Speaker 1: Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence, and is
Speaker 1: not intended for all audiences.
Speaker 2: Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 3: What happened, It's okay, it's okay. Get it off your chest.
Speaker 4: I didn't do anything.
Speaker 3: You're a liar.
Speaker 5: You danced around in her blood and blah blah, yay me,
Speaker 5: look at me. Here's to you, Satan.
Speaker 3: Here's to you, my first sacrifice.
Speaker 1: Life is hard, but it is wonderful, isn't it? And
Speaker 1: every day is a gift. So thank you for sharing
Speaker 1: yours with us today. This is episode three hundred and
Speaker 1: thirty of Sword and Scale, a show that reveals it
Speaker 1: the worst monsters are really tucked into the no their
Speaker 1: an edge of Saint Joseph, Missouri. Krug Park spans one
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty three acres of meticulously landscaped grounds, Renaissance
Speaker 1: style architecture, and winding walking trails.
Speaker 2: Sounds nice, not.
Speaker 1: For its rose gardens, quiet lagoon and even whimsical Italian castle.
Speaker 1: The park draws families and joggers alike, especially when it
Speaker 1: transforms into a glowing spectacle during the holidays. But beneath
Speaker 1: its tranquil charm and seasonal cheer, Krug Park holds a
Speaker 1: dark memory, one that shattered it's peaceful Facade's take a
Speaker 1: number one.
Speaker 4: Where here emergency?
Speaker 6: I'm not out running the trails to Krug Pork and
Speaker 6: I'm pretty sure I just ran right across.
Speaker 2: The dead body.
Speaker 4: Why do you think that there's a dead body there?
Speaker 6: I wasn't sure there's a mannequin like Halloween or not,
Speaker 6: but because it's just sitting there still. But I just
Speaker 6: stood there, you know, for two minutes, trying to check
Speaker 6: everything in and it's real.
Speaker 7: I didn't touch it.
Speaker 8: I didn't know it.
Speaker 9: Does she have any injuries or anything like that?
Speaker 10: You know?
Speaker 6: I came up to the front, but it looked like
Speaker 6: a whole woman over chest and then cut by her neck,
Speaker 6: like where her neck was. Okay, can you describe the
Speaker 6: person Tomy young waiting completely like her close girl rips office.
Speaker 8: She was right next to her.
Speaker 9: Did you see any hair, eye color on the female?
Speaker 8: The wider wide open the ground.
Speaker 1: On the morning of October sixteenth, twenty sixteen, a young
Speaker 1: man was walking through Crug Park when he made a
Speaker 1: discovery that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
Speaker 1: He found the body of a teenage girl lying exposed
Speaker 1: on the jogging trail. She had been stabbed repeatedly, her
Speaker 1: throat slit. This was no accident. It was a brutal
Speaker 1: and deliberate killing. When investigators arrived, the details were as
Speaker 1: strange as they were disturbing. The girl was naked, her
Speaker 1: clothes tossed nearby in plain sight. No attempt had been
Speaker 1: made to hide her or the clothing. There were no
Speaker 1: signs of sexual assault, and no form of identification was found.
Speaker 1: A search of the surrounding area turned up only a
Speaker 1: few broken and seemingly useless pieces of a cell phone.
Speaker 1: A medical examiner later concluded that the murder had taken
Speaker 1: place recently, likely within twenty four hours of the body
Speaker 1: being found. It was ultimately determined that the teenage girl
Speaker 1: was killed the night before. The investigator's first priority was
Speaker 1: to identify the girl. Until they had a name, she
Speaker 1: was referred to only as krug Park Jane. Hoping for
Speaker 1: a lead, detectives examined her discarded clothing and found a
Speaker 1: logo on a T shirt, one belonging to a nearby
Speaker 1: high school. They visited the high school, where the principle
Speaker 1: provided a tentative identification. A seventeen year old student named
Speaker 1: Caitlin Root. Your book photos confirmed it the victim was Caitlyn.
Speaker 1: Detectives then reached out to her family and continued the
Speaker 1: investigation by interviewing her father.
Speaker 11: Now, is Caitlin the only child you guys have together?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 8: Okay?
Speaker 11: And when was the last time you saw Caitlyn?
Speaker 12: It was actually in person?
Speaker 13: It was probably around the I think probably the seventh okay.
Speaker 1: Caitlyn's parents were divorced and she wasn't living with either
Speaker 1: of them at the time, which partly explained why no
Speaker 1: missing person's report had been filed before her body was found.
Speaker 11: And when was the last time that she stayed with you?
Speaker 11: It's been about a year and by a year through.
Speaker 11: What's Caitlin's lifestyle? Like Jesus, let's follow her friends, okay,
Speaker 11: do whatever they do?
Speaker 9: Okay.
Speaker 1: A few months before the murder, Caitlyn's mother was preparing
Speaker 1: for an out of state job transfer. At the time,
Speaker 1: Caitlyn was living with her, but the prospect of leaving
Speaker 1: her friends behind didn't sit well. She was determined to
Speaker 1: stay in Saint Joseph. Looking for another option, Caitlyn reached
Speaker 1: out to her best friend's mom and grandmother to ask
Speaker 1: if she could move in with them. They didn't hesitate
Speaker 1: and welcome to Caitlyn with open arms. They had known
Speaker 1: Caitlyn for years and already thought of her as family.
Speaker 8: How do you feel about Caitlyn before this all happened?
Speaker 13: You, what'd you think about her?
Speaker 14: She's my daughter, She's not my biological No, But from
Speaker 14: the moment she walked in the door met me, I
Speaker 14: was mom.
Speaker 15: That was that.
Speaker 1: Caitlyn was welcomed by a loving family who offered her
Speaker 1: care and support. But the home was considerably chaotic and
Speaker 1: very crowded.
Speaker 3: Hula lives there with her.
Speaker 8: There's a list.
Speaker 2: There's my buddy Pablo, and then Tabitha and her two daughters,
Speaker 2: and then grandma Grandpa and then basically they're nurses.
Speaker 4: Don't care people take care of it.
Speaker 16: Okay, yeah, but.
Speaker 3: They also are trying to living at the residence.
Speaker 2: Oh really, Yeah, there's actually two houses right next to
Speaker 2: store to each other. Okay, Grandpa has one and the
Speaker 2: grandma eyed the other.
Speaker 3: And so where does Caitlyn stay? She stayed in Gremls.
Speaker 1: Despite the crowded living situation, everyone in the house was
Speaker 1: glad to have Caitlyn move in. They genuinely liked her.
Speaker 1: In fact, Caitlin was well liked by many. Her cheerful
Speaker 1: personality and charm made people naturally gravitate towards her.
Speaker 17: Caitlyn has she's crazy because it's a good crazy.
Speaker 13: What do you mean by that?
Speaker 18: Like, I she's kind of my personality, which is a
Speaker 18: bubbly which and Kaitlyn's she's fine to be wrong.
Speaker 14: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Tragically, Caitlyn's life was cut short at just seventeen years old,
Speaker 1: and investigators were faced with the heartbreaking duty of informing
Speaker 1: her family and friends that the young woman found in
Speaker 1: Krug Park was Caitlin Root.
Speaker 11: You know, there's really no.
Speaker 19: Easy way to say this or do this.
Speaker 11: We do believe it is kit And and that was
Speaker 11: stunned up in crud Park. We're really probably pretty certain
Speaker 11: it is.
Speaker 3: We do have a couple of pictures that.
Speaker 20: If you'd be willing to take a look out to
Speaker 20: say for sure. Yeah, you know, there's really no easy
Speaker 20: way to prepare yourself for this. No, I'll just you
Speaker 20: know when you're ready, if you just want.
Speaker 11: To Yeah, that's fair, relatively certain or one hundred percent or.
Speaker 8: How can you be so sure?
Speaker 13: There's too about a picture.
Speaker 11: I'm so so very sorry for your loss.
Speaker 3: Ye, Sanna says, you do that, Jar.
Speaker 11: We're going to do everything in our power, you know,
Speaker 11: to be able to answer all the questions for you.
Speaker 1: Naturally, everyone who knew and loved Caitlyn were desperate for answers.
Speaker 1: They wanted to know who had done this to her
Speaker 1: and why.
Speaker 11: I just want to know who, so would we, And
Speaker 11: we're working on I just can't figure out why.
Speaker 8: Even if we figure out who.
Speaker 3: Why, hopefully they'll be able to explain it. Caitlyn.
Speaker 19: Who would be that mad at her?
Speaker 8: I don't know.
Speaker 1: For a time, the case was a classic who'd done it?
Speaker 1: Caitlyn was an extremely well like teenager, making the brutal
Speaker 1: nature of her murder all the more perplexing. Investigators and
Speaker 1: loved ones alike were left asking the same haunting question,
Speaker 1: why would anyone want to kill her? Adding to the confusion,
Speaker 1: no one could explain why Caitlin had even been at
Speaker 1: Kirk Park in the first place.
Speaker 19: So, as far as you do, you think it's out
Speaker 19: a character for her to be walking in the park.
Speaker 8: Yes, she enjoyed nature at all, but.
Speaker 16: She's never been to the park krug Park ever.
Speaker 8: Okay, and the time even owners didn't like to be.
Speaker 8: She hasn't been there since I've known her about a
Speaker 8: year or two. I don't think she would go to
Speaker 8: the park unless it was a cohercion.
Speaker 1: In their efforts to unravel the mystery, investigators spoke with
Speaker 1: several of Caitlyn's family members and everyone she'd been living with.
Speaker 1: All were cleared as suspects, and no one could shed
Speaker 1: light on why Caitlyn had gone to Krug Park that
Speaker 1: night the night she was killed. With those leads, exhausted,
Speaker 1: detectives shifted their focus to another group of people, Caitlyn's boyfriends.
Speaker 14: She has dated several people. He has she was a
Speaker 14: very promiscuous, a little oh really, yes, And I'm not
Speaker 14: saying that.
Speaker 19: To inspect disrespect her character, but she was.
Speaker 14: And the week before this all happened, and she and
Speaker 14: I had gotten into an argument over it. I said, Caitlyn,
Speaker 14: I wouldn't have to do that to be liked.
Speaker 8: Do you think she was doing to be liked?
Speaker 21: I think she was doing it to be liked to.
Speaker 3: Fit in.
Speaker 1: Caitlyn had been through many short lived relationships, but at
Speaker 1: the time of her murder, she wasn't dating anyone.
Speaker 3: So who's Caitlin dating at the time? She was dating nobody? Okay,
Speaker 3: who was she seeing somebody before?
Speaker 19: Not that I knew, Like I knew there's somebody named
Speaker 19: Kevin at the time.
Speaker 8: Okay.
