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: Unfortunately, you are right in the middle of all of this,
Speaker 3: and for to sit here and lie to us to.
Speaker 4: Begin with, is not helping you at all.
Speaker 3: This is a friend of yours or was a friend
Speaker 3: of yours, and somebody brutally marked I.
Speaker 1: Know, hello and welcome to season thirteen, episode three hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty of Sword and Scale, the show that reveals
Speaker 1: that the worst monsters are real. Simpsonville, South Carolina, is
Speaker 1: a small southern town where life moves at an easy pace,
Speaker 1: Families know their neighbors, church bells still mark the hour,
Speaker 1: and the peaceful atmosphere feels almost rehearsed. But on the
Speaker 1: afternoon of October twenty sixth, twenty sixteen, the calumn was broken.
Speaker 1: Inside a cramped interview room at the Simpsonville Police departm
Speaker 1: investigator spoke to a young man named Ricky Hargrove.
Speaker 5: I want to tell you once you've effectively done, Ricky,
Speaker 5: is you've inserted yourself into a murder investigation.
Speaker 6: I mean, what do you think I think you would
Speaker 6: do something like that?
Speaker 7: Take some kind of monster to do something like that
Speaker 7: or someone.
Speaker 1: This interview with Ricky was one of the first threats
Speaker 1: in an investigation that would spend nearly a decade. It
Speaker 1: was a horrific homicide case that centered around a twenty
Speaker 1: two year old woman named Katie Blavel. Katie believed she
Speaker 1: could build a simple life for herself in Simpsonville and
Speaker 1: was doing what she could do to make that happen.
Speaker 1: Katie was an animal lover, and in twenty sixteen, she
Speaker 1: was working full time at her local Pet Smart.
Speaker 8: I just want to confirm with you she was working
Speaker 8: here on Monday, and do you remember what her hours work?
Speaker 9: You're on Monday was nine am to two pm, nine
Speaker 9: to two.
Speaker 8: I don't know exactly what time she left, but I
Speaker 8: mean it was no later.
Speaker 9: Than two fifteen, So you were working on Monday, did yes?
Speaker 4: How was Katie's demeanor? That na perfectly fine. She was talking.
Speaker 10: About picking up her someone named Cheyenne, I don't know
Speaker 10: who that is to her, and they were going shopping together.
Speaker 1: On October twenty third, twenty sixteen, Katie worked a full
Speaker 1: time shift at PetSmart. When she clocked out at around
Speaker 1: two fifteen pm, she confirmed plants to meet up with
Speaker 1: her younger sister, Cheyenne.
Speaker 4: But I said, what are you doing? And she said,
Speaker 4: I'm driving around, Sir.
Speaker 11: I said, when you take me Kimany to get food
Speaker 11: and Canny, we'll buy you food. And she said, yeah,
Speaker 11: I'll be there in an hour. So if you don't
Speaker 11: know what you're doing right now, is at hour, get
Speaker 11: here you.
Speaker 6: And she said, I don't do.
Speaker 4: But I kind of just let it go because I
Speaker 4: was like, you know, maybe she DoD something she don't
Speaker 4: want to tell me about. She's grown, she can do that,
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 11: And so I fell asleep and I caught her back
Speaker 11: in like an hour and a half, and she.
Speaker 1: Didn't answy Katy never showed up to meet her sister
Speaker 1: that day. When phone calls went unanswered, Cheyenne felt the
Speaker 1: first wave of panic. She immediately knew that something was
Speaker 1: very wrong.
Speaker 4: Her phone was off.
Speaker 11: And then that's why I kind of started to worry,
Speaker 11: because I'm like, Katie never released her phone, you know,
Speaker 11: Katy never blows me off.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 11: Like twelve thirty one o'clock, I called John. He answered,
Speaker 11: it be someon like he's just woken up. And I said,
Speaker 11: I can't find Katie. And I said, I mean to
Speaker 11: know if she's at your house or.
Speaker 4: If you see your day. Hasn't just tell me, you know?
Speaker 11: He said, no, I don't talk to her anymore, as
Speaker 11: what he said on the phone.
Speaker 1: Desperate to find her sister, Cheyenne did the only thing
Speaker 1: she could think of. She reached out to Katie's a
Speaker 1: strange husband, John, what's your wife?
Speaker 12: Full name Catherine and Wavelt?
Speaker 6: And are you you familved that she's missing? Yeah.
Speaker 1: Twenty eight year old John Blovelt was an active duty
Speaker 1: soldier in the United States Army when Katie went missing.
Speaker 1: He was living and working in Simpsonville as a recruiters.
Speaker 13: Understand, you've been deployed twice, yes, iraq or yeah on
Speaker 13: once the last time I got back.
Speaker 6: Two thousand and ten.
Speaker 12: Has recruiting the obviously a lot different than Yeah.
Speaker 6: That was probably the worst jot of the red Yeah,
Speaker 6: because you know, I joined the army at eighteen to
Speaker 6: fight and ira.
Speaker 13: Yeah, and then they had me sit behind the desk
Speaker 13: and you couldn't get a different assignment. No, it's one
Speaker 13: of it's like one of the armies, and like mandatory
Speaker 13: assignments you to take it.
Speaker 6: Or you get out.
Speaker 1: John and Katie met by chance outside the Army recruiting
Speaker 1: office where he worked. Her job was just a few
Speaker 1: doors down, and one afternoon, during a smoke break, their
Speaker 1: conversations began.
Speaker 6: So me and her just kind of met and started dating.
Speaker 6: I was staying at her house most days during the week,
Speaker 6: at her dad's house.
Speaker 13: And then we finally got an apartment in December, and
Speaker 13: you got married, what year twenty fifteen?
Speaker 1: After they married, it didn't take long for John and
Speaker 1: Katie to realize they weren't as compatible as they'd hoped.
Speaker 1: They barely lived together for two months before the relationship
Speaker 1: fell apart and Katie decided to walk away. She left
Speaker 1: John and the two were officially separated.
Speaker 12: O Kay of stuff, a y'all.
Speaker 6: Arguing about.
Speaker 12: Everything just normal, just normal stuff, people's stuff.
Speaker 13: And then being a recruiter, I talked to a lot
Speaker 13: of different people, So I had two phones, and I
Speaker 13: talked to a lot of females. And she didn't my chest,
Speaker 13: but was my job as a recruiter. I had to
Speaker 13: talk to everybody. Yeah, and she would like that. So
Speaker 13: then we argue about that.
Speaker 6: See, you guys weren't very long at all in two months.
Speaker 1: In October of twenty sixteen, Katie went missing, and naturally,
Speaker 1: her husband was one of the first people police wanted
Speaker 1: to talk to. For the most part, John was open
Speaker 1: and cooperative. He admitted that their marriage had been difficult,
Speaker 1: even horrible at times, but he insisted he'd never laid
Speaker 1: a hand on her or caused her any physical harm.
Speaker 13: I mean we were the worst couple, you know, we argued,
Speaker 13: but I think it was just bad timing, honestly, because
Speaker 13: she was going through some shit.
