
Speaker 5: would would use and say that it was a vigorous defense,
Speaker 5: or some of the kinds of things that the prosecution
Speaker 5: put forth trying to string certain seemingly insignificant things together
Speaker 5: as sort of circumstantial evidence, and so it seemed like
Speaker 5: that again with the dramatic bathtub. A lot of the
Speaker 5: things seemed to be ploise that I would usually see
Speaker 5: defense attorneys using, not the other way around.
Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting that you make that observation, because at
Speaker 2: one point the prosecution actually tried to get the trial
Speaker 2: moved out of the county, a change venue, which most
Speaker 2: of the people I've talked to and in my own experience,
Speaker 2: that is again something that the defense usually does. And
Speaker 2: from what I understand, they believe that public opinion was
Speaker 2: against them in this particular case, and so that was
Speaker 2: why they were trying to get the case moved out
Speaker 2: of the county. But that didn't happen.
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Speaker 5: Now, at this first trial, again it seems like that
Speaker 5: normally they would have an issue not having any kind
Speaker 5: of real motive. So what was the prosecution at trial?
Speaker 5: What was there, what was their theory about the motive,
Speaker 5: and what was the evidence they put forth towards that
Speaker 5: if any.
Speaker 2: Well, they the only glimmer and I mean just this
Speaker 2: tiny sliver of some information that hinted at a motive.
Speaker 2: There were two things they put out. This information that
Speaker 2: Sarah Whimber had applied for a life insurance policy. However,
Speaker 2: there was no life insurance in place at the time
Speaker 2: of her death, so there was no fat life insurance
Speaker 2: check that he was going to collect. If if he had,
Speaker 2: would you know, kill her and then get away with
Speaker 2: it sort of thing the other and but again that
Speaker 2: was kind of it seemed to me to be fairly
Speaker 2: well neutralized by the defense because that was their argument that,
Speaker 2: you know, how is this guy going to benefit from
Speaker 2: her desk that you know she actually applied for it,
Speaker 2: And there was some testimony that Ryan was putting pressure
Speaker 2: on her to get this life insurance. However, this didn't
Speaker 2: come out in trial, but I thought it was interesting.
Speaker 2: I found out later that the couple had met with
Speaker 2: a financial planner, and most people who've ever done that
Speaker 2: note that, you know, planning for unfortunately one person or
Speaker 2: the other dying is an important thing to take care of,
Speaker 2: and it was a benefit available through her work, so
Speaker 2: that life insurance never took effect. The other thing that
Speaker 2: was raised again as a kind of a sliver of
Speaker 2: a motive during the case was Sarah's mother testified that
Speaker 2: she was out with her daughter once and that Ryan
Speaker 2: called her immediately after she made a purchase. I believe
Speaker 2: that Target. I don't remember if Sarah's mother said Target,
Speaker 2: but I believe Ryan told me that later, and friends
Speaker 2: told me this later, and kind of, according to the mother,
Speaker 2: gave her crap over. You know, hey, what do you
Speaker 2: do and spend one hundred bucks at Target? You need
Speaker 2: a stene hundred bucks at Target. But that was couched
Speaker 2: as being a joke that a lot of people joke.
Speaker 2: A lot of couples or you know, women who like
Speaker 2: toff or whatever, say hey, I can't get out of
Speaker 2: Charget with I'll spend one hundred dollars. So again, was
Speaker 2: it him being controlling him, you know, kind of monitoring
Speaker 2: her financial transactions, or was it instead just an innocent joke. Now,
Speaker 2: people who knew Ryan insisted that that was it was
Speaker 2: a joke, that Ryan was kind of a goofball personality
Speaker 2: and that that you know, Sarah would say jump and
Speaker 2: he would say how high he that? And she made
Speaker 2: more money than he did. So again they're saying, this
Speaker 2: makes zero sense that she makes more money and he's
Speaker 2: coming down on her for expenditures. So that was the
Speaker 2: only you know, they weren't able to really bring out
Speaker 2: much of any motive. Now they're not required under the
Speaker 2: law the prosecutions that required to prove motive, but it
Speaker 2: sure helps the jury to justify a verdict.
Speaker 5: Right, And there was any witness to testify to any
Speaker 5: temper anger, any kind of violent behavior, disposition, anybody from work.
Speaker 5: They talked to everybody at where he worked, where Ryan worked, anything.
Speaker 2: From that Actually quite the opposite. They went way back
Speaker 2: into Ryan's childhood and I think they found a kid
Speaker 2: who knew Ryan when he was ten and said he
Speaker 2: was upset at a baseball game or something. But he
Speaker 2: was described as being one of the most passive and
Speaker 2: laid back that I heard that term laid back many
Speaker 2: many times as I did my interviews and as well
Speaker 2: as you know, the testimony of people who knew Ryan
Speaker 2: and Sarah would say that about Ryan, that he was
Speaker 2: very laid back, that Sarah would say, I want to
Speaker 2: do this, and he would just acquiesce because it kind
Speaker 2: of wasn't worth to him, are you In Plus, he,
Speaker 2: according to everybody, doated on her and just wanted to
Speaker 2: please her was one of his primary missions in life. Yes, yes, dear, yes, dear.
Speaker 2: So quite a different portrayal from the people who knew
Speaker 2: Ryan than people who would look at that target expenditure,
Speaker 2: for example, and assume that he was a control freak.
Speaker 5: Now, his attorney, which is interesting because this will be
Speaker 5: very interesting I think near the end of the end
Speaker 5: of this book. In this interview, his attorney was an
Speaker 5: attorney named Charles Ridger, and yeah, Ritger really believed in
Speaker 5: his which I thought was again unusual. You don't hear
Speaker 5: at a lawyer and attorney defending somebody really pushing to
Speaker 5: find out the truthfulness of their client story.