Speaker 3: If I were saying to give me somebody that would
Speaker 3: want to hurt her, who would come.
Speaker 8: To your mind?
Speaker 9: Mmm?
Speaker 19: I would have to say Kevin.
Speaker 3: Why would you say Kevin?
Speaker 19: From what she was telling me before that she has
Speaker 19: put hands on her.
Speaker 1: During the initial round of interviews, one name surfaced repeatedly,
Speaker 1: Kevin Whitmer. It quickly became clear that there had been
Speaker 1: some recent tension or drama between him and Caitlyn.
Speaker 12: I know she was getting threats from Kevin Allan Whittmer.
Speaker 22: She sent you about the guy who hit her? Yeah,
Speaker 22: who's this Whitmer? Apparently he hit her on Friday. She
Speaker 22: sent him a message saying, hey he hit me and
Speaker 22: stuff like that. Well, then other people started putting on
Speaker 22: was she putting on Facebook public?
Speaker 23: Right?
Speaker 13: Publicly?
Speaker 11: Then all these other people started commenting on that.
Speaker 2: What was it about?
Speaker 3: Any idea what that was about?
Speaker 24: No?
Speaker 19: I had no clue.
Speaker 1: Rumors started to swirl after a Facebook post and a
Speaker 1: string of comments beneath It suggested that Kevin Whitmer had
Speaker 1: recently gotten violent with Caitlin, but before investigators had a
Speaker 1: chance to find Kevin, he contacted them and voluntarily came
Speaker 1: to the police station for an interview.
Speaker 8: How did you win it with her?
Speaker 25: She is a friend of my old buddies. How long
Speaker 25: actually knowing her for? Probably maybe three weeks? When's the
Speaker 25: first time you gotta started talking or hanging out or whatever?
Speaker 21: Actually talking? It would have been profotly three weeks ago.
Speaker 13: That's just you know, conversation.
Speaker 19: But when did you guys start hanging.
Speaker 21: Out, hanging out dating? I think the first time we
Speaker 21: hung out was like a week and a half ago.
Speaker 8: What did you guys do?
Speaker 21: Just drove around?
Speaker 12: Are you guys hanging up?
Speaker 19: Its friends?
Speaker 21: Yeah, friend looking into engaging in a relationship with her.
Speaker 21: She wanted to, but she's seventeen. I'm twenty one. That's
Speaker 21: my thing.
Speaker 25: She wanted to, and I was like, I'm cool with friends,
Speaker 25: but that's as far as it's going to go. She
Speaker 25: tried to kissing me. I mean we kissed.
Speaker 8: That's about it.
Speaker 21: That's the end of it.
Speaker 1: Twenty one year old Kevin told investigators he had only
Speaker 1: known Caitlyn for a short while and insisted he had
Speaker 1: no interest in a romantic relationship with her. According to him,
Speaker 1: that was Caitlyn who had wanted something more.
Speaker 21: And then we finally got to hang out Thursday, and
Speaker 21: then she stayed the night with me.
Speaker 12: You guys watch movies.
Speaker 21: He wasn't sitting there on Facebook and talking.
Speaker 19: Did she stay the night that night?
Speaker 8: Okay? Anything going on that night? Now, here's the deal.
Speaker 25: We've already talked about this seventeen twenty one, right, illegal,
Speaker 25: So I just want to make sure that you're telling
Speaker 25: you please. And later, the most she and I did
Speaker 25: talk to her about, you know, having sex. I just
Speaker 25: and she told me that she's had sex with multiple people,
Speaker 25: and I'm like, that's not going to happen. So we
Speaker 25: just cuddled and when we got up next morning, we
Speaker 25: laid in bed until probably, like I said, twelve thirty
Speaker 25: one o'clock, and then I took her ound and dropped
Speaker 25: her off.
Speaker 1: Kevin explained he was put off by Caitlin's age and
Speaker 1: her alleged promise scuity, so he chose not to sleep
Speaker 1: with her or pursue a relationship. He also claimed the
Speaker 1: last time he saw her was three days before the murder,
Speaker 1: when he dropped her off at home. The following day,
Speaker 1: he received a strange and threatening phone call.
Speaker 25: Six eight nine number called me and I was like,
Speaker 25: are you Kevin Whitmer? And I was like, who's this
Speaker 25: and he's like, don't worry about it.
Speaker 21: Just know that you're a woman beat and if you're
Speaker 21: gonna beat on a woman and you can beat on me.
Speaker 25: So I called Kitlyn and I was like, what the
Speaker 25: hell is going on? And she's like, you know, you
Speaker 25: hit me twice and gave me two bloody noses. And
Speaker 25: I was like, the fuck ever, I don't put my
Speaker 25: hands on women. She's like, you know what you did
Speaker 25: and fuck off or whatever, and she hung up on me.
Speaker 25: So I made a status after that and put it
Speaker 25: on Facebook. I have all the screenshots of all the
Speaker 25: comments up today to last night. Whenever I went to sleep,
Speaker 25: I woke up this morning like thirty plus people will
Speaker 25: comment on it.
Speaker 8: So I just went and deleted it.
Speaker 1: According to Kevin, Caitlyn had told someone you hit her.
Speaker 1: This was an allegation that he firmly denied.
Speaker 26: Was her claiming that he punched her in the face
Speaker 26: and gave her a blighty nose and all that.
Speaker 3: Why do you think that she would say that? What
Speaker 3: does she get out of it attention?
Speaker 21: I don't know honestly.
Speaker 1: With this new information, investigators were faced with possibilities, neither
Speaker 1: of which was easy to prove. Either Caitlyn upset over
Speaker 1: being rejected or falsely accused Kevin of violence, or Kevin
Speaker 1: was lying to cover up something far more sinister. Without evidence,
Speaker 1: both scenarios seemed frustratingly out of reach, and this was
Speaker 1: just the beginning. As the investigation unfolded, detectives encountered a
Speaker 1: growing list of unusual suspects, each one adding new layers
Speaker 1: of confusion. More often than not, interviews ended with more
Speaker 1: questions than answers, and investigators were left asking the one
Speaker 1: question that continued to haunt them. Who killed Caitlin Root.
Speaker 1: On October sixteenth, twenty sixteen, seventeen year old Caitlin Root
Speaker 1: was found murdered in Krug Park. She had been stabbed,
Speaker 1: her throat slit, her naked body left in plain sight.
Speaker 1: With no witnesses and a few leads, investigators struggled to
Speaker 1: piece together why she was there, who she was with,
Speaker 1: and what went so horribly wrong. Suspicions swirled around a
Speaker 1: young man named Kevin Whitmer, but nothing could be proven,
Speaker 1: and the deeper investigators dug the stranger the case became.
Speaker 1: During their conversations with Kevin, investigators learned about another young
Speaker 1: man who was reportedly eager and maybe even desperate to
Speaker 1: start a romantic relationship with Caitlin.
Speaker 21: What exactly did she tell you about her?
Speaker 8: This guy has the.
Speaker 25: Biggest crush on her, going to be with him as
Speaker 25: messenger suicidally.
Speaker 21: He wants to cut his health, He wants to kill
Speaker 21: his hell without on.
Speaker 1: A Police were already familiar with the name Adam Brown.
Speaker 1: He was one of Caitlyn's closest friends. They'd known each
Speaker 1: other for years and were often seen together. To those
Speaker 1: who knew them, the dynamic was clear. Adam wanted something more,
Speaker 1: but Caitlyn had firmly placed him in the friend zone.
Speaker 19: Adam hen always had a thing for it just never
Speaker 19: worked out.
Speaker 14: Yeah, that's the way I would interpret it, just being
Speaker 14: by actions.
Speaker 8: What do you mean by his actions?
Speaker 4: He was always trying to impress her in somewhere.
Speaker 3: She thought of him as a brother.
Speaker 21: Nothing.
Speaker 11: He he wanted more, He wanted more.
Speaker 8: Do you think he was jealous of the attention neither
Speaker 8: young man got from her.
Speaker 4: If he was, he never let a show.
Speaker 27: And technically he's the last person we really know was
Speaker 27: seen with her right by his own mission.
Speaker 1: Right after gathering some background information on Adam's relationship with Caitlyn,
Speaker 1: investigators brought him in for questioning.
Speaker 28: WHOA.
Speaker 3: I believe it was like fifteenth Saturday.
Speaker 2: So I message Kitlyn and I asked her if she
Speaker 2: wanted to hang out for a little bit and I
Speaker 2: can come by because she was where she was staying
Speaker 2: was like right up the street from me.
Speaker 4: Frinish just set over on the other portrait Grandpa.
Speaker 3: So we were just talking and talking.
Speaker 2: And talking, kissing up and we were just sitting there
Speaker 2: and then she like jumps off the fortune was like
Speaker 2: I gotta.
Speaker 3: Go meet to Amanda. And I'm like, Amanda who.
Speaker 2: And then she said, Amanda mix and I'm like, I
Speaker 2: wouldn't even just stay home.
Speaker 19: It's late.
Speaker 3: Told you get hurt.
Speaker 1: Adam freely admitted he was with Caitlyn on the front
Speaker 1: porch of her home the night she was murdered, and
Speaker 1: that he was the last person to see her alive.
Speaker 1: He claimed that during their final moments together, Caitlyn abruptly
Speaker 1: decided to leave and meet up with someone else, Poor Adam.
Speaker 1: Adam said he I had to warn her not to go,
Speaker 1: but she ignored his advice.
Speaker 9: She listened.
Speaker 2: She went down to the corner on fifteenth and Olive
Speaker 2: got into the car that I couldn't even actually recognize.
Speaker 2: It looks like a sub ish kind of lookod thing,
Speaker 2: and it's last heard from her.
Speaker 1: Adam told investigators that Caitlin stepped off her front porch,
Speaker 1: walked down the road, and climbed into a mysterious black suv.
Speaker 1: If you've heard enough Sword and Scale, you know that
Speaker 1: this kind of story immediately raises some red flags. Investigators
Speaker 1: wondered why someone would pick her up down the street
Speaker 1: instead of at her house. What were they trying to
Speaker 1: avoid or hide? Did this even really happen or was
Speaker 1: it just a whole story that Adam was making up
Speaker 1: just to cover his tracks.
Speaker 3: So you guys just aw sitting there chatting on the
Speaker 3: front porch. So when does take a leave?
Speaker 19: She left about like in between like ten thirty and eleven.
Speaker 3: So how did she tell me? Started how she's up
Speaker 3: the leaves?
Speaker 19: She was messaging Amanda on Facebook, and.
Speaker 29: Uh, what's the relationship between her and Amanda as far
Speaker 29: than ano, They're just friends and.