Speaker 6: I was going through some shit and she's left one day.
Speaker 6: It was the last time you actually saw her, I'd
Speaker 6: say probably July, because she moved out in the April.
Speaker 12: I think have you ever gotten some mad at her?
Speaker 12: That maybe he did something you didn't mean to do?
Speaker 6: Absolutely not, don't.
Speaker 1: So told investigators that he hadn't seen Katie for months,
Speaker 1: and he provided a reasonable alibi for the day she
Speaker 1: went missing.
Speaker 12: Did you work this Monday? What time did you get
Speaker 12: off on Monday?
Speaker 6: Like two thirties too? I don't know where'd you go
Speaker 6: it for home?
Speaker 12: Did you stop anywhere on the way home? Was anybody
Speaker 12: home with you?
Speaker 6: Yeah? My roommates were there.
Speaker 1: John's roommates backed up his story. They told investigators they
Speaker 1: saw him come home from work that day on the
Speaker 1: day that Katie went missing, though they did lose track
Speaker 1: of him later in the evening when he said he
Speaker 1: was going out for a job. Investigators also spoke with
Speaker 1: people who knew both John and Katie and were familiar
Speaker 1: with their relationship. Many described John the same way, polite, disciplined,
Speaker 1: the picture of an army soldier. For them, the idea
Speaker 1: that he could hurt Katie didn't seem possible at all.
Speaker 14: Used to buy a lot, but like.
Speaker 15: He was never like.
Speaker 16: Violent with her when I lived there, and a lot
Speaker 16: of the time it was like really her that like
Speaker 16: started argument.
Speaker 17: What do you think the chances are of the John
Speaker 17: lost his school and did something to her.
Speaker 14: I know he didn't know.
Speaker 18: I've been around hi when he's drunk, quite straight up
Speaker 18: drunk in it, and he's not angry. You know, they've
Speaker 18: gotten really upset and he just he just comes in
Speaker 18: and just cries, like I mean, I've seen him mad.
Speaker 4: But you know, he just yells and that's the end
Speaker 4: of it.
Speaker 1: After looking into John and finding no clear link to
Speaker 1: Katie's disappearance, investigators began to consider other possibilities. They knew
Speaker 1: that after the marriage ended, Katie had started dating again.
Speaker 1: This opened the door to new questions and a different suspect.
Speaker 19: I don't know when her family stile you.
Speaker 6: Hopefully she's been up front with you. Machine in dating
Speaker 6: around a lot.
Speaker 12: Okay, yeah, yeah, we're looking.
Speaker 6: Into some of that.
Speaker 1: Investigators learned that Katie had recently reconnected with an ex boyfriend,
Speaker 1: twenty one year old Wayne Roper. This was a bizarre
Speaker 1: relationship that quickly became the focus of their suspicions, and
Speaker 1: through a series of strange, unsettling events, that relationship led
Speaker 1: detectives to another name, the young man you heard at
Speaker 1: the beginning of this episode, Ricky Hargrove.
Speaker 7: Yesterday, when I was finishing up some assignments in my
Speaker 7: classes online, I got a call from Wayne at around
Speaker 7: one and thirty. Wayne called says, hey, man, can you
Speaker 7: can you come pick me up from work?
Speaker 1: On the night of October twenty fourth, twenty sixteen, Ricky
Speaker 1: received an unexpected phone call. It was from Katie's ex boyfriend,
Speaker 1: Wayne Roper, who asked for a ride home from the
Speaker 1: Walmart art where he worked. Ricky hesitated, then agreed as
Speaker 1: long as he got a little gas money.
Speaker 7: When he got out of the got into the car,
Speaker 7: I say, hey, man, what's up with Katie being missing?
Speaker 7: And he said they haven't been able to find her,
Speaker 7: and they pinged her phone in West Virginia or something,
Speaker 7: and then they pinged it again and it was in Simpsonville.
Speaker 7: And he said, Uh, yeah, there was this house that
Speaker 7: we used to hang out at and I've been wanting
Speaker 7: to check that because I think they that.
Speaker 6: She might be there.
Speaker 1: When Wayne climbed into the passenger seat, his request pot
Speaker 1: Ricky off guard. He wanted to go to a nearby
Speaker 1: abandoned farmhouse, a place that was rumored to be haunted. Strangely,
Speaker 1: Wayne said he thought Katie might be hiding there.
Speaker 7: I get out of the car with him, give him
Speaker 7: my lamp, my head lamb, and we walk in there.
Speaker 7: I'm talking about the house being haunted. I don't want
Speaker 7: anything to do with his and I tell him about
Speaker 7: you know, if we do find her. He says, we're
Speaker 7: going to call the cops. And I say, I got
Speaker 7: a bunch of wheat in there, and then I'm not
Speaker 7: expected to find her at all in there. And I
Speaker 7: was just kind of dismissive whenever we go in there.
Speaker 7: We checked all the upstairs rooms, and then when we
Speaker 7: get done checking those, we go downstairs.
Speaker 1: Reluctantly, Ricky drove Wayne to the abandoned farmhouse and together
Speaker 1: they searched the dark, empty rooms for any sign of Katie.
Speaker 1: After several minutes of searching, and after they made their
Speaker 1: way into the basement, Wayne Roper pulled out his phone
Speaker 1: and dialed nine one one.
Speaker 19: The pasion of your emergency.
Speaker 17: I was.
Speaker 5: In the woods.
Speaker 19: My friend.
Speaker 20: Uh, she's been missing for for I think thirty hours now,
Speaker 20: and we went into the woods where we used to
Speaker 20: all hang out at and there's a house there, and
Speaker 20: we went looking for her there, just in case, like
Speaker 20: she might be there staying or something. And we found
Speaker 20: her in the in the bottom part in the basement, covered.
Speaker 19: Up with pieces of wood. Okay, like was she was?
Speaker 19: She still alive?
Speaker 20: Mister nervous on She's pale.
Speaker 19: So she was pale and unresponsive. Yes, are you still
Speaker 19: there with her? No, sir, I walked away. I couldn't.
Speaker 19: Is anybody still there with her? Mister?
Speaker 1: That night, the body of twenty two year old Katie
Speaker 1: Blavelt was found in the basement of an abandoned farmhouse.
Speaker 1: She'd been covered with planks of rotting wood, and an
Speaker 1: autopsy later revealed she'd been brutally stabbed to death. Simpsonville
Speaker 1: wasn't the kind of place where people normally vanished or
Speaker 1: where murder made the nightly news. When it did, everyone
Speaker 1: knew about it, naturally. Solving Katie's murder became a top
Speaker 1: priority for local investigators, but answers didn't come quickly. Nearly
Speaker 1: a decade would pass before a jury would finally hear
Speaker 1: the case, and even then the truth was anything but certain.