Speaker 2: I just thought, Yes, in fact, Charlie Rickers with somebody
Speaker 2: just like the many of the other players in this case,
Speaker 2: that I knew at least somewhat outside the confines of
Speaker 2: this case before the case began, and I had the
Speaker 2: type of rapport with Charlie where I had the confidence
Speaker 2: that he actually he was a great interview because he
Speaker 2: would sort of tell me some things off the record
Speaker 2: to help me understand context. And as a reporter, you
Speaker 2: always appreciate that. But one of the problems was when
Speaker 2: this case actually went before it went to trial, there
Speaker 2: was a gag order issued, so it prevented Charlie from
Speaker 2: even talking to me or anybody else off the record
Speaker 2: at that point. None of the players, Rachel Hustle, the police,
Speaker 2: everything was clamped down at one point. But Charlie to
Speaker 2: this day has very strongly defended Ryan, and in fact,
Speaker 2: I was part of a when I did the launch
Speaker 2: of my book last year, he spoke out and said
Speaker 2: that he really strongly believes that some of the evidence
Speaker 2: that didn't come out during the trial should be released.
Speaker 2: So that was kind of to this day he stands
Speaker 2: by Ryan.
Speaker 5: You talk about something I thought was surprised, Well, I
Speaker 5: found it surprising that and I think a lot of
Speaker 5: people might have this attitude in some way, at least
Speaker 5: a bias anyway about Ryan taking the stand at that
Speaker 5: first trial in his own defense. What was your attitude?
Speaker 5: What are other people's attitude and what happened in that regard?
Speaker 2: Well, of course, anytime a defendant takes the witness stand
Speaker 2: in his or her own defense, everybody wants to hear
Speaker 2: what this person has to say. And early on in
Speaker 2: my career I think I had an attitude similar to
Speaker 2: probably most people in the general public, which is, you know, hey,
Speaker 2: if I were accused of something I didn't do it,
Speaker 2: I nothing would stop me from getting up there proclaiming
Speaker 2: my innocence. I would be stomping my beaten, pounding my fists,
Speaker 2: and talking about how innocent I am. However, I did
Speaker 2: later come to learn that even the most passionate defense
Speaker 2: from a defendant, a lot of times a jury may
Speaker 2: not tend to even care about that very much, because
Speaker 2: there does seem to be in a lot of jurors
Speaker 2: minds a tendency to think, well, this person if they
Speaker 2: sound polished because they're rehearsed, if they don't sound polished
Speaker 2: and they stutter and stammer and they are upset and crying. Well,
Speaker 2: that's because they're guilty, and that's their guilty conscience showing
Speaker 2: up on the witness stand. So a lot of people
Speaker 2: were wanting to hear because there were a lot of missing,
Speaker 2: a lot of gaps in the whole storyline that it
Speaker 2: seemed like the lawyers were kind of trying to hint
Speaker 2: at through their questions, but what was Ryan's actual story?
Speaker 2: And when he didn't take the witness stand, there were
Speaker 2: quite a few people who said that it was because
Speaker 2: he certainly must have something to hide, and I wasn't
Speaker 2: so sure of that. I thought that was quite possible,
Speaker 2: but I also thought it was possible that there might
Speaker 2: be some other explanation, and later I learned that there was.
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Speaker 5: we are at the culmination of the first trial. Because
Speaker 5: there are as a story does not end at the
Speaker 5: first trial or the appeals, and certainly we've alluded to
Speaker 5: that in the introduction. So tell us what happens in
Speaker 5: this first trial, what did the what did you expect,
Speaker 5: what did the public expect? And then what happened? And
Speaker 5: tell us about the the charge that murder guilty of murder,
Speaker 5: but the aggravated murder. Tell us about that distinction.
Speaker 2: Okay, So the jury in this case deliberated by local
Speaker 2: standards quite a long time, about twenty three hours before
Speaker 2: they came back with their the decision. And actually for
Speaker 2: anybody who was in that courtroom at the moment that
Speaker 2: the verdicts were read. It was one of the most visceral,
Speaker 2: powerful experiences I will never ever forget, and I know
Speaker 2: anyone else who is there would agree with it, because
Speaker 2: originally the courtroom was actually packed with Ryan's supporters, and
Speaker 2: in fact, I remember trying really hard to find anybody
Speaker 2: who was there for Sarah, which made me kind of said.
Speaker 2: But a lot of the people that were friends with
Speaker 2: Ryan and Sarah were very supportive of Ryan. They thought
Speaker 2: he should be acquitted. And there were two charges that
Speaker 2: were available to the jury to decide. One of them
Speaker 2: was aggravated murder. Now aggravated murder under the State of
Speaker 2: Ohio law says that the person had some premeditation, even
Speaker 2: if it was only for a few moments. Doesn't have
Speaker 2: to be planned months in advance. And I've got poison
Speaker 2: or whatever the person you know it is. You know,
Speaker 2: you have an opportunity to kind of stop yourself, and
Speaker 2: then you don't. There's some premeditation, you think for at
Speaker 2: least some time. It could be a momentary premeditation that
Speaker 2: you purposely kill another person. So that particular charge, the
Speaker 2: first verdict was on that charge and it was not guilty.
Speaker 2: The courtroom actually erupted in tears, like sighs of relief,
Speaker 2: and the judge put out his hand like stop to
Speaker 2: shush everyone, and then everybody was absolutely I remember my
Speaker 2: hands were shaking so hard I could hardly type. It
Speaker 2: was a very strange thing because I didn't have any
Speaker 2: dog in this hunt. I didn't per se, you know,
Speaker 2: have any you know, feel like, oh, Ryan Woodmer should
Speaker 2: be convicted or when we should be acquitted. I was
Speaker 2: kind of puzzled and didn't really know what direction the
Speaker 2: jury would go because I found myself kind of going
Speaker 2: back back and forth like did he or didn't he?