Speaker 3: That's Amanda Mix.
Speaker 2: Yeah, have they have had any trouble with each other
Speaker 2: before or no? But I've had my doubts about Amanda,
Speaker 2: and I don't really trust her. What do you mean, Patrick,
Speaker 2: Donton Like, to me, she's just not the kind of
Speaker 2: the right kind of people really be hanging out with
Speaker 2: personal nitpicking things that meet her.
Speaker 3: We just don't click, don't make a long run.
Speaker 23: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So basically, yeah, they were texting on Facebook. That's whenever
Speaker 2: she was like, I gotta ry to get down here,
Speaker 2: She's about to pull up and everything.
Speaker 19: I'm like, oh, you should not go.
Speaker 3: Did you say what she's gonna go do?
Speaker 2: She said that they were gonna go sit at Hyde
Speaker 2: Park and they were gonna basically be hanging out and
Speaker 2: everything else, just basically doing girl stuff.
Speaker 1: Adam identified the person who picked up Caitlyn as someone
Speaker 1: named Amanda Mix. This was a name that caught investigators
Speaker 1: off guard. Until this moment, no one else had mentioned
Speaker 1: her in connection with this case.
Speaker 3: So, actually, when Caitlyn laugh, you were the only one
Speaker 3: I truly see her leave. Pretty much I was sitting
Speaker 3: on the fort on the Yeah.
Speaker 1: Investigators were clearly wary about him. There's something a little
Speaker 1: shady about him. They questioned both his account of that
Speaker 1: night and how he characterized his relationship with Caitlyn.
Speaker 2: There was a brief moment where I we thought me
Speaker 2: and her need to eat together. But no, I'm sorry,
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna date my best friend for twelve years.
Speaker 15: No.
Speaker 3: So basically I was just so, how long did you
Speaker 3: guys date or how long did not work out?
Speaker 30: We pretty much we were together for us six hours
Speaker 30: to really, uh, guys at repsacks, do you have any
Speaker 30: idea who might have done something to her?
Speaker 2: I mean I can only pretty much like start where
Speaker 2: basically the first person I knew about that she was
Speaker 2: gonna be with, which would be a Manda, Like That's
Speaker 2: what That's why I think.
Speaker 3: About first all the heck would I get in touch
Speaker 3: with Amanda?
Speaker 2: That's a very good question that I haven't been able
Speaker 2: to get hold of.
Speaker 3: Her all day.
Speaker 1: Despite their doubts about Adam's story, investigators decided to look
Speaker 1: into Amanda mix. What they found was intriguing. Amanda, as
Speaker 1: it turns out, was once Caitlin's best friend.
Speaker 31: You said that Amanda Mix and her were friends, but
Speaker 31: they had a falling out and recently.
Speaker 13: And that person she was last thing with at time?
Speaker 28: How do you know that?
Speaker 22: From everybody who's told me that she came over to
Speaker 22: the house at fifteen to get Caitlyn And.
Speaker 1: Before long, Amanda's name started coming up repeatedly in the investigation.
Speaker 1: Some even claimed that the former best friend of Caitlyn's
Speaker 1: had confessed to murder and the.
Speaker 32: Next day that the candle lighting, My brother came up
Speaker 32: to me crying. I mean he was like shaking and crying,
Speaker 32: and he's like, hey, dude, he said, I'm glad I
Speaker 32: found you.
Speaker 19: He's like, I'm scared shitless right now. He's like, she
Speaker 19: admitted it. He was like, admitted, who who come down
Speaker 19: and tell me what was going on? He sat there
Speaker 19: and told me, he's like, she admitted it.
Speaker 8: I was like, who, mid what?
Speaker 19: He's like Amanda?
Speaker 32: She admitted that she, her and several other people would
Speaker 32: beat that ship out of that root girl.
Speaker 19: Did they You said earlier that they did.
Speaker 16: You referred to them as they had jumped her.
Speaker 19: I don't know who they are, okay. He just said
Speaker 19: Amanda and several other people.
Speaker 1: Eventually, investigators brought Amanda Mix in for questioning, but her
Speaker 1: situation was a bit different from the other potential suspects.
Speaker 1: Unlike the rest, Amanda had not come willingly. She was
Speaker 1: picked up on an unrelated outstanding warrant. What you know
Speaker 1: is always a good sign.
Speaker 16: Do you know a girl?
Speaker 13: My name paper Root?
Speaker 27: Yes?
Speaker 8: How do you know?
Speaker 13: Do I have to say all this?
Speaker 12: Well, I'm I'm just asking questions.
Speaker 13: I'm just curious how we know work?
Speaker 12: Well, she's your best friend?
Speaker 11: Oh, she's a best friend?
Speaker 24: Was tip.
Speaker 12: I don't really, I don't hang on anyone.
Speaker 10: What happened?
Speaker 3: Which you too?
Speaker 11: I mean that you guys aren't friends anymore.
Speaker 12: Well somemore like we didn't be like just when our
Speaker 12: suzing this, I don't have any turn.
Speaker 1: This from a man that told investigators there was no
Speaker 1: bad blood between her and Caitlyn. They had simply grown
Speaker 1: a part over time, which is why they were no
Speaker 1: longer as close as they once were.
Speaker 11: You never had a falling out as Caitlin than anything
Speaker 11: a while back, while, you guess, I mean because I haven't.
Speaker 11: I've got friends of that girl now for a long time.
Speaker 11: Was everything that ever happened between you two that he
Speaker 11: was kind of lost track of each other.
Speaker 12: They're just I haven't I've lost off friends because I don't.
Speaker 12: I don't want thing in the rock people.
Speaker 11: Are you are even really mad or passed off a
Speaker 11: Caitlyn or anything?
Speaker 12: Okay, this is about I'm messing about Caitlyn.
Speaker 23: Okay, So why is I mean?
Speaker 13: Why, Well, she's missing what she's missing?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 12: When did miss the other day?
Speaker 11: I'm not quite sure what they's the last time you
Speaker 11: saw her?
Speaker 12: Oh, I've just seen her.
Speaker 23: I mean I went to a fuck. I don't know
Speaker 23: the day. It was like some day last week, because
Speaker 23: there's I love Caitlyn, I really do, and I don't
Speaker 23: know anything.
Speaker 12: I haven't the last time I've seen her but that
Speaker 12: when we have a ride.
Speaker 1: Amanda appeared genuinely unaware that Caitlyn was dead. She told
Speaker 1: investigators the last time she saw her was more than
Speaker 1: a week before the murder. According to Amanda, she and
Speaker 1: her boyfriend were walking past Caitlyn's house when they spotted
Speaker 1: her sitting on the front porch. Amanda asked if anyone
Speaker 1: inside could give them a ride home, and Caitlyn found
Speaker 1: someone willing to help. Since that day, Amanda had no
Speaker 1: seen or heard from Caitlyn, or so she claimed her Facebook.
Speaker 12: Talked about Yeah. Yeah, not recently.
Speaker 19: No recently.
Speaker 12: It hasn't been recently at all.
Speaker 11: I have, don't somebody something you guys talked the other
Speaker 11: day on Facebook?
Speaker 8: Is that not true?
Speaker 23: That's not true.
Speaker 12: I have talked to Caitlyn on Facebook that I mean,
Speaker 12: Facebook accounts.
Speaker 23: To you one.
Speaker 18: I just feel like there's something You're just one does
Speaker 18: I promise I'm not keep me anything from.
Speaker 1: Amanda also claimed she had not communicated with Caitlin through
Speaker 1: texts or social media in quite some time. If true,
Speaker 1: that directly contradicted Adam Brown's statement. He told police that
Speaker 1: Caitlyn was messaging Amanda the very night she was killed.
Speaker 3: I don't be honest.
Speaker 11: We talked with somebody said that you were with her
Speaker 11: Saturday night?
Speaker 13: Are you serious?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 12: Okay, I wouldn't for Saturday Night's no big deal.
Speaker 11: Why something would lie and say that you were with
Speaker 11: her on Saturday.
Speaker 12: Exactly unless they don't want to get somebody else in trouble.
Speaker 12: I could get a serious trouble. Was whatever the fuck's
Speaker 12: going on?
Speaker 13: What's going on?
Speaker 12: Whatever the situation is. I don't know what's going on, saying.
Speaker 11: So, you mean tell me you didn't know that Kitlan
Speaker 11: has been missing?
Speaker 23: No, I didn't know, shouldn't No, Now, so.
Speaker 20: What would you say, I said, if somebody saw you
Speaker 20: leaving with her about ten o'clock Saturday night.
Speaker 12: I laugh, actually, because it's true ten o'clock that I
Speaker 12: was under my roof.
Speaker 1: Amanda insisted she was home the night of the murder,
Speaker 1: and she was adamant about it. She even claimed she
Speaker 1: could back it up. At the time, Amanda was living
Speaker 1: in a group home, and she told investigators that the
Speaker 1: house manager could confirm her whereabouts.
Speaker 12: That's hilarious, did.
Speaker 23: Kissing me off?
Speaker 17: But if we called Tina right now, we get us
Speaker 17: all verified.
Speaker 12: But I don't know if you called her, we'll get
Speaker 12: around to calling her, said, I try to get to
Speaker 12: cant with all this. Okay, she all ship because I
Speaker 12: didn't leave with her at ten o'clock. Pena, I mean,
Speaker 12: very very I don't know, y'all.
Speaker 23: This is a full ship. That's why I would like
Speaker 23: you to call her around.
Speaker 3: So let's see if I'll get somebody to call Tina.
Speaker 12: Yeah, exactly, she didn't even tell you I was there.
Speaker 23: Saturday night.
Speaker 1: Amanda urged investigators to contact her house manager to confirm
Speaker 1: her alibi, and she grew increasingly impatient as the questioning continued.
Speaker 12: I have not hoped, Caitlyn, I try to repeating myself. No,
Speaker 12: I want to know the whole story. That's what I
Speaker 12: want to know.
Speaker 18: That's exactly what I want to know, because I'm telling you, guys,
Speaker 18: what the fuck I.
Speaker 12: Did Saturday night ten o'clock.
Speaker 11: Yeah, well, I'm telling you that people are telling me
Speaker 11: you the last person that.
Speaker 12: Well, that's hilarious. Call Tina please when because I want
Speaker 12: to hear her.
Speaker 17: Tell y'all you know this sounds like one of the
Speaker 17: mysteries fucking TV shows does so this is Cartina, Please
Speaker 17: give us your figure it.
Speaker 12: Out like this is ridiculous. If y'all just call, y'all
Speaker 12: know the fucking truth. I'm not totally enjoy cartoon.
Speaker 13: It's one of those things.