Speaker 1: On October twenty third, twenty sixteen, twenty two year old
Speaker 1: Katie Blavelt was supposed to meet her younger sister after work,
Speaker 1: but by that evening she was missing. The following day,
Speaker 1: investigators began piecing together what little they knew, a troubled
Speaker 1: marriage with an army recruiter, a recent separation. At a
Speaker 1: late night drive to an abandoned farmhouse, that's where two
Speaker 1: young men, Wayne Roper and Ricky Hargrove claimed to have
Speaker 1: made a discovery they'd never forget. It was Wayne, who
Speaker 1: happened to be Katie's ex boyfriend, who reached for his
Speaker 1: phone and dialed nine one one.
Speaker 20: I was worried about my friends Kady, and she would
Speaker 20: have missed it. She's been missing for a while now.
Speaker 20: And who came in this house that we used to
Speaker 20: hanging all an elegance?
Speaker 10: And what's more, what's wrong with her?
Speaker 21: Sir?
Speaker 15: We fold her in himself?
Speaker 20: La, you found her what we fell? We found my
Speaker 20: friend Katie border did in?
Speaker 11: Okay?
Speaker 20: Okay?
Speaker 1: In other words, she's dead in that?
Speaker 11: Are you saying she's dead in the house?
Speaker 17: Now?
Speaker 5: Now you're sure she's dead.
Speaker 17: She's not breathing, is she cold?
Speaker 6: She's very real?
Speaker 20: And there was no response.
Speaker 22: There's no response? Okay, sir?
Speaker 19: And what's your name?
Speaker 20: Wayne's profra.
Speaker 1: After Wayne made this call, officers quickly arrived at the scene,
Speaker 1: and the search for Katie Blauvelt came to an end.
Speaker 1: Her body was found in the basement of the abandoned farmhouse,
Speaker 1: stuffed into a narrow cement opening and covered with planks
Speaker 1: of rotting wood. An autopsy later revealed the cause of death.
Speaker 1: She'd been stabbed multiple times, including twice in the neck.
Speaker 1: A fragment of the knife used to kill her was
Speaker 1: still lodged in her throat. Investigators later concluded that the
Speaker 1: murder had taken place somewhere else, likely nearby, perhaps in
Speaker 1: the driveway, and that Katie's body had been dragged into
Speaker 1: the basement in a hurried attempt to hide the crime.
Speaker 1: Now that Katie had been found and the case had
Speaker 1: shifted from a missing person to a homicide investigation, detectives
Speaker 1: turned their attention to the man who claimed to have
Speaker 1: discovered her body, Katie's ex boyfriend, Wayne Roper.
Speaker 6: Jemmy, how did you meet Kate? I'm going to school
Speaker 6: with her, Chris.
Speaker 2: Class.
Speaker 6: Y'all the same age. She's two twenty one.
Speaker 15: She's a few months older man, But y'all were inside.
Speaker 6: Gray she's a year buy okay, and the classes together.
Speaker 6: Y'all mate the.
Speaker 15: Bus together, and we also had the same watch a
Speaker 15: first met her of her friends at first.
Speaker 23: And then we dated for.
Speaker 6: Like a month or so.
Speaker 1: Wayne explained that his relationship with Katie had been a
Speaker 1: brief high school Flint, and then after they broke up,
Speaker 1: the two remained friends. Years later, after Katie married army
Speaker 1: recruiter John Blauvelt, Wayne ended up moving into their home.
Speaker 1: In a strange twist, he had become a housemate to
Speaker 1: his ex girlfriend and her new husband.
Speaker 12: John offered me.
Speaker 6: To move in within a roommate, so you lived with
Speaker 6: her and her husband.
Speaker 16: Yeah, it's weird.
Speaker 6: Did he know that when you moved in? Yeah?
Speaker 1: According to Wayne, John was aware of his past relationship
Speaker 1: with Katie and never seemed to be bothered by it.
Speaker 1: In fact, after a night of heavy drinking, Wayne claimed
Speaker 1: he was invited into their bedroom.
Speaker 5: When you were living with John A kat how often
Speaker 5: we all been intimate with each other?
Speaker 19: It was the long ones.
Speaker 6: And John was there or not there?
Speaker 1: It was and you know it.
Speaker 6: How did you not know it?
Speaker 12: I hate it was looking through something. And after that,
Speaker 12: like he just changed.
Speaker 6: And how did that come about? I only drinking, he
Speaker 6: was drunking. You know, that's the right idea.
Speaker 24: I can see where that might call some friction. But
Speaker 24: you continued to live there. Yeah, I mean he didn't
Speaker 24: say anything verbally to me, you know, and I just
Speaker 24: thought everything was gonna be okay.
Speaker 15: Then they started having arguments because of me, because she
Speaker 15: told me that he was jealous of me.
Speaker 12: Their arguments are eating worse.
Speaker 1: Wayne described how John and Katie's marriage had fallen apart,
Speaker 1: marked by constant fighting and tension in the house. Eventually,
Speaker 1: Katie moved out, and a few months later Wayne did
Speaker 1: as well. Then, after Katie went missing, Wayne claimed he
Speaker 1: had just decided on a whim to go look for
Speaker 1: her at the old abandoned farmhouse where her body was found.
Speaker 6: Tell me about the band in the house. I didn't
Speaker 6: you know about it. We used to go there and
Speaker 6: drink all the time. But I didn't get off of
Speaker 6: work until eleven.
Speaker 15: Now called called Ricky and see if you give me
Speaker 15: a ride, And yeah, I was almost home from work,
Speaker 15: and I asked him if he would undertake me together
Speaker 15: the band house to look. I used a flashlight to
Speaker 15: go in there, and I was looking at the fire
Speaker 15: flash flight. It was a headline, okay, And I was
Speaker 15: looking on the ground for any footprints or trash or anything.
Speaker 1: Wayne said he went to the abandoned farmhouse in the
Speaker 1: middle of the night to look for Katie, which was
Speaker 1: something investigators immediately found unusual and highly suspicious.
Speaker 12: Then we went down to the basement.
Speaker 15: I looked at her in that conquered thing, and I
Speaker 15: seen her jacket looks.
Speaker 6: At the I see her, Hey, you know it was her.
Speaker 15: She was missing, Like it's the first thing that thought
Speaker 15: in my head. Am sure that we ran out of there,
Speaker 15: and then once I got to the to the road.
Speaker 14: I called on.
Speaker 1: Investigators also spoke with the young man who had driven
Speaker 1: Wayne to the farmhouse, Ricky Hargrove. His account of that
Speaker 1: night largely matched Wayne's version of events.
Speaker 7: And then he looks down and he said that I
Speaker 7: think he said there she is, Oh my god. And
Speaker 7: then I looked playing stattered. I said, oh my god.
Speaker 7: I turned around and hears him say Katie, like trying
Speaker 7: to wake her up or something, and I'm like, dude,
Speaker 7: I think she's dead. I'm kind of going up the
Speaker 7: steps by then, and he comes up behind me when
Speaker 7: they's pulling out his phone, calling IDEM.
Speaker 1: Naturally, investigators were puzzled by this story. Something about it
Speaker 1: just didn't add up. It was strange enough that these
Speaker 1: two guys had randomly decided to search for Katie in
Speaker 1: the middle of the night, but even stranger was the
Speaker 1: first place they looked they found her body. Detectives knew
Speaker 1: something wasn't right. One of them, or maybe both, had
Speaker 1: to be lying.