Speaker 2: It was. It was a very I was on the edge,
Speaker 2: and I think a lot of people were that way.
Speaker 2: And I also think though that because of that back
Speaker 2: and forth back and forth, that there were a lot
Speaker 2: of people who said, Okay, well maybe he did it,
Speaker 2: but they didn't prove it, so that that was a
Speaker 2: pretty strong sentiment among some people in the community. In fact,
Speaker 2: there was a poll uh later that that did show
Speaker 2: that most people thought Ryan should not have been convicted.
Speaker 2: So when that second verdict was read and that it
Speaker 2: was guilty, the tears in elation that were literally a
Speaker 2: moment or two earlier just changed to this complete anguish.
Speaker 2: People were wailing and crying and that, you know, somebody
Speaker 2: shouted out small justice, and Ryan's uncle slammed open the
Speaker 2: courtroom door and like just burst out of the court
Speaker 2: in disgust, convict an innocent man, and there was just
Speaker 2: all these you know, it was an absolute cauldron of
Speaker 2: emotion boiling over. It was I get chills even right
Speaker 2: now telling you about it, just being there in that
Speaker 2: room with those emotions flip flopping like a light switch.
Speaker 2: Unabsolutely unforgettable. And then when Ryan Widmer had the opportunity
Speaker 2: to address the court, it was absolute. People were just
Speaker 2: completely like hit in the gut. And that's how he appeared.
Speaker 2: He doubled over and then he said, I did not
Speaker 2: do this. I love He said it in present tense,
Speaker 2: which struck me. I love my wife almost as the
Speaker 2: so he was in denial that she was dead. That's
Speaker 2: how I interpreted it, and that's how some other people
Speaker 2: interpreted it as well. I love my wife. I would
Speaker 2: never hurt her. And he was tearful and shaking his head, no, no, no, again.
Speaker 2: It was a courtroom verdicts are often emotional, but to
Speaker 2: have absolutely elation one moment and then flip flop into
Speaker 2: this anguish on the part of the majority of the
Speaker 2: people who were spectating there, that's pretty much unheard of
Speaker 2: in my experience. It was absolutely incredible, unforgettable, sad, and
Speaker 2: it was even hard, like I said, for me to
Speaker 2: take notes and to send a message to my editor
Speaker 2: and say, Okay, put this out on Twitter. Here's what happened.
Speaker 5: Yeah, tell us about the media and public response after this,
Speaker 5: and then tell us about this John C. Juror and
Speaker 5: what almost happens in terms of jury misconduct.
Speaker 2: Well, there, the newspaper did a poll that asked people
Speaker 2: do you think that the jury got it right? And
Speaker 2: a large percentage of the people said no, they thought
Speaker 2: that based on what was reported from this case. Now,
Speaker 2: you know, you hear a lot of criticisms of media,
Speaker 2: and a lot of those criticisms are founded. I agree
Speaker 2: with that, but in this case, one of the things
Speaker 2: that was sort of unusual, at least locally and at
Speaker 2: that time. Remember this was you know, almost eleven years ago. Now,
Speaker 2: actually take it back. The trial was in two thousand
Speaker 2: and nine, so it was ten years ago this year
Speaker 2: that the trial happened, and jas had changed a lot
Speaker 2: in these ten years. Back then, it was a really
Speaker 2: big deal that one of the local TV stations started
Speaker 2: a live blog. So this guy in the court was
Speaker 2: sitting there typing in testimony a lot of verbatim, and
Speaker 2: he did it almost like a cult following, so a
Speaker 2: lot of people. It was the first time I can
Speaker 2: remember in our, you know, area of the country, that
Speaker 2: that people had the opportunity to kind of real time
Speaker 2: follow a local case like this. And it was interesting
Speaker 2: because the judge forbade any live TV broadcast, so this
Speaker 2: was kind of a way around that, right, So there
Speaker 2: was one one TV camera in the courtroom and that
Speaker 2: it was by Dateline NBC, and they were required to
Speaker 2: share their footage with all the other local media each day,
Speaker 2: but they were not allowed to broadcast live. So what
Speaker 2: happens after that is shortly after this verdict, one of
Speaker 2: the jurors, a guy named John first initial C, comes
Speaker 2: forward and says, something's been really bothering me. He actually
Speaker 2: kept a journal that he later shared with the court
Speaker 2: about his misgivings about the verdict and the way it happened.
Speaker 2: He actually revealed he ended up faxing Charlie Rickers, that
Speaker 2: defense lawyer, and saying, there's something I'd like to talk
Speaker 2: to you about about the case. If you want to
Speaker 2: talk to me, you know, give me a call back.
Speaker 2: So he ends up talking the lawyer, of course, talks
Speaker 2: to the guy and he comes out and says, well,
Speaker 2: you know that instruction where the judges tell the jury
Speaker 2: that you're only allowed to decide this case based on
Speaker 2: what is presented in court, Well, I'm kind of concerned
Speaker 2: that maybe that rule was violated because some of the
Speaker 2: jurors did home experiments on how long it takes a
Speaker 2: body to air dry. Remember I told you about the
Speaker 2: duryness of Sarah's body as observed. People wanted to know
Speaker 2: how long does it take a body to air dry?