Speaker 12: It's one of those things where you can't get that
Speaker 12: fucking bird right now?
Speaker 23: Is that not make sense?
Speaker 12: You can go give my boyfriend and he'll tell you
Speaker 12: the same exactly ship.
Speaker 16: Why are young?
Speaker 12: Because he's I'm really doing something to Kaitlyn. I don't
Speaker 12: really fucking talk to Kaitlyn anymore. Anything happened to face? Okay,
Speaker 12: she's missing. Oh so something obviously has happened.
Speaker 11: Maybe she's in Cansteady. Maybe Calen.
Speaker 10: How do you know that?
Speaker 12: I've been friends with her for a while. So but
Speaker 12: I know, Okay, just because I'm no, I will go. No,
Speaker 12: I'm done, I don't want to talk.
Speaker 10: I'm not talking.
Speaker 12: I'm gonna be silent. I just will go, That's all.
Speaker 1: Amanda took a firm stance with investigators and ultimately chose
Speaker 1: to remain silent, which is of course her right. When
Speaker 1: they followed up with their house manager, the story she
Speaker 1: gave them seemed to check out. Amanda had signed in
Speaker 1: early that evening, but the alibi wasn't airtight. Nothing would
Speaker 1: have prevented her from slipping out unnoticed. Later that night,
Speaker 1: once again, investigators were faced with two conflicting stories. Either
Speaker 1: Adam Brown had lied about Caitlin messaging and leaving with
Speaker 1: Amanda Mix or Amanda was lying about her whereabouts on
Speaker 1: the night of the murder. Now's a good time to
Speaker 1: test your slothing abilities. And I ask you who do
Speaker 1: you think was responsible? Out of these two? I wonder
Speaker 1: if you'll get it right, because what came next was
Speaker 1: a revelation that no one expected. Neither of them had lied. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how about that the person who had actually misled the
Speaker 1: investigators and did not tell the truth was the most
Speaker 1: unlikely person of all, the victim, Caitlin Root. In October
Speaker 1: of twenty sixteen, homicide investigators in Saint Joseph, Missouri, were
Speaker 1: deep into the investigation of seventeen year old Caitlin Root's
Speaker 1: brutal murder. Caitlyn's body had been found in Krug Park.
Speaker 1: With a few clues to follow, investigators chased down leads,
Speaker 1: questioned family and friends, and attempted to unravel conflicting stories,
Speaker 1: but nothing was adding up. Then came a stunning theory.
Speaker 1: Perhaps the person misleading them wasn't a suspect. Perhaps it
Speaker 1: was Caitlin herself. You see, Caitlyn's close friend Adam Brown,
Speaker 1: told investigators that the last time he saw her, she'd
Speaker 1: said that she was going to meet up with Amanda Mix.
Speaker 1: Maybe she told him the truth, or maybe it was
Speaker 1: a lie. It was entirely possible that Caitlyn had plans
Speaker 1: with someone else that night and just didn't want anyone
Speaker 1: to know. With answers still elusive, investigators returned to the
Speaker 1: crime scene and expanded their search of the area. This
Speaker 1: decision led to a crucial breakthrough. While the initial sweep
Speaker 1: had uncovered only broken fragments of Caitlyn's cell phone, the
Speaker 1: extended search turned up even more pieces. FORENDSIC specialists managed
Speaker 1: to reassemble the phone, giving detectives access to Caitlyn's texts
Speaker 1: and social media. This was a game changer. The recovered
Speaker 1: messages revealed that Caitlin had been planning to meet someone
Speaker 1: named Amanda that night, but not Amanda Mix. It was
Speaker 1: another teenager who had gone to high school with Caitlin.
Speaker 1: Her name was Amanda Bennett. These messages revealed that Amanda
Speaker 1: Bennett had invited Caitlin to hang out with her and
Speaker 1: her boyfriend, and had even told her not to tell
Speaker 1: anyone who she was with. Armed with this discovery, investigators
Speaker 1: quietly surveiled Amanda Bennett and her boyfriend for several days
Speaker 1: before making their move. Both were arrested. Amanda's mom was
Speaker 1: also brought in for questioning.
Speaker 16: So, Amanda and Sebashian both live with you, correct? And
Speaker 16: how long has you been.
Speaker 12: Living with you?
Speaker 4: He's been there at least over a year.
Speaker 16: Where's Amanda working at right now?
Speaker 4: She worked at and Morpholt Pizza Hut with me.
Speaker 16: And how about Sebastian whores?
Speaker 4: She work at the McDonald's down on the interstate.
Speaker 16: What do they do for the fun besides that the house?
Speaker 16: What kind of things do they do?
Speaker 4: I don't really do much, That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 9: Said.
Speaker 4: I have internet and netflips and all that, so they
Speaker 4: very much to stay in their room and watch TV
Speaker 4: or they play video games.
Speaker 16: They ever going where and hanging out? Not really, No
Speaker 16: anyone ever come to the house hang out.
Speaker 4: And that's been a lot of Amanda's problems. She don't
Speaker 4: have very many friends, so she doesn't have any friends,
Speaker 4: and she'll tell you that she doesn't hang out with anybody.
Speaker 1: Investigators learned that seventeen year old Amanda Bennett and her
Speaker 1: eighteen year old boyfriend Sebastian Dowell were living with Amanda's mom.
Speaker 1: The couple was reclusive, with no known friends or social connections.
Speaker 1: What they did have was a newborn son who was
Speaker 1: just a few months old. The soft cooping heard in
Speaker 1: the background of this interview belongs to their baby.
Speaker 26: I don't keep trying Sebastian honestly, because I can care
Speaker 26: less about Sebastian.
Speaker 8: What's with that?
Speaker 4: Well, he's lazy pretty much. There's always an excuse why
Speaker 4: he can't get up there to work, or you know,
Speaker 4: he doesn't want to do any tours around the house.
Speaker 4: He's just not a good dad. She's usually up with
Speaker 4: the baby all night.
Speaker 26: She's been trying to go to school and then working,
Speaker 26: and he does nothing, and it makes me mad.
Speaker 4: And I was to the point, I've been talking to
Speaker 4: my son. I said, you know, she's been talking.
Speaker 26: About moving out with them, and if that's the case,
Speaker 26: I'm giving attorney.
Speaker 4: And get CASTI ah Siler because.
Speaker 26: From what it sounds, and he also has a two
Speaker 26: year old little girl, and I know that he doesn't
Speaker 26: ever see her.
Speaker 4: More page old sport doesn't do anything for a man.
Speaker 1: His mom shared some background with investigators about her daughter
Speaker 1: and Sebastian. She confirmed that both were high school dropouts,
Speaker 1: with Amanda working at Pizza Hut and Sebastian at McDonald's.
Speaker 1: What a pair. She also admitted she wasn't fond of Sebastian,
Speaker 1: describing him as a lazy, inattentive, and irresponsible father. When
Speaker 1: asked about the night Caitlin Root was murdered. She recalled
Speaker 1: that Amanda and Sebastian had gone out, supposedly to see
Speaker 1: a movie. They returned home very late. And you work together,
Speaker 1: so you're together all day until nine pm. You so
Speaker 1: when you come home nine pm, does she ride home
Speaker 1: with you?
Speaker 12: Yes?
Speaker 4: Okay, so we came home.
Speaker 26: Sebastian was home with the baby, and I'm going to
Speaker 26: watch on my phone because I want to say that
Speaker 26: that was the night they went to the movies.
Speaker 4: As far as I know, they went to the movies,
Speaker 4: is what I was told.
Speaker 16: Okay, I'm going to take your car. Yes, And what
Speaker 16: time do you think they text you to tell you
Speaker 16: that they're going over to Jermys.
Speaker 33: Well, they didn't actually text me to tell me that
Speaker 33: it's where they were going. I text her and asked her,
Speaker 33: I said, where are you guys at? Because I don't
Speaker 33: think the movie lasts no three hours, so it was
Speaker 33: like ten, I'm on twelve thirty.
Speaker 4: She said, oh, we came over to Jeremy's house.
Speaker 1: After their conversation with Amanda's mom, investigator sat down with
Speaker 1: Amanda herself, who appeared remarkably unfazed by the situation, showing
Speaker 1: little concern or emotion as the questioning started.
Speaker 19: You're seventeen, okay today birthday?
Speaker 10: Yeah?
Speaker 19: What was the last grade level?
Speaker 24: And sto?
Speaker 19: When you completed? I finished sophomore year and you're working
Speaker 19: anywhere Northville? Any idea why you're here?
Speaker 24: M hmm.
Speaker 3: I'll be honest, I find it hard to believe you
Speaker 3: don't know why you're here. We have a lot of information,
Speaker 3: we have a lot of evidence, and I know you
Speaker 3: know why you're here.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 30: I don't believe that your involvement is done on your own.
Speaker 30: I know that you know as somebody else was there,
Speaker 30: and we don't think you're a bad person, not at all.
Speaker 23: When do I ask for a lawyer?
Speaker 19: You can ask for a lawyer any time you want,
Speaker 19: if that's.
Speaker 2: What you want to do.
Speaker 9: Do you guys think I did something?
Speaker 3: So what do you think we think you did?
Speaker 9: I don't know.
Speaker 8: Then I would think you would.
Speaker 19: Want to find out what you're supposed.
Speaker 9: To tell me? What do you think I do?
Speaker 1: Amanda claim she had no idea what was going on,
Speaker 1: and it quickly became clear that a confession wasn't coming
Speaker 1: anytime soon. Shifting tactics investigators eased into a gentler line
Speaker 1: of questioning, focusing instead on her relationship with Sebastian.
Speaker 19: Does he stay anywhere else now? Even occasionally every night?
Speaker 19: At you the thumb on that right? Make sure he's
Speaker 19: very supposed to be.
Speaker 17: Yep, he's pretty.
Speaker 4: You got to keep a lock on that.
Speaker 19: He's pretty. Yet, do you guys ever go out separate?
Speaker 19: Do you guys ever do separate things?
Speaker 2: You go?
Speaker 19: He goes where he goes, you go.
Speaker 8: Huh?
Speaker 19: Except for work, of course?
Speaker 9: Yeah. I'm usually at his work too, But except for
Speaker 9: when I work.
Speaker 8: Who do you guys run around with? I mean, who
Speaker 8: do you guys do stuff with? Other than you know,
Speaker 8: when you guys go through something friends? You guys don't
Speaker 8: run around with anybody. You don't hang out with anybody.
Speaker 8: It's just you two exciting and we just don't have friends.
Speaker 8: We don't have any Sebastian didn't.
Speaker 19: Have any friends.
Speaker 9: No, I don't. I don't let him.
Speaker 1: Amanda was pretty open about her relationship with Sebastian and
Speaker 1: admitted to being a very controlling presence in his life.