Speaker 6: Why didn't you call the place? They already put out
Speaker 6: a report and I'm talking about all.
Speaker 5: This conversation about the abandoned house. I'm just curious, why
Speaker 5: didn't you refer it and say, hey, look i'm.
Speaker 6: Holding over there, and look, I didn't think of it.
Speaker 4: I didn't.
Speaker 6: That's kind of odd.
Speaker 19: It's just like.
Speaker 6: I just didn't expect anything to be there.
Speaker 5: You did a call and said, hey, I don't know
Speaker 5: if he's any truth to the is, but I've heard
Speaker 5: people talking and there's.
Speaker 6: No man in the house down here, and you all
Speaker 6: may want to check that.
Speaker 12: That makes sense to me.
Speaker 5: Putting on a headlamp while a miner ain't going to
Speaker 5: bed there at midnight don't make no sense to me.
Speaker 1: Another detail that bothered investigators was that Katie's car wasn't
Speaker 1: at the scene. It had actually been found the day before,
Speaker 1: abandoned in a parking lot several miles from the farmhouse,
Speaker 1: with its license plates removed. So when Wayne and Ricky
Speaker 1: showed up at that old house, investigators had to wonder
Speaker 1: why go inside at all? If Katie's car wasn't there,
Speaker 1: what made them think she would be?
Speaker 6: Did you think she was dead?
Speaker 17: No?
Speaker 5: I didn't, okay, because there's no cars there, so one
Speaker 5: of the odds if she's really there, that she would
Speaker 5: be Okay, I just I.
Speaker 6: Mean, help me understand. I mean, I don't know. I'm trying.
Speaker 6: I'm trying to get it.
Speaker 5: Because you drive up there because you're you're kind of
Speaker 5: worried about her. When you get there, there's no cars, right,
Speaker 5: So what's the probability that she's really there?
Speaker 6: How was she had gotten there? You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 6: this is just you know she was dead.
Speaker 1: Detectives pressed Wayne with simple questions, one that should have
Speaker 1: been easy to answer, but instead of explanations, they got
Speaker 1: shoulder shrugs and a string of I don't know.
Speaker 6: It's really hard for me.
Speaker 5: To get through my brain that you got hundreds of
Speaker 5: ball for phil officers looking for this little girl that.
Speaker 6: You said was a friend of yours.
Speaker 5: We're peening phone, we're subpoenaing records, we're trying to find
Speaker 5: this squirrel because people that love her are trying to
Speaker 5: find her, and yet you.
Speaker 6: And other guy in there, the first place they look,
Speaker 6: they find her. What are the odds of that?
Speaker 21: What do you mean?
Speaker 6: I think they's a sail of men. You had a
Speaker 6: bunch of options.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but if you really cared about her, why didn't
Speaker 5: you tell somebody.
Speaker 6: Why didn't you get somebody else in it? Why would
Speaker 6: you think the best idea is for you to walk
Speaker 6: into what turns out today her final resting.
Speaker 5: Place where somebody murdered her and dumped her down there
Speaker 5: like a piece of trash.
Speaker 6: Why do you think the best solution for you and
Speaker 6: Richie is.
Speaker 5: To go up there and put your DNA all over
Speaker 5: a murder crime, saying why.
Speaker 12: I just I didn't think about that.
Speaker 1: Listening to this interview, it's not difficult to figure out
Speaker 1: what investigators were thinking. They clearly believe that Wayne already
Speaker 1: knew what had happened to Katie, He probably knew where
Speaker 1: her body was, and this so called discovery had been
Speaker 1: completely staged.
Speaker 5: And we need to decide whether we're going to continue
Speaker 5: to risk being accessory before after the factual murder, helping
Speaker 5: dispose of a body after it was already dead, or
Speaker 5: play stupid and ended.
Speaker 6: Up getting charged with all of it.
Speaker 14: Yeah, I'll be good right now.
Speaker 5: We can't put your hand being the one that killed
Speaker 5: that girl, but you finding her there, that's way too
Speaker 5: big of a quiescence for me, Powell, So I'm not
Speaker 5: opposed to him. For anybody has made him say, Wayne,
Speaker 5: but I can't help you if you don't.
Speaker 6: Tell me the truth.
Speaker 14: You're telling me the truth.
Speaker 6: You're telling me part of the truth. I'm telling you
Speaker 6: the full truth. I've told you of it.
Speaker 16: Then.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I told us everything in that Wayne, But it's
Speaker 6: time for you to do that, okay.
Speaker 1: Investigators kept pressing Wayne for what they believed was the truth,
Speaker 1: but no matter how hard they pushed, he stood by
Speaker 1: his story that he'd simply found Kittie's body and he
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with her death or how she
Speaker 1: ended up in the farmhouse.
Speaker 25: No, you took that your poor unsuspecting friend right down
Speaker 25: the crowd stay because you knew exactly where she was,
Speaker 25: and you couldn't send that that she was gonna be
Speaker 25: there and might not be found.
Speaker 6: That's what I think happened. You took that boy in
Speaker 6: there so you could find her body.
Speaker 14: No one didn't.
Speaker 6: I'm telling you the full truth. I've told you everything
Speaker 6: that I can think of.
Speaker 12: What kind of hand did you have in putting her
Speaker 12: body there?
Speaker 6: None at all? None, whatever, none, whatsoever.
Speaker 1: Despite the investigator's efforts, Wayne stuck to his story and
Speaker 1: to his claim of innocence. After several hours of questioning.
Speaker 1: Both he and Ricky Hargrove were released and sent home.
Speaker 1: From there, the focus shifted to the farmhouse itself. Detectives
Speaker 1: began narrowing down their list of suspects by looking for
Speaker 1: anyone who not only knew about Katie but was familiar
Speaker 1: with the property. They soon learned the house had a reputation.
Speaker 1: It was a popular hangout spot for local teenagers looking
Speaker 1: to drink or get high.
Speaker 26: Because the abandoned house that she was found in, like
Speaker 26: it was released in the news, was a high school
Speaker 26: hangout for us. We'd go over there and chill sometimes.
Speaker 26: But uh, the only people that really knew about the
Speaker 26: house was the immediate group, which was me, Cameron, Wayne,
Speaker 26: who found Katie, Cyane, Ali, Nick, and John.
Speaker 1: When detectives reviewed the names of people connected to the farmhouse,
Speaker 1: one caught their attention. John Blavel, Katie's husband. He was
Speaker 1: thirty and an army recruiter. So what was he doing
Speaker 1: hanging around a known teenage party hotspot?
Speaker 12: Are you familiar with this abandoned house?
Speaker 6: Yeah, okay, that's the spot.
Speaker 12: That's like, what's the stuf hangout spot? I've been there
Speaker 12: a couple of times. So when was the last time
Speaker 12: you were there, like a week ago, a month ago,
Speaker 12: spend months.
Speaker 1: When asked, John admitted he was familiar with the farmhouse.