Speaker 2: And so literally some of them would shower and and
Speaker 2: either allow themselves to drip dry, and reportedly at least
Speaker 2: one der ended up on the carpet, lying down and
Speaker 2: trying to see how long it takes to dry. To
Speaker 2: see if Ryan's story and all of the events recorded
Speaker 2: on this nine one one call tracked with the dryness
Speaker 2: of the body as observed by those first responders when
Speaker 2: they first got there, and so one of the that
Speaker 2: this is pretty much an absolute no no. And although
Speaker 2: the prosecution fought mightily and there were months of court
Speaker 2: battles that ensued after this. At least five hundred pages
Speaker 2: of documents were filed after this, and there were affidavits
Speaker 2: from some jurors saying that yes, this changed my vote,
Speaker 2: and other jurors saying, look, this was such a small
Speaker 2: part of the deliberations it didn't really even matter. And
Speaker 2: eventually though, this resulted in the verdict being thrown out.
Speaker 2: So now Ryan Woodmer is back in the position of
Speaker 2: being supposedly innocent until proven guilt. He's just now a
Speaker 2: suspect again. He's no longer convicted. He ends up he
Speaker 2: was in prisoner for these first few months after the verdict,
Speaker 2: and then he's released on bond. And guess what the
Speaker 2: family had to pony up the money again because the
Speaker 2: first bond is now I'm all and void and over with,
Speaker 2: and they're just out that money. A lot of people
Speaker 2: don't know that that when you post bond, you just
Speaker 2: lose that money. It can't be applied to something again later,
Speaker 2: and you don't get that money back if the guy
Speaker 2: shows up for trial. For example, it's just payment period.
Speaker 2: So then you know, some people thought, well, to you,
Speaker 2: will the prosecution even try to go to a second trial?
Speaker 2: And they were, oh, yes, certainly, we're going for a
Speaker 2: second trial. So that's what happened next.
Speaker 5: Now what was the improvements in that second trial? And
Speaker 5: just to say, when we've talked about the money, we'll
Speaker 5: just get ahead to how much money Gary and Kim
Speaker 5: and the family spent. But Gary, long distance, long distant
Speaker 5: father of Ryan, pulling up quite a bit, took out
Speaker 5: his retirement funds. Kim, his wife, was very supportive, even
Speaker 5: though she was not his stepmom at all. She didn't
Speaker 5: even know Ryan. You talk about five hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 5: after this by the second trial.
Speaker 2: Yes, eventually that is what the family estimated that they
Speaker 2: ended up spending in legal fees in you know, expert witnesses,
Speaker 2: you know, bond, paying electronic monitoring fees for the ankle
Speaker 2: bracelet that when he was released on bond, he originally
Speaker 2: had to have that, and there was a pretty heftc
Speaker 2: associated with that. So yeah, there were a lot of
Speaker 2: costs that this family absorbed and they're just kind of
Speaker 2: an ordinary family. Although I will say Ryan's mother. She
Speaker 2: was kind of a remarkable lady in my opinion. I
Speaker 2: didn't get to know her very well, but god, she
Speaker 2: ended up. She started out as a secretary at this
Speaker 2: one company, ends up becoming the vice president of marketing
Speaker 2: for an international company. So that's pretty impressive from a
Speaker 2: person who starts as a secretary. That's a person who
Speaker 2: has some hutzpah. And she fought mightily and absolutely defended
Speaker 2: her son. She just said, you know, I don't care.
Speaker 2: She lived by our standards here. It was a pretty,
Speaker 2: very very nice home in one of the most upscale
Speaker 2: subdivisions in the region. It was over three hundred thousand
Speaker 2: dollars home. She re mortgaged that she got dipped into
Speaker 2: her own retirement and depleted all of it. She was
Speaker 2: willing to risk everything for her son because she absolutely
Speaker 2: believed in him. What was very interesting too to me
Speaker 2: was the fact that even though Ryan's parents were divorced,
Speaker 2: both his parents described Ryan as being their favorite son.
Speaker 2: They said there was a sweetness to Ryan, which doesn't
Speaker 2: seem to track with convicted killer. So they both thought
Speaker 2: he was a very sweet person. So but then again,
Speaker 2: we've all seen people who seem to be very sweet
Speaker 2: on one side, and then on the other there's something
Speaker 2: very sinister. So you know, again I didn't know these
Speaker 2: people at all, but I'm just telling you this is
Speaker 2: what was relayed to me. And I did find it
Speaker 2: to be significant that both parents, even though they had
Speaker 2: three children, for whatever reason, Ryan just endeared themselves to people.
Speaker 2: And he was kind of again a goofball kind of
Speaker 2: person who happy, go lucky, goofball personality that people who
Speaker 2: when they got to know him did seem to really
Speaker 2: like him.
Speaker 5: Right. You talk about this second trial, and of course
Speaker 5: the prosecution as opportunities to learn from the first trout,
Speaker 5: but so does the defense. There are some new additions
Speaker 5: obviously new attorneys for the second trial. The prosecution stays
Speaker 5: essentially the same. It's interesting, I thought, and maybe you
Speaker 5: could tell us your take on it being there if
Speaker 5: the prosecution seemed to have be bolstering a much stronger
Speaker 5: case in the second trial with experts like doctor Smile.
Speaker 2: Well, doctor Smile was actually one of the defense experts
Speaker 2: and he actually satisfied in the first trial. Yeah, Now,
Speaker 2: what was interesting. Definitely both sides up their game in
Speaker 2: this second trial, but it based on the comments that
Speaker 2: were being made by quote unquote the legal express memory
Speaker 2: told you about that gag order. Well, when there's a
Speaker 2: gag order, as a reporter, you're kind of forced to
Speaker 2: go to some outside sources. For example, a former county
Speaker 2: prosecutor who was in the Cincinnati area. A lot of
Speaker 2: us relied on him for commentary. There were other attorneys
Speaker 2: who were actually attending the trial who ended up providing
Speaker 2: some interviews for interview star reporters. And it was the
Speaker 2: second trial involved a new legal team, and a lot
Speaker 2: of people wondered why that happened. Well, part of it
Speaker 2: is because it's kind of, you know, in some ways
Speaker 2: it's hard to kind of second guess your own work.