Speaker 1: Let's put it that way.
Speaker 9: I shaved his legs.
Speaker 3: What he lets you shave his legs?
Speaker 19: Like with a razor shave, like all the way up
Speaker 19: top all the way down.
Speaker 8: Why's that I.
Speaker 23: Wanted to get rid of his masculinity?
Speaker 8: Okay, now you're gonna have to explain that one to me.
Speaker 19: You got me scratched, Well you do too.
Speaker 1: Apparently, investigators also questioned Amanda about her religious beliefs, particularly
Speaker 1: her views on the devil. Their curiosity stemmed from a
Speaker 1: search of her bedroom, where they had found books related
Speaker 1: to Satanism. In her basement, they also found a journal
Speaker 1: penned by Amanda that was full of bizarre writings about demons,
Speaker 1: sacrificing souls and controlling fire with one's mind. How about that?
Speaker 19: So, what do you think about the devil? Do you
Speaker 19: think the devil is this? Have you ever looked into
Speaker 19: other forms of religion? Have you ever considered of the
Speaker 19: forms of religion a sparimn with a that, or any
Speaker 19: Satanic step or anything like that.
Speaker 8: So you have faith in God, but you've questioned it.
Speaker 10: Well, I've grown up believing that, Like ever since I
Speaker 10: was born, I was in a church environment.
Speaker 1: After gaining more insight into Amanda, her relationship with Sebastian
Speaker 1: and her beliefs, investigators turned to a crucial question, where
Speaker 1: was she in Sebastian on the night of October fifteenth,
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, the night Caitlin Root was murdered.
Speaker 10: We were gonna go to the movies because I got
Speaker 10: two for like free tickets, you know how they use
Speaker 10: free tickets.
Speaker 23: But we watched The.
Speaker 9: Girl in the Train.
Speaker 8: That is that good?
Speaker 9: No, most scary movies nowadays are good.
Speaker 19: They stayed for the whole movie.
Speaker 8: The movie and.
Speaker 10: Weird, just weird.
Speaker 9: It was all like a mystery about like a murder.
Speaker 3: Who did the murder?
Speaker 9: Oh?
Speaker 23: Pay in session.
Speaker 9: It was a boring movie, and then we went to
Speaker 9: a specialist dad's house.
Speaker 1: Amanda told investigators that she and Sebastian had gone to
Speaker 1: see the movie The Girl on the Train that night,
Speaker 1: but when asked about the plot, she couldn't recall a
Speaker 1: single detail. Pro tip, if you're gonna use a movie
Speaker 1: as an alibi, make sure you've actually seen it. Also,
Speaker 1: that movie was fantastic, So if you say it was boring,
Speaker 1: then you're either lying or you're extremely unintelligent, or most
Speaker 1: likely both. Amanda went on to say that after the movie,
Speaker 1: the two of them headed to Sebastian's dad's house and
Speaker 1: spent a few hours there. But Amanda didn't know that
Speaker 1: investigators had already done their homework. You see, this is
Speaker 1: the kind of person that doesn't do homework, so she
Speaker 1: assumes no one else does either. The police had reviewed
Speaker 1: surveillance footage from the theater, and neither Amanda nor Sebastian
Speaker 1: appeared in any of it. Her story was obviously a lie.
Speaker 8: Why would you tell me that you were at the
Speaker 8: movies when you.
Speaker 21: Weren't at the movies?
Speaker 4: Were the movies.
Speaker 8: At the late? Movie was started at ten ten of
Speaker 8: Girl on the Train?
Speaker 9: Then?
Speaker 8: Why, I mean, are you guys like invisible or something?
Speaker 8: Or I mean, why won't you be on the video
Speaker 8: and you're not there?
Speaker 27: Well, hey, you got to be there. If you were there,
Speaker 27: you had to go up to the window and get
Speaker 27: exchange your passes for tickets. Right, Neither one of you
Speaker 27: are on video getting the tickets there. They've got the
Speaker 27: videos on thumb drives. They're gonna bring them back here,
Speaker 27: you know, and you can't be there if you're not there.
Speaker 27: You know, all the cameras don't lie.
Speaker 8: So tell me why you wouldn't be on on video?
Speaker 9: I don't know.
Speaker 27: I would suggest it's because you weren't there, And I
Speaker 27: would suggest you were somewhere else.
Speaker 8: And you don't want to tell me about that.
Speaker 4: We were of the movies.
Speaker 8: What would you say if we had Sebastian on videos
Speaker 8: somewhere else?
Speaker 9: I'd say you were a liar?
Speaker 19: Are you afraid to tell us the truth?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 8: I went to the movie other than the movie.
Speaker 19: Are you afraid to tell us the truth?
Speaker 3: Are you afraid us to know everything?
Speaker 8: But for us to know everything that happens Saturday nine?
Speaker 23: I told you everything that happened.
Speaker 1: In addition to the theater footage, police had surveillance from
Speaker 1: another location that placed Sebastian across town, alarmingly close to
Speaker 1: Kruk Park. A street camera captured him sitting in the
Speaker 1: passenger seat of Amanda's mom's car, presumably Amanda was behind
Speaker 1: the wheel.
Speaker 8: So how do we explain that?
Speaker 27: How do we explain your car with Sebastian in it
Speaker 27: being at a completely different location.
Speaker 3: The time the movie was going on. Are you scared
Speaker 3: right now?
Speaker 10: M M?
Speaker 8: I would be because you're not telling it's the truth.
Speaker 3: I would be looking for a chance to help yourself
Speaker 3: and stop lying.
Speaker 9: I mean, if you think I did something wrong.
Speaker 17: Either way, I'm going down.
Speaker 8: No, that's not true. If you didn't do it, you
Speaker 8: wouldn't have anything to worry about. You wouldn't need to
Speaker 8: be scared. Right now, I'm not scared, but you should
Speaker 8: be because.
Speaker 4: I know you did it, and I know see you
Speaker 4: think I did it.
Speaker 8: No, I know, I understand. It's not It's not a matter.
Speaker 8: Don't get upset.
Speaker 27: I'm talking to you, I mean a person being really.
Speaker 27: I told you I would not lie to you. I
Speaker 27: will not tell you that I can prove something that
Speaker 27: I can't prove. You know, this is not our first rodeo.
Speaker 8: We've had a.
Speaker 9: Tens seven homicides in Sant Joe in the past year. Yeah,
Speaker 9: at least that you found a body for it, right,
Speaker 9: it's probably more.
Speaker 8: But is well? Who said anything about the homicide?
Speaker 4: Google?
Speaker 8: But I mean, we didn't say anything about a homicide.
Speaker 1: Interestingly, the first mention of murder during this interview didn't
Speaker 1: come from investigators. It came from Amanda herself. Oops, I
Speaker 1: guess you're not the criminal mastermind you thought you were.
Speaker 1: I ain't that right, Amanda?
Speaker 8: He says, this is a homicide we're talking about. Is
Speaker 8: there something we need to know about a homicide.
Speaker 9: Well, you're investigating the homicide.
Speaker 8: We're investigating hundreds of crimes.
Speaker 9: Well that's the only one in the news, so I'm assuming.
Speaker 8: So what do you know about the homicide? Then? Since
Speaker 8: you talking about it, what do you know about.
Speaker 23: It the stuff in the news.
Speaker 1: For a while, Amanda stuck to her flimsy story about
Speaker 1: going into the movies on the night of the murder,
Speaker 1: even though it had already been disproven, so investigators decided
Speaker 1: to leave her alone in the interrogation room and shift
Speaker 1: their focus to her boyfriend, eighteen year old Sebastian Dowell.
Speaker 21: Saturday, did you work last Saturday?
Speaker 12: A week ago today?
Speaker 28: Well it's not good for sure?
Speaker 9: Was off that? Okay?
Speaker 13: So would you guys do anything Saturday?
Speaker 34: No, we just stay home.
Speaker 13: Stayed home the whole time.
Speaker 12: It's Saturday.
Speaker 35: High note, no daylight, No, just watch TV and watch Netflix.
Speaker 1: For investigators, it was clear that Amanda and Sebastian hadn't
Speaker 1: coordinated their story very well. Amanda said they were going
Speaker 1: to a movie on the night of the murder, while
Speaker 1: Sebastian insisted they had stayed home the entire time.
Speaker 13: So who's that the domin hearing the one in the house,
Speaker 13: probably her. There's nothing wrong with that. It's the same way, right,
Speaker 13: the same.
Speaker 23: Way she jealous one.
Speaker 13: She doesn't time my ass, damn like majorly majorly tell
Speaker 13: me about that almost just like me.
Speaker 8: Efficient.
Speaker 28: If she thinks I did something.
Speaker 31: Wrong, she'll yell and so, what's so a violent thing
Speaker 31: she's ever done?
Speaker 8: Over jealous him?
Speaker 9: She uh.
Speaker 13: Freshened my ribs.
Speaker 28: I think she tried to stab me at one point.
Speaker 17: Wow, how does she break your ribs?
Speaker 13: She did me and punched me.
Speaker 11: Ain't try to stab you.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that's scary.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but she has always been controlling.
Speaker 11: I have to ask if I can move in the house.
Speaker 36: I have to.
Speaker 28: Ask her anything if I want to do anything.
Speaker 1: Sebastian confirmed the control nature of his relationship with Amanda
Speaker 1: and added a disturbing layer. He claimed Amanda's dominance over
Speaker 1: him was enforced through violence, alleging that she had once
Speaker 1: fractured his ribs and even tried to stab him. While
Speaker 1: the rest of the interview offered deeper insight into their
Speaker 1: toxic and abusive relationship, much of the audio was difficult
Speaker 1: to make out, with Sebastian muttering barely above a whisper,
Speaker 1: like a little kid. Still, he revealed that both he
Speaker 1: and Amanda were deeply involved in Satanism and considered themselves
Speaker 1: devoted followers. As for Caitlin Root, Sebastian claimed he barely
Speaker 1: knew her. According to him, the only time they met
Speaker 1: was on the day his son was born, when Caitlyn
Speaker 1: visited Amanda in the hospital and get this, started flirting
Speaker 1: with him right there, right in the hospital, right in
Speaker 1: front of Amanda.
Speaker 11: Again, I was lot there, but she'd being disrespectful, like.
Speaker 3: In her face, like Jolman and Anna's face that.
Speaker 28: She's who was kind of disrespectful as saying.
Speaker 2: I guess what I'm kind of missing here is she
Speaker 2: are not really friends, but she shows up at the
Speaker 2: hospital and starts hitting on the father of the child.
Speaker 3: I mean why, I mean, listen.
Speaker 2: I have no idea.