Speaker 1: He'd partied there before with some local teenagers, but he
Speaker 1: claimed he hadn't been there in months. Even if that
Speaker 1: was true, investigators couldn't ignore how strange it was for
Speaker 1: a nearly thirty year old army recruiter to be socializing
Speaker 1: with high school students. As they dug deeper, they learned
Speaker 1: that John's job often brought him into contact with juniors
Speaker 1: and seniors, and that drinking with them had apparently become
Speaker 1: part of his routine. Many of those students said they
Speaker 1: admired him, and why wouldn't they. It was a good
Speaker 1: looking soldier with a confident smile in a uniform that
Speaker 1: commanded respect. On the surface, he looked like a man
Speaker 1: who had his life in order, disciplined, trustworthy, the kind
Speaker 1: of person parents might even encourage their kids to follow.
Speaker 1: But beneath that polished exterior, investigators were hearing something very different.
Speaker 1: According to several of those same teenagers, it wasn't unusual
Speaker 1: for John to invite potential recruits back to his house,
Speaker 1: where he'd let them drink and get high.
Speaker 26: He was doing recruitment thing and I guess he wasn't
Speaker 26: meeting his quota, so she had. He had told her
Speaker 26: to invite some friends over to smoke and then he
Speaker 26: would do the recruitment stuff then and then that's how
Speaker 26: we met him.
Speaker 6: So it was a pretty such study.
Speaker 15: That's a hangout or if I had your rights back
Speaker 15: then to hang out drugs, drink alcohol.
Speaker 1: As investigators spoke with these teenagers, they began to get
Speaker 1: a clearer picture of John and Katie's relationship. What they
Speaker 1: learned didn't quite match the simple and amicable separation story
Speaker 1: John had been telling during the.
Speaker 23: Time that you were around when they were together, did
Speaker 23: you ever see any violence between the two of the
Speaker 23: many arguing.
Speaker 26: Yes, yes, there was frequent. They were always fighting about
Speaker 26: something and then John would always be yelling and screaming
Speaker 26: at her, and then they would go in their room
Speaker 26: and locked the dole in this fight. And we wouldn't
Speaker 26: see any of it like visually, but there was a
Speaker 26: we could always hear it.
Speaker 1: Investigators eventually discovered that before her death, Katie had filed
Speaker 1: a police report with a different department than the one
Speaker 1: handling her murder case. In that report, she stated that
Speaker 1: John had threatened to kill her and her entire family.
Speaker 27: Katie filed a criminal domestic violence report with Fountain In
Speaker 27: Police in January, and in the report, she detailed a
Speaker 27: fight that she had had with her husband a month earlier,
Speaker 27: where he threatened her several times at home with a revolver,
Speaker 27: threatening to kill her if she would not open or
Speaker 27: unlock her phone. The report went on to say that
Speaker 27: John Blofeld grabbed his shotgun, both sets of keys, and
Speaker 27: left the house, saying he was going to kill everybody
Speaker 27: she knows.
Speaker 1: Following this incident, Katie made up her mind to leave John.
Speaker 1: She went to the police and reported what had happened.
Speaker 1: Within days, officers were at the door to arrest him.
Speaker 13: She's left one day, it was like a Tuesday, and
Speaker 13: then she came back Friday with the entire Fountain police barman,
Speaker 13: and it was a pretty big scene.
Speaker 6: Were our thing.
Speaker 1: When police arrived at John's door, he was drinking and
Speaker 1: getting high with high school students.
Speaker 26: And then the night that it happened, when the cops
Speaker 26: showed up, he was I'm not sure what he was on,
Speaker 26: but he was running around the house waving guns saying
Speaker 26: that he wasn't gonna let the cops in and that
Speaker 26: he would rather like use the gun before he let
Speaker 26: them in.
Speaker 6: So is this the night he got arrested? Yes, Okay.
Speaker 1: Strangely, when officers arrested John, it wasn't for threatening Katie
Speaker 1: with a gun, even though she'd file the report saying
Speaker 1: he had. Instead, he was charged with contributing to the
Speaker 1: delinquency of a minor for drinking and using drugs with teenagers.
Speaker 1: After the arrest, the Army was notified and John's recruiting
Speaker 1: duties were suspended pending investigation.
Speaker 13: Because of the civil investigation, online recruiting newies have been suspended.
Speaker 6: So I've literally been sitting here since about March.
Speaker 12: During the day, just off his touchstone, playing on the phone.
Speaker 1: John knew that the Army's investigation was mostly a formality.
Speaker 1: He knew what the outcome would be. He'd be found
Speaker 1: guilty and discharged, ending a ten year military career with
Speaker 1: a dishonorable record after a decade of service, He'd essentially
Speaker 1: destroyed everything he'd built. But instead of any self reflection,
Speaker 1: instead of admitting that giving alcohol and drugs to teenagers
Speaker 1: might have been a bad idea. John looked for someone
Speaker 1: to blame. All of his anger landed squarely on as
Speaker 1: soon to be ex wife Katie Blovel, And I.
Speaker 4: Do you think kind of went back for a little while.
Speaker 4: He looks like that he's losing his job. He just
Speaker 4: blames it all. And I don't know if this matters.
Speaker 11: Or not, but I know he hasn't gone a fifty
Speaker 11: thousand dollars life insurance policy aren't here.
Speaker 1: As John waited for the army to discharge him, his
Speaker 1: behavior didn't change. He continued drinking with the high school students,
Speaker 1: and according to several of them, he often talked about
Speaker 1: Katie's life insurance policy and his desire to see her dead.
Speaker 2: I was over there one day with a bunch of
Speaker 2: friends and, like John, like he plotted out ways to
Speaker 2: like kill her, but it was joking.
Speaker 1: Incredibly, John also offered a sixteen year old girl fifty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars to help him build a false alibi. He
Speaker 1: planned to have this teenager drive his car and take
Speaker 1: his phone to Charleston so it would appear he'd left town,
Speaker 1: when in reality he'd still be in Simpsonville killing Katie.
Speaker 4: And he was like, do you want to go to Charleston,
Speaker 4: and I was like, he doesn't longer tells me?
Speaker 28: Yeah, me to what?
Speaker 12: And he's as long as he.
Speaker 4: Was take my car on the phone. And I was
Speaker 4: like me, you and cy in and he was like no, no,
Speaker 4: just dude.
Speaker 9: I realized a why and he was like, I can't
Speaker 9: really tell you and he was like no, I didn't
Speaker 9: want to tell me.
Speaker 4: And I was like, well, why, I know, why do you?
Speaker 4: He like, hit my car, I'm going my credit card,
Speaker 4: that's what you wanted to do.
Speaker 11: And he was drunk and he was like, I'm getting
Speaker 11: feel okay, he was gonna get I left the tanking
Speaker 11: his credit card in his phone to Charleston.
Speaker 4: Well, he asked why and he said so it look
Speaker 4: like I was in ust. And he asked him what
Speaker 4: he was gonna do what she wasn't Charleston.
Speaker 21: He said he was.