Speaker 2: But I think that the trial actually just took a
Speaker 2: huge toll. In fact, I know it did on Charlie
Speaker 2: Rickers's health. Even he fervently believed in Ryan's innocence and
Speaker 2: felt awful that he had somehow failed Ryan with that
Speaker 2: guilty verdict, and then when they were able to get
Speaker 2: that very overturned, he fell like, Okay, let's let someone
Speaker 2: else have a crack at this. I think that was
Speaker 2: the consensus of pretty much everybody involved on Ryan's side
Speaker 2: of it. So they the new set of lawyers, three lawyers,
Speaker 2: went you know, full on it tack mode against the
Speaker 2: emergency responders. They really picked apart every single document, every mistake,
Speaker 2: every any little anything that just didn't seem consistent or
Speaker 2: seemed sloppy. They were hammering home those points. So and
Speaker 2: the prosecution, though, they saw some of the things that
Speaker 2: the and I know that they were following live blogs
Speaker 2: and they were following the comments from the public, and
Speaker 2: so that enabled them to kind of tighten up some
Speaker 2: things that they were doing. For example, I believe that
Speaker 2: they got a different in fact, I know they got
Speaker 2: a different expert witness to talk about whether Sarah could
Speaker 2: have fallen asleep. And this was a person then who
Speaker 2: could talk not just about the alleged falling asleep as
Speaker 2: being preposterous, but about some other possible scenarios and an
Speaker 2: expert who could address not just the alleged falling asleep.
Speaker 2: Although again, the defense, I will say, never alleged that
Speaker 2: Sarah fell asleep. They just said that was Ryan's supposition,
Speaker 2: that was his theory, his way of perceiving what happened. Again,
Speaker 2: if you believe that he's making a cover story for murder,
Speaker 2: that's one thing, or you might believe what the defense says,
Speaker 2: which is that he just perceived that she had possibly
Speaker 2: fallen asleep, because that's what she did. She fell asleep
Speaker 2: all the time. So both sides did tighten up their
Speaker 2: game quite a bit in that second trial, but it
Speaker 2: actually got very heated and very contentious in there. It
Speaker 2: was a quite different nature, and I think that anybody
Speaker 2: who saw the two trials, it was very, very different
Speaker 2: in character. It was a lot more contentious.
Speaker 5: You say, the defense has the three attorneys and you
Speaker 5: talk about Attorney Ehrenstein being eloquent basically compared to the prosecution,
Speaker 5: which was view What was your estimation and other people's,
Speaker 5: you know, court watchers estimation of what might happen in
Speaker 5: this case as opposed to the first one. What thought
Speaker 5: was the difference and what was the possibility the outcome
Speaker 5: in people's minds.
Speaker 2: According to the experts that we were all interviewing, the
Speaker 2: consensus seemed to be that the prosecution was kind of
Speaker 2: on its heels a lot of the times, you know,
Speaker 2: even when as you know, the prosecution presents there of
Speaker 2: its first and then the defense gets to present their witnesses.
Speaker 2: So during the prosecution's case, the defense was really scoring
Speaker 2: a lot of points by those attack mode that I
Speaker 2: was describing. Their attack mode was just really pretty strong.
Speaker 2: It started to create a lot of doubt about the
Speaker 2: perhaps competency and or you know how observant some of
Speaker 2: these people really were. Things along those lines, just creating
Speaker 2: a lot of doubt, which is their job to poke
Speaker 2: holes in the prosecution's theory of what happened here. And
Speaker 2: the consensus was that maybe Ryan Woodmer would come out
Speaker 2: of this with a not guilty verdict, but that didn't happen.
Speaker 5: Tell us about the verdict and the response again, you
Speaker 5: said the first time was surreal, So tell us what
Speaker 5: happens in the second time. And we really haven't spoken
Speaker 5: about other than Ryan. Tell us more about Ryan's response
Speaker 5: in this second trial.
Speaker 2: Well, the second trial ended after over thirty hours of
Speaker 2: deliberations with a hungry because under the law, the jurors
Speaker 2: in a case like this have to decide unanimously either
Speaker 2: guilty or not guilty. If they cannot get everyone to agree,
Speaker 2: then it's a hungury. And guess what a third drill
Speaker 2: comes along, possibly or the prosecution could decide, Hey, I'm
Speaker 2: throwing up my hands, you know, maybe getting this person
Speaker 2: a plea deal or whatever. Now what happened here was
Speaker 2: a lot of people in the community were I like
Speaker 2: to use the term windmred out. They were exhausted by
Speaker 2: the emotional rollercoaster of this case, and people followed it
Speaker 2: super closely, very very closely. And Ryan's reaction in this
Speaker 2: case he just said, well, obviously he didn't really say
Speaker 2: a whole lot at the end of this one, but
Speaker 2: some reporters caught him as he was walking away from
Speaker 2: the courthouse and he said, well, obviously I should have
Speaker 2: found not guilty. But I think that in his mind
Speaker 2: and in the mind of a lot of the supporters
Speaker 2: and lawyers, that they were getting closer. They went from
Speaker 2: a guilty verdict to at least a hungury with some
Speaker 2: more people you know, in his or his corner, so
Speaker 2: to speak, among the jurors. And there was a big
Speaker 2: dispute about how many jurors actually would have been in
Speaker 2: his you know, willing to vote not guilty, because there
Speaker 2: was no actual vote taken, and there was a lot
Speaker 2: of controversy and confusion over that. But what was very
Speaker 2: fascinating and very unusual several of the jurors that voted
Speaker 2: or would have voted if they had actually taken a vote,
Speaker 2: a final vote that would have voted not guilty. Came
Speaker 2: to the third trial, and they actually had provided affidavits
Speaker 2: that were trying to discourage the prosecution from proceeding because,
Speaker 2: in the words of Wonder quote, it was like they
Speaker 2: gave us a bunch of crap evidence and said, you
Speaker 2: figure this out, because, as I mentioned earlier, the prosecution's
Speaker 2: theory about what happened here they offered several different Well,
Speaker 2: it could have been this, it could have been that,
Speaker 2: could have been in the bathtub, the toilet sink. I mean,
Speaker 2: it went kind of all over, but then they ended
Speaker 2: up kind of settling on the bathtub. But still there
Speaker 2: were some jurors who said, oh, I think it happened
Speaker 2: in the toilet because only your head was wet, But
Speaker 2: there was no evidence presented about the toilet, which was
Speaker 2: so weird to me. How do you end up thinking that? Again,
Speaker 2: it was a very bizarre case in so.