Speaker 1: According to Sebastian, during the hospital visit, Caitlin implied that
Speaker 1: Amanda's newborn son wasn't his, but rather a child of
Speaker 1: Amanda's ex boyfriend. This suggestion infuriated Amanda. Hooe's mad as
Speaker 1: they say. Finally, after two hours of questioning, Sebastian requested
Speaker 1: a lawyer bringing the interview to a close. Investigators then
Speaker 1: shifted their attention back to Amanda, returning to the interrogation
Speaker 1: room where she'd been waiting.
Speaker 8: What happens at the homicide?
Speaker 4: She did, Well, you know you've seen you saw.
Speaker 27: Too with your own eyes mm hmm and at your
Speaker 27: hands mm hmm. She did, honey, mm hmmm. Your phone
Speaker 27: tells a different story, your messages.
Speaker 29: And if you want to sit and continue to lie
Speaker 29: and say no, no, no, and when you go to
Speaker 29: court and we prove this, this, this, this, this and
Speaker 29: this that we have and you sit there and say
Speaker 29: I don't know anything, show no remorse, say you didn't.
Speaker 8: Do it, and the reason is gone.
Speaker 2: I mean we know.
Speaker 3: It's not a threat.
Speaker 10: Going to do that.
Speaker 8: No, don you get convicted, honey, I'm going away forever.
Speaker 8: And you don't do anything to.
Speaker 19: Help yourself to explain and be raised by somebody else
Speaker 19: to to.
Speaker 8: Explain why this happened. Don't you think that everybody deserves
Speaker 8: to at least know why? Sure didn't tell us why?
Speaker 9: Why?
Speaker 24: What?
Speaker 8: Why? You guys killed this girl?
Speaker 17: We didn't kill anyone.
Speaker 3: That's not true, and.
Speaker 9: You know it.
Speaker 1: This time, investigators adopted a much tougher approach with Amanda,
Speaker 1: and it quickly revealed the very cold and callous side
Speaker 1: of her personality.
Speaker 27: There's only two people that were there, you and Sebastian.
Speaker 27: So you're telling me he did it all.
Speaker 4: He didn't do anything that who did?
Speaker 9: Then?
Speaker 37: Bear?
Speaker 8: You know what I'm beginning to think. What I'm beginning to.
Speaker 37: Think is you are a very cool, hard person that
Speaker 37: you can sit here and have no emotion and make
Speaker 37: funnies about all this stuff to say, maybe she was
Speaker 37: killed by a bear.
Speaker 15: I don't know, Oh you know exactly what she was
Speaker 15: killed by, but yeah, you sit here and make light
Speaker 15: of it like it's no big deal, taking a human line.
Speaker 15: It's you don't physically scare me that it's just spooky
Speaker 15: that you just have no emotion about it.
Speaker 1: Possibly recognizing that they were dealing with someone who was
Speaker 1: deeply detached and sociopathic, investigators abandoned any pretensive gentleness and
Speaker 1: doubled down on their hard line approach with Amanda.
Speaker 3: You killed her, I don't know. You're a liar. You
Speaker 3: like the fact that you killed Caitlyn Rutin. You can't
Speaker 3: wait to do it again.
Speaker 8: You're a killer, and you like that.
Speaker 9: You don't care.
Speaker 8: Less than a week ago.
Speaker 3: You killed somebody and you don't care. You probably went
Speaker 3: home and had a great time. Oh wasn't that fun?
Speaker 3: Wasn't that great?
Speaker 8: I can't wait to do again.
Speaker 19: Man, we should do it to silent.
Speaker 9: You're sick.
Speaker 3: You're sick. I've never killed anyone neither. You're a liar.
Speaker 3: You're a liar. You watched her die and you got
Speaker 3: off on it.
Speaker 10: What was it like?
Speaker 3: Were you looking in her eyes the whole time she's dying?
Speaker 3: Did she say anything to you? Do you replay it
Speaker 3: when you close your eyes at night. You and Sebastian
Speaker 3: are killers.
Speaker 10: And you like it.
Speaker 19: You like to be You want to be known as
Speaker 19: the people who kill people.
Speaker 5: You're getting off on the fact that you know that
Speaker 5: you guys killed somebody together and you'll kill again because
Speaker 5: you're killers. You probably rubbed your blood all over your
Speaker 5: body and probably, I don't know, probably had some weird.
Speaker 3: Second yeah shouting you did so. Did you say what happened?
Speaker 3: It's okay, it's okay, get it off your chest. You're
Speaker 3: a liar.
Speaker 5: You danced around in her blood and probably yay me,
Speaker 5: look at me. Here's to you, Satan, here's to you
Speaker 5: my first sacrifice or is it my first sacrifice to you?
Speaker 1: Despite their best efforts, investigators did not get a confession
Speaker 1: from Amanda, and eventually they had to call it quits.
Speaker 1: Amanda remained in the entireation room, waiting to be booked
Speaker 1: for murder. While she sat there, a different officer kept
Speaker 1: her company, and the two engaged in a surprisingly casual
Speaker 1: conversation about favorite TV shows and other everyday topics. During
Speaker 1: the course of that seemingly harmless chat, Amanda revealed some
Speaker 1: unsettling things about herself.
Speaker 24: Nothing really bothers me because I've interacted with the supernatural.
Speaker 24: I've seen demons, I've so nothing really scares me anymore.
Speaker 16: You ever do any of like the ghost hunting kind
Speaker 16: of stuff before.
Speaker 19: I have an interested in that I.
Speaker 9: Like to do.
Speaker 24: I want to think I'm crazy, but I've been to
Speaker 24: Hell before, so once you cross over that border, you
Speaker 24: can see everything from a spiritual point of view, well,
Speaker 24: if they want you to see them. Hell's way more
Speaker 24: complex than what everyone says. Like there's no fun. For one,
Speaker 24: it's not hot, it's normal, and there's like it's.
Speaker 9: Kind of like an office building.
Speaker 24: There's different sections and each demon has like a secretary
Speaker 24: who goes out and collects like debts and souls from people.
Speaker 24: It's like corridors like that, and you get to decorate,
Speaker 24: you get to like design it however you want. Like
Speaker 24: the secretary for ahmadeir as a room exactly like this.
Speaker 4: It's great, that's it.
Speaker 1: As a man that continued to ramble on about are
Speaker 1: bizarre and quite frankly retarded beliefs, something unexpected was unfolding
Speaker 1: in the other interrogation room. Sebastian had waived his right
Speaker 1: to an attorney and asked to speak with investigators again.
Speaker 1: After a week long investigation and countless hours of interviews
Speaker 1: with friends, family, and suspects, the moment they had been
Speaker 1: waiting for had arrived. One of Caitlin's killers was finally
Speaker 1: ready to confess. On October twenty sixteen, teenagers Amanda Bennett
Speaker 1: and Sebastian Dowell were arrested for the brutal murder of
Speaker 1: Caitlin Root. At first, both denied any involvement, but investigators
Speaker 1: knew it was only a matter of time before one
Speaker 1: of them cracked. They were right. During a second interview,
Speaker 1: Sebastian finally began to open up, revealing not just pieces
Speaker 1: of the truth, but also the disturbing details about his
Speaker 1: belief about himselfiopath.
Speaker 28: For stars like that'll roost was so calm, I had em.
Speaker 28: I have my own religion, which is polytheis. There is
Speaker 28: an exactual name for our religion, nurs especially based on
Speaker 28: the myths now, but we have a patriarch gods mar religion.
Speaker 13: Mine is our eighties, the.
Speaker 8: Lord of the underworld.
Speaker 1: In case Sebastian's low, muttered voice is hard to make out,
Speaker 1: he told investigators that he considered himself a sociopath and
Speaker 1: claimed to worship Hades, the Greek god of the underworld.
Speaker 1: I have my own religion, he says, matter of factly.
Speaker 1: To be clear, Amanda and Sebastian weren't dark mystics or
Speaker 1: vessels of some supernatural evil. They didn't have their own religion,
Speaker 1: as he says. What they did have was way too
Speaker 1: much time on their hands and a lack of cognitive skills.
Speaker 1: They were delusional and deeply out of touch with reality.
Speaker 1: They fancy themselves connected to something sinister, but that's what
Speaker 1: losers do. They spend their lazy asses online building up
Speaker 1: delusions of grandeur to feed and protect their own egos
Speaker 1: from coming to the realization that they are utterly useless trash,
Speaker 1: leeching off the goodwill of others and contributing absolutely nothing
Speaker 1: to society other than misery and death. In truth, they
Speaker 1: were nothing but at just a couple of high school
Speaker 1: dropouts working part time fast food jobs, living in a
Speaker 1: cluttered bedroom in Amanda's mom's house, barely managing to care
Speaker 1: for their newborn son, and they were responsible for the
Speaker 1: murder of an innocent seventeen year old girl.
Speaker 19: That's it.
Speaker 1: That's the end result of too much coddling, too much sheltering,
Speaker 1: and no actual parenting. Where the fuck is the father?
Speaker 1: Where are the rules? Where's the goddamn discipline? You're an
Speaker 1: adult with a child, still living at your mom's house
Speaker 1: because that's all you can afford. Jesus Christ, where's the
Speaker 1: fucking shame. As this interview continued, Sebastian revealed another bizarre
Speaker 1: detail about himself. He claimed to have a second personality
Speaker 1: of all names Drake, who would sometimes take control of
Speaker 1: Sebastian's body. He said, so, here we go with all
Speaker 1: that bullshit, and when.
Speaker 8: You're Drake, do you feel I mean, you can you.
Speaker 13: Like the Sebastian love back on the.
Speaker 31: Third person of you and see Drake talking and doing
Speaker 31: or times sometimes it's just fun.
Speaker 28: I like the eyes it's over, and then sometimes it's just.
Speaker 11: Watching, watching what's happening.
Speaker 1: After setting the stage with claims of memory loss and
Speaker 1: blame for his alter ego, started recounting his version of
Speaker 1: what happened on the night Caitlin Route was murdered.
Speaker 8: You rolled in her head.
Speaker 12: She was holding her head, So did maybe Amanda hit.
Speaker 21: Her with something to knock her down or suppose.
Speaker 36: And so this was part of the satanic part that
Speaker 36: she had kind of off rid of you because she says,
Speaker 36: with doing a sacrifice, is.
Speaker 1: It's not nice ya as expected. Sebastian claimed he couldn't
Speaker 1: remember much about the murder because Drake had taken over
Speaker 1: his body. Still, he told investigators that Amanda had struck
Speaker 1: Caitlin over the head, and once she was unconscious, the
Speaker 1: two of them cut off her clothes and carried out
Speaker 1: what he described as a satanic human sacrifice, stabbing her
Speaker 1: multiple times and slitting her throat. Sebastian emphis that Amanda
Speaker 1: was the mastermind behind all of this. According to him,
Speaker 1: she'd planned the entire thing and taken the lead. While
Speaker 1: he didn't deny participating, he painted himself as a passive accomplice.