Speaker 10: Gonna kill Katie and he would give her fifteen thousand dollars,
Speaker 10: which is the exact amount of life and transposing naturally.
Speaker 1: After hearing these things about John, investigators confronted him with
Speaker 1: the act accusations. John denied it all.
Speaker 12: Have you ever and probably jokingly, I would assume, made
Speaker 12: a statement.
Speaker 17: To any of your friends about wanting.
Speaker 6: To kill Katie.
Speaker 12: Ever said you know, well if Katie dies, you know
Speaker 12: we'll get some money or want money to do anything with.
Speaker 23: Have you ever gone up to any friends and said, hey,
Speaker 23: would you do me a favor and take my car,
Speaker 23: take my keys, my debit card, my phone, go away
Speaker 23: for the weekend to Charleston, say, and that'll make it
Speaker 23: look like I'm out of town so I can kill Katie.
Speaker 12: No, so, somebody who told us that they're making that up?
Speaker 6: I believe so. Yeah.
Speaker 1: After being confronted with the accusations, John pointed the finger
Speaker 1: at Katie's family, claiming they were spreading lies about him.
Speaker 1: In his version of events, he was the real victim
Speaker 1: and just as hurt as everyone else who loved Katie.
Speaker 13: That's the same type of shit that from out her
Speaker 13: found now for the last fucking two weeks, and I'm
Speaker 13: getting kind of sick of it because I don't feel
Speaker 13: safe in my house anymore. Fucking dirt bag ass family,
Speaker 13: Well you gotta understand right now, they're going through a
Speaker 13: lot too, trying to understand. But I'm going through the
Speaker 13: same fucking shit.
Speaker 6: I lost a friend. Maybe not the best life, but
Speaker 6: I lost the fucking friend.
Speaker 1: There was another crucial element in this investigation, one that
Speaker 1: would eventually give investigators their best shot at justice for Katie.
Speaker 1: It's entered around a teenage girl named Hannah Thompsons.
Speaker 17: A sort of hand I tell me about her, hear
Speaker 17: and John like a couple.
Speaker 4: And John I've been.
Speaker 12: Sorting together, I guess for like.
Speaker 4: Seven eight months.
Speaker 6: Seven months so pretty much since he and Katie stood up.
Speaker 1: While John and Katie were still living together, John began
Speaker 1: sleeping with seventeen year old Hannah Thompson, and after Katie
Speaker 1: moved out, Hannah became John's living girlfriend. Once investigators learned
Speaker 1: about Hannah and her connection to John, they were of
Speaker 1: course eager to speak with her.
Speaker 12: When was the last time you saw Katie, like a
Speaker 12: few months ago, what was her feelings shorts for?
Speaker 8: I mean, I always like, I've always seen her as
Speaker 8: like a friend, because like you know, she always told
Speaker 8: me that she's like here for me if.
Speaker 4: I are need day thing.
Speaker 17: So it's a very saying you were good turns slither.
Speaker 12: Once she was killed.
Speaker 9: We had a good relationship, like we were a little
Speaker 9: kind of close.
Speaker 17: John never make any mention of life insurance policy.
Speaker 19: In her I don't know.
Speaker 12: He never talked to me about it, has ever joked
Speaker 12: around about things to be better.
Speaker 17: If she's dead, I should kill her he joked about that. Yes.
Speaker 1: Within moments of speaking with Hannah, investigators were fairly certain
Speaker 1: of one thing. She was trying to cover for John.
Speaker 1: In other words, she was lying to protect him, which
Speaker 1: was an extremely dumb thing to do.
Speaker 17: We've been working the space steady since she disappeared, so
Speaker 17: there's a lot of these things that we know the answers.
Speaker 17: I can tell you already you're lying to me. Okay,
Speaker 17: you do not want to get wrapped up and catch
Speaker 17: the murder charge. You're seventeen years old. You know your
Speaker 17: entire life, and you may love John, and you may
Speaker 17: think you two him to get married and walk down
Speaker 17: yellow brick Road.
Speaker 6: Okay, but no man and.
Speaker 17: No woman is worth going to prison.
Speaker 1: Investigators gave Hannah the typical pep talk about honesty, consequences,
Speaker 1: and the importance of coming clean, but none of it
Speaker 1: seemed to sink in.
Speaker 6: When you told me earlier that you and John aren't
Speaker 6: an item, that was a lot right.
Speaker 21: No, they're not.
Speaker 4: Really a leagal loss.
Speaker 6: So who are you doing.
Speaker 9: I'm not dating anybody.
Speaker 6: But if you look at your.
Speaker 13: Facebook, sass, you just posted on Sunday that we're currently
Speaker 13: in the most amazing relationship ever something along those lines.
Speaker 6: So who was that relationship with on Sunday it was, I.
Speaker 9: Mean, it was with John, But we're not like in
Speaker 9: a relationship.
Speaker 14: We're not dating.
Speaker 4: I just have a good relationship with him.
Speaker 1: Well, Hannah denied being in a romantic relationship with John.
Speaker 1: Investigators only turned up the pressure. They were clearly convinced
Speaker 1: that she knew a lot more than she was saying.
Speaker 10: Well, after me and John started like getting together, Katy
Speaker 10: started not liking me.
Speaker 4: And I'm going to say it right now, I'm like,
Speaker 4: she was not nice sometimes, but she did.
Speaker 9: Not deserve that.
Speaker 8: What she deserves right now is for us to figure
Speaker 8: out who did this. Oh I know, I know, And
Speaker 8: at this point nobody needs to cover for anybody. If
Speaker 8: you know something and you're trying to cover up for it,
Speaker 8: you're going to go down with the rest of them.
Speaker 8: You're going to go down with the person.
Speaker 9: Who did this to her.
Speaker 10: I don't know anything about you, do.
Speaker 6: We will do you do? We know more than anything
Speaker 6: which is evident.
Speaker 12: I don't.
Speaker 3: Got it because you know who else can't talk right now?
Speaker 4: It is Katie.
Speaker 6: She's ever talk again.
Speaker 1: Investigators kept pressing Hannah, but they went too far. The
Speaker 1: moment they showed her the photos of Katie's body, the
Speaker 1: interview fell apart.
Speaker 6: What do you think about.
Speaker 17: Somebody that would sad girl in the neck to the
Speaker 17: point where the knife went all the way through to
Speaker 17: the other side, and then stick her body like a
Speaker 17: piece of trash in the basement of an A band
Speaker 17: has to sit there for a day and a half
Speaker 17: before somebody finds her.
Speaker 12: Let's go right here.
Speaker 11: I want to look at her.
Speaker 4: I don't want to do this anymore.
Speaker 17: I don't want to do what.
Speaker 3: I don't want to us find out who Kilbert.
Speaker 6: I'll go w Is tell the truth.
Speaker 17: It will be.
Speaker 6: You gotta tell you something To tell the truth.
Speaker 17: You don't have to try.
Speaker 6: It just flows. It just comes out.
Speaker 4: Please leave, Hannah. This is a friend of yours and
Speaker 4: I'm trying to do I don't listening. You listen to
Speaker 4: me for just a second.