Speaker 5: Many ways you talk about that, it looks for the
Speaker 5: defense that they're making headway. So the third trial they
Speaker 5: try to avoid a third trial, and they think that
Speaker 5: the prosecution can be pressured in certain ways. So there
Speaker 5: are a couple of strategies they do a couple attempts
Speaker 5: at things so that they can even avoid this third
Speaker 5: trial because they're obviously more confident. Tell us what happens
Speaker 5: with those motions and those strategies to do that, and
Speaker 5: then the third trial again the players that are for
Speaker 5: defense and for prosecution with this third trial.
Speaker 2: So one of the things that the defense complained about
Speaker 2: was they had learned during that second trial that Sarah
Speaker 2: Windmer had filled out a document at her work that
Speaker 2: said that she had a heart murmur when she was
Speaker 2: a child, And all the previous testimony was portraying her
Speaker 2: as being a relatively healthy twenty four year old woman
Speaker 2: with just some allergies and stuff like, no big deal.
Speaker 2: But then people wondered, ge, well, was this heart murmur
Speaker 2: something that could have played a role in her death.
Speaker 2: It actually later came out that a recommended follow up
Speaker 2: of that heart murmur, which was discovered when she was
Speaker 2: an infant, was never done. So again we have a
Speaker 2: bunch of question marks that can never be answered, like
Speaker 2: that one, did Sarah really have some kind of a
Speaker 2: heart issue because she was never If you don't have
Speaker 2: any kg a lot of heart issues are not a
Speaker 2: parent maybe with just a stethoscope for example, so it
Speaker 2: could be, you know, some could be. But again there
Speaker 2: were no specific tests ever done outside of it at
Speaker 2: one EKG when she was a child, and then the
Speaker 2: EKG that was done, which unfortunately she was what they
Speaker 2: call flatline. She never ever regained a pulse while the
Speaker 2: paramedics were trying to you know, work on her, other
Speaker 2: than of course the compressions they do on her chest
Speaker 2: during the CPR. So yeah, they did try to get
Speaker 2: some you know, say hey, look, you know, we don't
Speaker 2: believe because of these affidavits from these jurors that any
Speaker 2: jury could ever reach a verdict because of the state
Speaker 2: of the evidence here. There's just too many unanswered questions.
Speaker 2: But the judge didn't allow that. Then they also were
Speaker 2: trying to really attack that Lieutenant Detective Jeff Brayley that
Speaker 2: we mentioned at the very beginning of our talk today.
Speaker 2: A lot of information had come out about his background
Speaker 2: that raised questions about his credibility, but the judge just
Speaker 2: would not allow that into the trial. So another very
Speaker 2: interesting thing, and this was not something that the defense
Speaker 2: fought for, but rather the prosecution offered Ryan Widmer a
Speaker 2: plea deal, and I didn't know this until later, and
Speaker 2: he flat out turned it down. In fact, according to
Speaker 2: the people who were in the room with Ryan, when
Speaker 2: his lawyer his dad was there, I interviewed him, and
Speaker 2: the one lawyer was there, I interviewed him, and they
Speaker 2: said that the lawyer could barely get the words out. Hey,
Speaker 2: you know, hear me out. He's like, no, I'm not
Speaker 2: going to admit to something I didn't do. So some
Speaker 2: people would look at that as being compelling evidence that
Speaker 2: are not compelling evidence, that copelling fine, that perhaps Ryan
Speaker 2: Wimer is really innocent. But then other people could look
Speaker 2: at that and say, hmm, I wonder if he thought
Speaker 2: he could just outsmart everybody and beat this. So again,
Speaker 2: they're just about everything in this case. Everything that looks
Speaker 2: one way, you flip it over and you can look
Speaker 2: at it almost as compellingly the second way.
Speaker 5: We move ahead to February second, twenty and eleven. At
Speaker 5: this third trial, a promise of a mystery witness is
Speaker 5: out there, so everyone's intrigued, and it's a Jennifer Gene
Speaker 5: Crew tell us a little bit about this supposed witness
Speaker 5: and her testimony.