Speaker 1: Despite the outlandish claims of memory loss and a second personality,
Speaker 1: investigators had what they needed, a confession, and it wouldn't
Speaker 1: be the only one. Just two days later, Amanda requested
Speaker 1: another meeting with investigators.
Speaker 24: I was.
Speaker 10: Just messaging people to see if anyone wanted to hang out,
Speaker 10: because I never do. My message a girl named Haley,
Speaker 10: Mouey Girl, another girl named Haley, and a girl.
Speaker 23: Named Ali and asked them. I was like, Hi, how
Speaker 23: are you guys?
Speaker 13: So are you the same age as all these girls?
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 1: During her next interview, Amanda revealed that on the night
Speaker 1: of the murder, she had sent Facebook messages to several
Speaker 1: teenage girls asking if they wanted to hang out with
Speaker 1: her and her boyfriend Sebastian. The first to respond was
Speaker 1: Caitlyn Root.
Speaker 34: Then Caitlyn talked to me like, oh, you wanna hang
Speaker 34: out or something? She said yeah, and that'd be cool.
Speaker 34: I was like, do you smoke, cause I know she hangs.
Speaker 23: Around that crowd that does. She hangs out with weed.
Speaker 9: Yeah.
Speaker 23: I told Sebastian that we were gonna go to park
Speaker 23: and he's like okay.
Speaker 10: And then we left and then we like I asked
Speaker 10: her where she was at and then she told me,
Speaker 10: and I was like, well, can you just walk up
Speaker 10: to like the corner of the street so I.
Speaker 23: Didn't have to look for your house.
Speaker 1: Amanda and Sebastian drove to Caitlyn's neighborhood. As they got closer,
Speaker 1: Amanda told Caitlyn to meet them at the nearby street corner.
Speaker 1: After picking them up, the two drove around for a
Speaker 1: bit before ending up at Krugg Park, where they walked
Speaker 1: the wooded trails and paused for a while to smoke
Speaker 1: some weed.
Speaker 38: And then Sebastian sat out next to me and he
Speaker 38: said they wanted her for a sacrifice. They wanted her specifically,
Speaker 38: and that she fit the criteria and that they wanted her.
Speaker 39: I told him that we were having the boodless her
Speaker 39: and that she was becoming my friend, and so they
Speaker 39: didn't want it.
Speaker 17: They they didn't want it to be her, and he
Speaker 17: said that it had to be her because they wanted her.
Speaker 38: So we kept walking and then Sebastian like she was leading,
Speaker 38: so Sebastian pulled me aside and said they'd hited me
Speaker 38: a stick and said hit her.
Speaker 39: You need to hit her, and I told him I
Speaker 39: didn't want to, and he said hit her now, So
Speaker 39: I hit her with a steak and then I after
Speaker 39: I hit.
Speaker 17: Her, Sabatini joked off top of her and started choking her.
Speaker 13: So she went to the ground.
Speaker 23: No, he ran past me, she.
Speaker 40: Imagine, ran past me and knocked kick to the ground,
Speaker 40: started choking her.
Speaker 17: She was laying right here and he had a hole
Speaker 17: of her like that and was choking her. And then
Speaker 17: she was trying to say, help me, please stop. I
Speaker 17: can't breathe. And then he said can you help me?
Speaker 17: And and I just stood there.
Speaker 23: He didn't know what to do.
Speaker 17: And then he took a strange out of his pocket,
Speaker 17: what a syringe, and he stabbed her in the neck
Speaker 17: with it. And I asked him what that lesson?
Speaker 39: He said it was supposed to maker going to sleep,
Speaker 39: so she didn't feel anything.
Speaker 17: So then she cut her clothes off and pulled her
Speaker 17: pants off.
Speaker 1: Hold On, I thought that once you'd been to hell,
Speaker 1: nothing scared you anymore. Why are you crying? Amanda?
Speaker 12: What happen?
Speaker 1: As you can tell? Amanda's version of events differed quite
Speaker 1: a bit from Sebastian's. She was just a reluctant bystander
Speaker 1: and an unwilling participant in a satanic ritual that Sebastian
Speaker 1: alone wanted to carry out. It was all him, It
Speaker 1: wasn't her. She was just an innocent little girl female accountability?
Speaker 16: Am I right?
Speaker 17: And then he had me and knife and said to
Speaker 17: stab her. And I told him I couldn't do it.
Speaker 17: I told him that I couldn't do it.
Speaker 3: He said that I had to.
Speaker 40: I told him that he couldn't, and he said, we
Speaker 40: have to do it now. So he took it back
Speaker 40: and and he stabbed her in the ship and I
Speaker 40: covered my eyes and ears, and I stirred around. When
Speaker 40: I turn around, she was standing up. I knew he
Speaker 40: had stabbed her, though, but she was sitting and starting to,
Speaker 40: you know, and walk away.
Speaker 23: And he'd he looked surprised, so I don't think it
Speaker 23: was supposed to happen.
Speaker 39: He'd light knocked her back down and jumped on top
Speaker 39: of her, like on pumper within the legs, like he
Speaker 39: was choked drinking.
Speaker 17: After a while, he.
Speaker 39: Said that she didn't have bolts anymore. He looked at
Speaker 39: me and he said he was proud of me. He
Speaker 39: said he was proud of me for being there.
Speaker 1: Amanda claimed that after Caitlin was killed, Sebastian smashed her
Speaker 1: phone and scattered the pieces throughout the park. He then
Speaker 1: coached Amanda on what to say if they were ever
Speaker 1: questioned by police.
Speaker 17: He doesn't in Cardiff, and he broke into half and
Speaker 17: put it somewhere. He don't me to look at it,
Speaker 17: and he'd call me that if we were caught, to
Speaker 17: tell him the police that we were at the movies.
Speaker 1: Amanda also insisted that any evidence linking her to Satanism
Speaker 1: or human sacrifice was entirely Sebastian's doing. It's always the
Speaker 1: man who's to blame, isn't it. She claimed he had
Speaker 1: forced his beliefs onto her and that she had simply
Speaker 1: gone along without taking any of his beliefs.
Speaker 38: Seriously, I thought, you guys found the books as you
Speaker 38: were talking to me about.
Speaker 23: Rituals, and the stuff that was in the books is
Speaker 23: the stuff that he told me. Yeah, in the black book?
Speaker 9: Who wrote it?
Speaker 23: I wrote what he told me.
Speaker 1: Amanda explained that Sebastian had mentioned performing a human sacrifice
Speaker 1: more than once, but she never actually believed he would
Speaker 1: do it. How many times have we heard that shit before?
Speaker 1: She claimed that when they picked up Caitlin that night,
Speaker 1: she had no idea what Sebastian intended to do.
Speaker 19: There's a part of you.
Speaker 11: Thinking and yeah, this is gonna happen, right, he was kidding.
Speaker 17: I didn't think he was really gonna do it. That's
Speaker 17: why I thought when we got to the end that
Speaker 17: we were just.
Speaker 23: Gonna take her home.
Speaker 17: I thought he was joking.
Speaker 16: I thought it was just all Ay telling him.
Speaker 13: I've got somebody that you can sacrifice.
Speaker 12: I found her.
Speaker 13: I found the one that you can sacrifice.
Speaker 24: Because he said that he needed to do it, and
Speaker 24: I didn't want him to kill a random person.
Speaker 23: If he was gonna do it.
Speaker 1: Amanda's story was riddled with inconsistencies, and after listening to
Speaker 1: her for several minutes, investigators started pushing back with pointed
Speaker 1: questions and rebuttals. It was clear she was still lying
Speaker 1: and trying to protect herself by shifting all of the
Speaker 1: blame onto Sebastian.
Speaker 13: I mean, when we talked the other day, you talked
Speaker 13: about how you control him. You're the domineering person in
Speaker 13: the relationship.
Speaker 31: How you keep him locked down because he's pretty he
Speaker 31: had a lot of shit.
Speaker 13: Dow say what he told me.
Speaker 38: I don't want him talk to anybody like his Poe
Speaker 38: isn't on and I read all of his messages because.
Speaker 23: He's had jealous Yeah.
Speaker 13: I mean you basically, you made it pretty clear that
Speaker 13: you were the boss in the family.
Speaker 23: About some things.
Speaker 31: But then now we're at where he's controlling you and
Speaker 31: one of the other thing is all honestly, and I'm
Speaker 31: just being straight with you. I mean, you showed no remorse,
Speaker 31: no emotion what server matter fact, laughed a couple of
Speaker 31: times when.
Speaker 13: We were talking about the situations.
Speaker 31: And now there's this complete mood and demean and change
Speaker 31: in these crocodile tiers stuff.
Speaker 13: I mean, I mean, with your demeanor the other day, I.
Speaker 31: Have a hard time believing that, all of a sudden,
Speaker 31: now complete opposite you were.
Speaker 13: Just as cold and soulless as you can possibly be.
Speaker 1: A man who interviews with investigators painted a picture of
Speaker 1: two entirely different people. In the first she came off
Speaker 1: as a cold, arrogant, and detached sociopath, but after two
Speaker 1: days in a jail cell, she returned as a tearful,
Speaker 1: self proclaimed victim. You know, female privilege.
Speaker 8: So why if this is a story.
Speaker 31: We would believe now that he's this evil person and
Speaker 31: you're just kind of a I guess you're kind of
Speaker 31: saying you're a victim in this.
Speaker 13: Why didn't you tell us all this or not? Why
Speaker 13: did you act so cold?
Speaker 3: Why did you not care?
Speaker 13: Why did you laugh?
Speaker 8: Why did you tell us to prove it?
Speaker 13: Why did you How did you possibly have no with
Speaker 13: the emotions you're.
Speaker 31: Having today, How could you possibly set there as I'm
Speaker 31: describing this homicide?
Speaker 23: It didn't affect me because it wasn't true. I mean,
Speaker 23: I knew what he was telling me wasn't true.
Speaker 9: That's why.
Speaker 41: Enough fact, you said you went threw up, you said
Speaker 41: you had to cover your eyes in your ears so
Speaker 41: you wouldn't hear her screen and you wouldn't see it.
Speaker 41: But you had no emotion in the end of the day,
Speaker 41: not a single tear, not even a sad face.
Speaker 35: Because he said, in jail for forty eight hours now,
Speaker 35: because you realize that you guys aren't going to get
Speaker 35: away with this, because you realize you've been charged and
Speaker 35: you're in a little prison.