Speaker 3: This is a friend of yours, or was a friend
Speaker 3: of verse, and somebody brutally marked Okay, Unfortunately you are
Speaker 3: right in the middle of all of this, and for
Speaker 3: to sit here and lie to us to.
Speaker 4: Begin with, is not helping you at all.
Speaker 1: Before long had abruptly stood up walked out of the room,
Speaker 1: and the investigators had no choice but to let or go.
Speaker 1: Around the same time, their interview with John ended as well,
Speaker 1: after he refused a light detector test and said he'd
Speaker 1: be contacting a lawyer.
Speaker 12: I'm just gonna ask you to be a point blank.
Speaker 12: Did you cop Kate?
Speaker 29: No?
Speaker 12: Do you have it killed her?
Speaker 17: No?
Speaker 12: Would you be willing to take pographs? So we can
Speaker 12: go ahead and do that with you and eliminate you and.
Speaker 4: Start looking about that first.
Speaker 6: Okay, see what he says, because I don't know about
Speaker 6: that at all.
Speaker 1: By this point, investigators had gathered a good amount of
Speaker 1: evidence against John. Several interviews with friends and acquaintances painted
Speaker 1: the disturbing picture of John repeatedly talking about killing Katie
Speaker 1: and hiding your body. One witness said that John even
Speaker 1: offered them money to help him create a false alibi.
Speaker 1: Investigators also knew John had a documented history of domestic
Speaker 1: violence towards Katie and that he was the sole beneficiary
Speaker 1: of her life insurance policy. Also, cell phone records placed
Speaker 1: John's phone near the park a lot where Katie's car
Speaker 1: was abandoned at the exact time it was left there.
Speaker 1: Despite all of this, investigators decided to hold off on
Speaker 1: arresting John, wanting more time to strengthen their case. They
Speaker 1: let John walk out of the interview room. This was
Speaker 1: a decision that would turn out to be a very
Speaker 1: big mistake.
Speaker 27: Hannah Thompson's mother reported her missing yesterday to the fountain
Speaker 27: In Police department. The report states that the teen was
Speaker 27: last seen on October thirtieth. Hannah's mother told police that
Speaker 27: her daughter is believed to be with John Blofeld, the
Speaker 27: known homicide suspect. Investigators told Hannah's mom that Hannah's bank
Speaker 27: account has been left untouched since her last paycheck.
Speaker 1: In November of twenty sixteen, When investigators went looking for
Speaker 1: John and Hannah again, both of them were gone, no note,
Speaker 1: no warning, no trace. They had simply vanished. Their phones
Speaker 1: were dead, their car missing, and every lead hit a
Speaker 1: dead end. Overnight, the prime suspect of his teenage girlfriend
Speaker 1: had disappeared into the wind, leaving behind a grieving family
Speaker 1: in an open murder case. For the next six long years,
Speaker 1: the investigation into Katie's death would remain frozen in place,
Speaker 1: just waiting for the day that John Blauvelt finally resurfaced.
Speaker 1: In November of twenty sixteen, the investigation into Katie Blovelt's
Speaker 1: murder took a shocking turn. Her estranged husband, the prime suspect,
Speaker 1: army recruiter John Blovelt, had disappeared. It fled town with
Speaker 1: his teenage girlfriend, Hannah Thompson, and nobody seemed to know
Speaker 1: where they might have gone well.
Speaker 27: Twenty eight year old John Blofeld is charged with murder
Speaker 27: in the death of his wife, Catherine, who went by Katie.
Speaker 27: Katie's body was found in an abandoned house in Simpsonville
Speaker 27: back on October twenty sixth. Investigators say she was killed
Speaker 27: with a knife two days earlier. Her husband was last
Speaker 27: seen on November fifteenth in New Mexico and remains on
Speaker 27: the run Simpsonville police. The investigators believe that he's with
Speaker 27: his seventeen year old girlfriend.
Speaker 1: After John and Hannah fled, police spent weeks chasing scattered
Speaker 1: tips across state lines, but nothing brought them any closer
Speaker 1: to finding the couple or even knowing where they might
Speaker 1: be hiding. For Katie's mom and the rest of her family,
Speaker 1: this was a crushing setback because.
Speaker 30: Losing your child, I mean, losing a member of the
Speaker 30: family's hard, but losing your child is just unbearable. And
Speaker 30: then in the beginning, we had hopes that we knew
Speaker 30: John did it. We just you know, hearts you knew
Speaker 30: John did it, but police have to go through their
Speaker 30: steps before they can serve once and get him. And
Speaker 30: waiting was hard.
Speaker 1: But we thought, you know, we know where they got
Speaker 1: him to get him.
Speaker 30: But then when he ran our hearts sunk.
Speaker 11: Like now what.
Speaker 1: Weeks turned into months and there were still no credible
Speaker 1: signs of John or Hannah. Then, just when it seemed
Speaker 1: like all hope was lost, Hannah Thompson walked into a
Speaker 1: police station and turned herself in.
Speaker 22: Obviously, we brought you in here today because we wanted
Speaker 22: to talk to you about the trade of about everything
Speaker 22: that's been going on with you. That let me tell
Speaker 22: you that we are very glad that you're back and
Speaker 22: that you're safe, and that's nothing bad.
Speaker 14: Happened to you.
Speaker 1: After Hannah returned to Simpsonville, investigators wasted no time to
Speaker 1: find John. They needed to know what they'd been doing
Speaker 1: while they were gone.
Speaker 14: Well, where did you go first?
Speaker 31: When you guys first left from the Simpsonville Fountain area?
Speaker 14: Where'd you guys go? We went to Startenberg first because John.
Speaker 16: Had a friend that he worked with that said that
Speaker 16: we could park.
Speaker 14: The car in his yard to sleep there, and so
Speaker 14: we did that for a few days, and then.
Speaker 16: He drove like for two days straight, like not sleeping
Speaker 16: or anything like, through Georgia and then oh, then he drew.
Speaker 14: He basically drove all the way to Texas, where we're
Speaker 14: going to sleep.
Speaker 1: According to Hannah, she and John hit the road and
Speaker 1: never looked back. They drove through several states, living like fugitives,
Speaker 1: mostly sleeping in their car, always on the move, and
Speaker 1: always looking over their shoulder.
Speaker 14: What was the game plan when you guys left? I
Speaker 14: don't think we really had one, Like I guess both
Speaker 14: of us just kind of panicked, and he decided that
Speaker 14: he wanted to leave, like the stay and.
Speaker 4: He told me that we were going to leave, and
Speaker 4: I was like, Okay, what.
Speaker 14: Was the reason for panicking? I think that was like
Speaker 14: around the time that like you and like the other
Speaker 14: investors had been like texting me and he wouldn't let
Speaker 14: me reply or anything.
Speaker 1: Hannah told investigators that John had simply panicked. He knew
Speaker 1: it was only a matter of time before he was arrested,
Speaker 1: so he ran. As for Hannah, she claimed she'd only
Speaker 1: left with John because he'd convinced her that she had
Speaker 1: no other options.