Speaker 2: Well, well, I've got to tell you, it created quite
Speaker 2: a lot of intrigue. When the prosecution, prior to this
Speaker 2: case going to the trial for a third time, filed
Speaker 2: a document that said that they had a new witness
Speaker 2: there was people were just rampant with speculation. A lot
Speaker 2: of people thought it was a jail house snitched and
Speaker 2: that that Ryan Woodmer had somehow admitted, you know what
Speaker 2: he was in prison or you know, before he got out,
Speaker 2: after that verdict was overturned, you know, admitted to somebody
Speaker 2: or somebody else was speculating that maybe was somebody in
Speaker 2: his family and you know that he confided in And
Speaker 2: as it turns out, they kept this identity secret until
Speaker 2: the trial. After the jury was actually selected and seated,
Speaker 2: there was a recess which then allowed the defense to
Speaker 2: check into the background of this witness, and they I
Speaker 2: later found out that they of course asked their client,
Speaker 2: who in the world could this be that, you know,
Speaker 2: the prosecution's alleging that you confessed to this person that
Speaker 2: you did this. He's like, I didn't confess, said no, boy,
Speaker 2: no one, what do you mean? And so this witness
Speaker 2: comes forward and says that, you know, she testified it
Speaker 2: during a phone call that she's at her home in Iowa,
Speaker 2: and that Ryan Woodmer admitted that he killed his wife,
Speaker 2: and he sounded drunk and upset. So the defense puts
Speaker 2: on a witness who had spoken to Ryan. Ryan had
Speaker 2: a phone called. Emails from across the country from a
Speaker 2: lot of these people are femal, and it makes it
Speaker 2: look like he's some kind of casanova, and that was
Speaker 2: how some of the local radio talk show hosts portrayed him.
Speaker 2: But as I got to know Ryan, he's pretty much
Speaker 2: I would not describe him that way. He again goofball
Speaker 2: personality is closer than casanova. So you know, this other
Speaker 2: woman was on the phone with him in a call
Speaker 2: that concluded six minutes before the phone call where he
Speaker 2: allegedly confessed, and he was, according to her, neither drunk
Speaker 2: nor upset. And then it comes out that this mystery
Speaker 2: witnessed actually was on methadone and had a history of
Speaker 2: some convictions for some minor offenses involving not being truthful,
Speaker 2: and so there were a lot of things that were
Speaker 2: raised as to her credibility, and the jurors that I
Speaker 2: spoke to universally told me they pretty much discounted everything
Speaker 2: she said they did not find her credible. And it
Speaker 2: was interesting to me though that if you don't find
Speaker 2: this person credible and it's being coubted that this is
Speaker 2: almost like the star witness, doesn't that make you doubt
Speaker 2: the entire prosecution's case. But that wasn't what happened.
Speaker 5: Tell us what happens at this verdict February fifteenth, two
Speaker 5: thousand and eleven.
Speaker 2: So actually we were already everybody was assuming and kind
Speaker 2: of preparing for an extra long deliberation because the trend
Speaker 2: was up. First trial twenty three hours of deliberations, second
Speaker 2: trial thirty hours, third trial. I'm putting my money on
Speaker 2: at least maybe forty hours because this was the longest
Speaker 2: trial yet, and each trial got longer and more complex,
Speaker 2: and I thought, you know, it's going to take them
Speaker 2: a long time to go through all this evidence, and
Speaker 2: you know, maybe they won't want reach decision for like
Speaker 2: forty hours. People were shocked when this story came back
Speaker 2: in twelve hours and it was guilty. People were absolutely shocked. Now,
Speaker 2: there were some people that believed this witness, or at
Speaker 2: least thought it was unsavory that that Ryan was having
Speaker 2: communication with these various women across the country and that
Speaker 2: that didn't look good and maybe he was having an
Speaker 2: affair with his wife or something like that was going
Speaker 2: on behind the scenes, and so that that started to
Speaker 2: fuel some more anti Widmer sentiment about Ryan Widmer. But
Speaker 2: it was just it was a very similar reaction to
Speaker 2: but there wasn't that same outburst that was that happened
Speaker 2: during that first trial. But Ryan responded again very similarly,
Speaker 2: shaking his head saying I didn't do this, you know,
Speaker 2: protesting his innocence, and he does to this day.
Speaker 5: Yes, incredible, Now there was there's a secret that you
Speaker 5: have in here that Ryan had a son and he
Speaker 5: had a relationship after his conviction and then well after
Speaker 5: his first conviction, i should say, while he was out
Speaker 5: on bond, and he has a son from this woman
Speaker 5: at that time they had a relationship. But you have
Speaker 5: the first other than Dateline, but you're the first reporter
Speaker 5: that was able to get an interview with Ryan. And
Speaker 5: so you described in the book how you set the
Speaker 5: parameters on how this interview is going to go. He's
Speaker 5: not going to set the rules. So what are the
Speaker 5: rules that you set before you were going to interview him?
Speaker 5: The grounds on which you were to interview him, what
Speaker 5: does he agree to and tell us just a little
Speaker 5: bit about that interview.
Speaker 2: Well, there weren't really a lot of rules or anything
Speaker 2: like that. I just basically said, look, the only thing
Speaker 2: I'm going to promise you is that I will tell
Speaker 2: your story more fully than Dateline. Dateline just gave him
Speaker 2: a little tiny snippet toward the end of a two
Speaker 2: hour special, and I just said, look, you know, I'm
Speaker 2: going to interview you. And I didn't really send any
Speaker 2: rules other than look, I'm going to ask you every
Speaker 2: question that I can within the time that the prison
Speaker 2: allows us. And it became very interesting to me. This
Speaker 2: was the first time that I really had a chance
Speaker 2: to talk to Ryan because of the gag order. I
Speaker 2: think I had said hello to him a couple of
Speaker 2: times during the course of all this. It was almost
Speaker 2: surreal because obviously Ryan was somebody I saw every day
Speaker 2: for days on end during all three trials, and he
Speaker 2: saw me every day for days on end during the
Speaker 2: three trials, but we were never allowed to talk until
Speaker 2: this moment when I'm in visiting with him in prison
Speaker 2: along with a photographer from the Inquirer. And one of
Speaker 2: the things that became apparent to me when you have
Speaker 2: one of those light bulb moments in life where you
Speaker 2: say aha. I had always wondered a little bit despite
Speaker 2: what I said about the fact that I know that
Speaker 2: there are valid reasons why someone might not testify, and
Speaker 2: there are also suspicious reasons why someone might not testify
Speaker 2: in his or her behalf. It became apparent to me
Speaker 2: during this interview why Ryan didn't testify. When he stated
Speaker 2: to me, you can't jump to a gun like they
Speaker 2: did with me, I knew what he meant, and it
Speaker 2: wasn't just that there were several things like that. There
Speaker 2: was like a pattern or speech with Ryan that made
Speaker 2: it clear to me that he just doesn't present super
Speaker 2: well and that that kind of odd sentence structure would
Speaker 2: make some jurors wonder about whether he was being honest. Perhaps,
Speaker 2: and with his permission, I said, Hey, I would like
Speaker 2: to talk to your lawyers. Will you give me a permission?