Speaker 33: Is that why?
Speaker 23: It's because he told me that no matter what, it
Speaker 23: would be okay. And obviously, since we're getting.
Speaker 31: Charged for something, so if you want to got charge everything,
Speaker 31: it would have been okay.
Speaker 24: Well, I wanted to tell you guys what happened, but
Speaker 24: I knew it would probably be worse.
Speaker 1: Amanda's Facebook messages to Caitlyn erased any chance of plausible deniability.
Speaker 1: She lured Caitlin to krug Park and specific told her
Speaker 1: not to reveal who she was meeting, asking her to
Speaker 1: keep it a secret under the pretense of hiding her
Speaker 1: marijuana use. Tragically, Caitlyn honored that request when she lied
Speaker 1: about her plans that night. In return, Amanda repaid her
Speaker 1: trust by slitting Caitlyn's throat and stabbing her to death,
Speaker 1: all in the service of some twisted, delusional beliefs in
Speaker 1: the supernatural.
Speaker 31: Everything you're saying now is exactly what he said about you.
Speaker 13: You know, he's saying that that that you.
Speaker 31: Said, it had to be Caitlin, that had to be
Speaker 31: an unclean soul, someone was condemned. Said that you've been
Speaker 31: talking about the sacrifice for some time, that he's kind
Speaker 31: of squashed it. But when you said it, he's you know,
Speaker 31: said he.
Speaker 2: Went along with it.
Speaker 27: He said, he held her down. Why you stabbed her
Speaker 27: and cut her throat? How many of the wounds were
Speaker 27: from you on Caitlin. Let's be honest, now, what about
Speaker 27: the stabbing or cutting and.
Speaker 13: Cut her through? He said, you did it all. He
Speaker 13: held her down by the shoulders.
Speaker 23: It's not true.
Speaker 8: I believe that you were both equally on board with it.
Speaker 13: I believe that you picked her. I believe that you
Speaker 13: lured her out, just like the text messages show. And
Speaker 13: I believe that what you need to do is be
Speaker 13: responsible for your actions.
Speaker 1: What makes this case even more chilling is the fact
Speaker 1: that Caitlyn wasn't Amanda's only target. She was just the
Speaker 1: first to respond. By her own admission, she reached out
Speaker 1: to four different teenage girls that night. Any one of
Speaker 1: them could have ended up as the victim to this brutal,
Speaker 1: senseless murder. Caitlin Root was just unfortunate and friendly accepted
Speaker 1: Amanda's invitation to hang out, which was her undoing. Investigators
Speaker 1: would later uncover on even more disturbing detail, Amanda and
Speaker 1: Sebastian had created a twisted mandate for themselves to kill
Speaker 1: two people per year. Had they gotten away with Caitlin's murder.
Speaker 1: There's little doubt they would have struck again.
Speaker 31: I'd be curious to know what your feelings are on
Speaker 31: these other three girls, maybe all four of these girls.
Speaker 13: Really, he didn't really care that much for the first
Speaker 13: person who would have went with you would have been
Speaker 13: a person, and she's just the one and left.
Speaker 1: Following Amanda's confession, which was filled with contradictions and obvious lies,
Speaker 1: investigators sat down with Sebastian one last time to confront
Speaker 1: him with what she had said. He denied most of it,
Speaker 1: falling back on memory lapses and claiming he couldn't recall details.
Speaker 1: It's funny how amniesia hits after you do something really bad,
Speaker 1: much like Amanda. This follow up interview revealed a drastically
Speaker 1: different version of Sebastian. The cold, stoic follower of Hades,
Speaker 1: Lord of the Underworld, had vanished. He was replaced by
Speaker 1: a frightened, trembling young man who looked nothing like the
Speaker 1: supernatural villain he claimed to be.
Speaker 13: You seem perfectly fine. You didn't seem like you had
Speaker 13: these you know, kind of like now the shades and
Speaker 13: having a qualt being called.
Speaker 42: It doesn't seem even it seems like more you're acting
Speaker 42: more than anything right now, and I know that's nerves
Speaker 42: and you don't want to become off as this this
Speaker 42: terrible animal or whatnot.
Speaker 23: You know, and I don't think you are.
Speaker 8: I think you guys got.
Speaker 25: Caught up in a.
Speaker 42: Kind of romany, a notion that this was something neat
Speaker 42: or cool, and now that the realism set in, and
Speaker 42: it's really not so romany, cause it sound so neat.
Speaker 42: You know, it's of the Twilight Saga. You know, it's
Speaker 42: real life, and it's affected both you guys and your
Speaker 42: families and Caitlin and her family. You know, you're kind
Speaker 42: of looking for an hour in a sense of trying
Speaker 42: to bury yourself behind this persona I do.
Speaker 12: I think you got wrapped up in this ship.
Speaker 13: Mentally, physically, emotionally.
Speaker 42: And then when it happened, you know, and now they
Speaker 42: have to face their realism of it. I think the
Speaker 42: realism has hit home, you know, and.
Speaker 8: It's a mess.
Speaker 1: Indeed, this situation was a disturbing mess, and it was
Speaker 1: now up to the justice system to sort it all out.
Speaker 1: On that note, Amanda had an unusual suggestion for how
Speaker 1: she thought the system should deal with.
Speaker 7: Her you guys are involved in this, Kaitlin's dead, what
Speaker 7: do you think the for replenishment would be.
Speaker 10: I mean, honestly, for me, was there and I didn't
Speaker 10: tell anybody anything happened, So I mean I should be
Speaker 10: put in jail for some time. But I do have
Speaker 10: a baby that's two months old, and that's a vital
Speaker 10: part of his life because he's gonna be crawling soon.
Speaker 10: He's gonna have his first Halloween without me there already,
Speaker 10: he's gonna start talking, and he's grown out of all
Speaker 10: of his clothes that I got for him and stuff,
Speaker 10: and I'm never gonna get to see him and those
Speaker 10: and I'm not gonna get to dress him and stuff
Speaker 10: like that.
Speaker 24: I don't know.
Speaker 23: I mean, I mean, there's house rooms.
Speaker 1: A man has suggested that as a mother house arrest
Speaker 1: would be an appropriate form of punishment. Fortunately, a prosecutor
Speaker 1: and judge saw things a little differently. I hate to
Speaker 1: keep beating this drum because Jesus Christ talk about female privilege,
Speaker 1: but yeah, that's what every baby needs. A psychopathic, maronic,
Speaker 1: devil worshiping loser of a mom with bad taste in men,
Speaker 1: abandoning them to go kill innocent young women sure, Amanda.
Speaker 1: In the end, both Amanda and Sebastian accepted plea deals,
Speaker 1: but not the kind they wanted. They pleaded guilty to
Speaker 1: second degree murder and were each sentenced to life in
Speaker 1: prison with the possibility of parole.
Speaker 13: I would leave you with this.
Speaker 7: Caylin will never have a baby, her parents will never
Speaker 7: see her get any older, her friends will never see her,
Speaker 7: her grandparents, she'll never know.
Speaker 23: I've listened to all of them things that people have said.
Speaker 8: Yeah, this is me saying that you know, when we care,
Speaker 8: when we when we compare.
Speaker 13: The things that you're gonna miss.
Speaker 9: That sucks.
Speaker 13: But but you you have a chance in sunlight in
Speaker 13: the future. Do you have a chance of parole?
Speaker 2: You will.
Speaker 31: I mean, as young age you are, chances are you'd
Speaker 31: probably come out of prison a young woman yet and
Speaker 31: get to remain the rest of your life for the better,
Speaker 31: I hope.
Speaker 13: But Caitlyn will never have that opportunity.
Speaker 1: The murder of Caitlin Root wasn't the result of a
Speaker 1: sudden outburst or tragic misunderstanding. It was a calculated act
Speaker 1: fueled by delusion, detachment, and a warped sense of purpose.
Speaker 1: Amanda Bennett and Sebastian Dowell had isolated themselves from the world,
Speaker 1: living in a bubble of dysfunction and feeding off one
Speaker 1: another's twisted beliefs. Seemingly with Mom's approval, they spiraled deeper
Speaker 1: into a fantasy where they weren't just ordinary teenagers, where
Speaker 1: they weren't just the losers that we all know them
Speaker 1: to be, but in their own minds they were powerful,
Speaker 1: dark figures, fulfilling some higher unholy calling what a bunch
Speaker 1: of fucking losers. In truth, they were nothing of the sort.
Speaker 1: They were deeply troubled, profounding immature high school dropouts, clinging
Speaker 1: to half baked ideas about Satanism and sacrifice, desperate to
Speaker 1: inject meaning into their otherwise aimless lives. Their belief system
Speaker 1: wasn't just stupid, it was deadly, and Caitlin Root paid
Speaker 1: the ultimate price for their stupidity. She was a kind hearted,
Speaker 1: free spirited, and trusting seventeen year old who wanted to
Speaker 1: hang out, have a good time. Her life, her future,
Speaker 1: and her relationships were stolen in a brutal, senseless act
Speaker 1: committed by two people who confuse cruelty for purpose. What's
Speaker 1: most haunting is how random this all was. Caitlyn wasn't
Speaker 1: targeted because she was part of a love triangle or
Speaker 1: a bitter betray She was just the first person to
Speaker 1: say yes to a Facebook message. That's it, that's all.
Speaker 1: It took one moment of trust, one response to an invitation,
Speaker 1: and her life was over. As if making friends isn't
Speaker 1: already hard enough, these losers go around killing people who
Speaker 1: want to be their friend. If nothing else, this case
Speaker 1: is a stark reminder of how dangerous isolation can become,
Speaker 1: how toxic delusions confessed her, and how easily the innocent
Speaker 1: can be pulled into someone else's madness. This show was
Speaker 1: written and produced by Michael Stabeel, hosted by Yours truly
Speaker 1: Mike Bude. Thank you so much for joining us. If
Speaker 1: you like the show, check out our website swordscale dot com.
Speaker 1: You'll find our TV show on there, which is pretty good.
Speaker 1: I might want to check that out. So available at
Speaker 1: only twenty bucks a month, you can cancel at any time.
Speaker 1: Thanks for sporting and stay safe.
Speaker 21: Hey Mike, my name is Nicole.
Speaker 36: I have been listening since twenty seventeen.
Speaker 21: Tell everybody about the show.
Speaker 1: It is my favorite thing.
Speaker 21: Your storytelling is unmatched. Dude, listen. Not like you need
Speaker 21: the advice from me, but screw the shit talkers.
Speaker 4: You're incredible.
Speaker 12: Keep doing what you're doing.
Speaker 3: Love the show, Thank you, it