Speaker 2: He said yes, and I asked, and universally all of
Speaker 2: the lawyers said that that is why they did not
Speaker 2: put him on the witness stand, because he had a
Speaker 2: tendency to misspeak to correct himself, which this doesn't come
Speaker 2: across very well if you're on the witness stand, and
Speaker 2: he might stay right when he meant to say left.
Speaker 2: And I didn't have the impression that he had that
Speaker 2: he's stupid or anything. I actually think Ryan Woodmurre is
Speaker 2: a fairly intelligent guy who was a pretty much a
Speaker 2: pretty good student in school from what I understand. But
Speaker 2: he's just one of those people for whom communicating isn't
Speaker 2: necessarily verbally isn't their strong suit. I think that his
Speaker 2: communication has improved over the years, but at that time,
Speaker 2: the very first interview I did with him in twenty eleven,
Speaker 2: it was obvious to me that there were some communication
Speaker 2: glitches as I would like to call them, that would
Speaker 2: make him be not the best presentable witness, you know,
Speaker 2: just doesn't come across as being super polished. So and
Speaker 2: actually I kind of figured out in my own head
Speaker 2: that jumped to a gun he actually thinks so quickly.
Speaker 2: I think that he will put together two phrases that
Speaker 2: are similar. For example, in that case, jump to a
Speaker 2: gun may have been the result of jump to conclusions
Speaker 2: and jump the gun melded together. That was the theory
Speaker 2: that I kind of developed after I noticed his communication patterns.
Speaker 5: He also had I thought a strong case from the
Speaker 5: defense point of view, and so I would think that
Speaker 5: when a defense attorney says, there's no way I would
Speaker 5: put that guy on the stand, considering the case that
Speaker 5: they had and considering the things you just said about
Speaker 5: him as a witness. But that's at least fifty percent
Speaker 5: of it. As well. They have a case they believed in,
Speaker 5: there was no need to jeopardize it with him on
Speaker 5: a witness stand, and no need really in their minds
Speaker 5: to have him up there really anyway I want to
Speaker 5: exactly that.
Speaker 2: Was what they said.
Speaker 5: Huh yeah, yes, absolutely, so Ryan Widmar remains in prison.
Speaker 5: This book has come out, and like you mentioned also
Speaker 5: that the free Ryan Widmer Facebook page is still active
Speaker 5: sixty thousand or six thousand members, so it's still in
Speaker 5: this case.
Speaker 2: It was in the public view well that that Facebook
Speaker 2: page was so lack of at the time, but apparently
Speaker 2: the gentleman who was policing that I took it down
Speaker 2: for some reason. But there is a website called Freeryanwidmer
Speaker 2: dot org where the supporters have started a petition to
Speaker 2: try to get the prosecution to turn over Sarah Widmer's DNA.
Speaker 2: So it can be tested for some of the disorders
Speaker 2: that were suspected for her that were these tests were
Speaker 2: never done, which is again big fact question mark in
Speaker 2: this case. Is it possible that she may have suffered
Speaker 2: from some of the disorders, that there's one in particular
Speaker 2: that she has a lot in common with a cleft palate,
Speaker 2: low set ears, small lower jaw, and a possible heart
Speaker 2: rhythm disturbance which can be associated with drownings. According to
Speaker 2: the Neo Clinic, the first sign of this disorder and
Speaker 2: a family could be an unexplained drowning. But yet she
Speaker 2: was never tested for this disorder. Isn't that interesting? Yes?
Speaker 5: Absolutely, you write in this book the case began when
Speaker 5: Sarah was found submerged, or when Sarah was submerged, and
Speaker 5: that you fear now this is also what happened to
Speaker 5: the truth. I want to thank you very much for
Speaker 5: coming on and adding to the biggest picture and explanation
Speaker 5: of this case that is possible submerged, Ryan Widmer, his
Speaker 5: drowned bride, and the justice system. I wanna thank you
Speaker 5: very much. Janis Hi Sofa coming on and talking about submerged.
Speaker 5: Is there a Facebook page or website that people might
Speaker 5: go to for more information.
Speaker 2: Yes, they can go to thus submerged book dot com,
Speaker 2: or they can find the Facebook page that's called submerged.
Speaker 2: Brian Woodmer has drawn bright in the justice system. On
Speaker 2: that page, I do post some updates about some things
Speaker 2: relevant to this case. For example, there's something that I
Speaker 2: just ran across about battup drownings and I'll hardly r
Speaker 2: to investigate. I'm going to be posting that very soon.
Speaker 2: And I have just things of interest to people who
Speaker 2: have been following this case and the criminal justice system
Speaker 2: and changes in journalism.
Speaker 5: Thank you very much, Janice Heisel for coming on and
Speaker 5: talking about Submerged. You have a great evening. Thank you,
Speaker 5: good night.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Dan appreciate it. Good night, thank you.