Speaker 32: He just kept telling me that if I talked to anybody,
Speaker 32: that I was going to jail. When I went back home,
Speaker 32: I was going to jail. I left him, I was
Speaker 32: going to jail. Like he just kept saying that, like
Speaker 32: pretty much every day. He made me believe that, like
Speaker 32: he knew what was best for me, and he.
Speaker 1: Like keeping me saved, like and I explained that. After
Speaker 1: several weeks on the run, the couple made it all
Speaker 1: the way to Oregon. That's where John's paranoia began to
Speaker 1: take over. It was unraveling more and more each day
Speaker 1: and panicking over the smallest things. Then one afternoon at McDonald's,
Speaker 1: his anxiety finally got the better of him.
Speaker 14: He stopped doing in McDonald's. And he's gonna use like
Speaker 14: Wi Fi.
Speaker 32: Because that's usually when we would go, like start with
Speaker 32: to McDonald's to get the whig fire.
Speaker 14: And he like went to go finding tables, and I
Speaker 14: went to the bathroom, and then when I came out,
Speaker 14: he was like he like packed everything up like really
Speaker 14: fast and like go like right now. And I'm like
Speaker 14: asking him why, and he just wasn't like talking to me.
Speaker 19: He was just like we just got to go.
Speaker 14: And we got in the car and he like he
Speaker 14: just kind of like threw the lapstop like on my
Speaker 14: lap and like basically for it out of McDonald's. And
Speaker 14: I had asked him, like what's going on, Like what's wrong.
Speaker 14: He's like I can't talk right now, and he's like
Speaker 14: I'm trying to focus.
Speaker 1: Don had seemingly snapped. It began driving like a madman,
Speaker 1: weaving through the winding roads of Eugene, Oregon, pushing deeper
Speaker 1: into the mountains as his paranoia took over me like
Speaker 1: you can drove up into.
Speaker 14: The mountains and he like.
Speaker 16: Freaking out, like just being really like heaptic and like
Speaker 16: in his own hand and you know, just panicking.
Speaker 14: I kept asking him one he just kept telling me
Speaker 14: to be quiet and not talk to him and stuff
Speaker 14: like that, and then he just got the car like
Speaker 14: stuck in and like intrigues like in the mountains, and.
Speaker 11: I was like why did you do that?
Speaker 14: Like what are you doing with how are we going
Speaker 14: to get it back out? And he was like, well
Speaker 14: figure it out, and he said that we would hike.
Speaker 14: He had to hike more off the mountain.
Speaker 1: Basically, John's paranoia had made a very bad situation even worse.
Speaker 1: The couple was already on the run for murder, and
Speaker 1: now John and managed to get their car stuck deep
Speaker 1: in the wilderness. There was no way to get it
Speaker 1: out without drawing attention, which meant they just lost their
Speaker 1: only means of transportation. Hanna said this was the moment
Speaker 1: it finally hit her. Something inside her seventeen year old
Speaker 1: brain finally clicked. She was trapped in the middle of
Speaker 1: nowhere with a man who was losing his grip, and
Speaker 1: for the first time she realized that her life was
Speaker 1: in real danger.
Speaker 10: I feel like when he got the car, he was
Speaker 10: trying to kill new or both huge, just driving like
Speaker 10: into trees, like full of speed, just like so fast.
Speaker 9: And we were hitting stuff that I really I got scared,
Speaker 9: like at that.
Speaker 12: Point that like I was going to die.
Speaker 1: That night, John and Hannah spent what would be their
Speaker 1: final night in the car. John talked about ending at
Speaker 1: all a double suicide, he said might be their only
Speaker 1: way out. The next morning, as they made their way
Speaker 1: off the mountain, he confessed something that was just as terrifying.
Speaker 29: That night, I remember if I went to bed, he
Speaker 29: told me he was like, I'm thinking about letting.
Speaker 9: The car run all night so that we both die
Speaker 9: in our sleep.
Speaker 4: And then the next morning he had taken a gun.
Speaker 29: With him, like when we left, and he the next
Speaker 29: morning he said he really thought about shooting me in
Speaker 29: my sleeping and shooting himself.
Speaker 1: After weeks of living on the road and dealing with
Speaker 1: John's spiraling, unpredictable behavior, Hannah finally broke. She wanted out,
Speaker 1: she wanted to live, and she wanted to go home.
Speaker 14: And I was just at that point, I was kind.
Speaker 5: Of like.
Speaker 14: Not really having it, and I was crying, and I
Speaker 14: was like I can't do this anymore, Like I need
Speaker 14: to go home, like.
Speaker 16: And he and he just started crying and he was
Speaker 16: like saying, I don't worry to fix Andaly fixed it.
Speaker 16: He I'll find it somewhere. He started like yelling.
Speaker 28: At me and calling me names and saying that if
Speaker 28: I left, he was gonna kill himself.
Speaker 14: He like ran on me from me, like he ran
Speaker 14: away from me, just like screaming, and then he came.
Speaker 32: Back and he was just like and was panicking against
Speaker 32: like he was like saying that he did all that
Speaker 32: stuff for me, like and all.
Speaker 28: This stuff kill king, Like he was like, I did
Speaker 28: that for you, and like all that kind of stuff,
Speaker 28: like trying to make me feel like it was my fault.
Speaker 33: Like.
Speaker 4: And he kept telling me that like.
Speaker 14: If I went home, like I wanted to get to
Speaker 14: see my parents, because I would just go straight to jail.
Speaker 9: He was just trying to make me feel really guilty,
Speaker 9: and like he told me that like he was the only.
Speaker 14: Person that I could ever trust in the world. He
Speaker 14: basically told me I didn't have anybody else with him.
Speaker 1: And I told investigators that John had manipulated her into
Speaker 1: staying with him, convinced her she didn't have a choice.
Speaker 1: But then one day John was simply gone.
Speaker 14: Then like one morning, like.
Speaker 16: He had gotten up, he was like, I'll be right back,
Speaker 16: like I'm going to get into the bathroom. I was like, okay,
Speaker 16: I'd come half sleep. She just cried up in love
Speaker 16: and then I went back to sleep, and one had
Speaker 16: woken up. He used a moment back, and I was
Speaker 16: just like, I'm not just gonna like sit here.
Speaker 14: Like and by then I was having to use the
Speaker 14: bap and choo, So I got up.
Speaker 16: I went to.
Speaker 12: Try and find the.
Speaker 1: Library, and I said. She made her way to a
Speaker 1: nearby library, logged into a public computer, and sent a
Speaker 1: few messages through her social media. A friend responded, offering
Speaker 1: to come get her and take her home to Simpsonville.
Speaker 1: She accepted and said that from that moment on, John
Speaker 1: Blauvelt was gone from her life.
Speaker 14: By the time I had.
Speaker 16: Gotten back on a computer, everybody like responded to me.
Speaker 16: And that's when like Angie came to hit me up
Speaker 16: like they had like a range, shit can pick me up?
Speaker 4: Did you ever see Johnian?
Speaker 1: During this interview, it became clear that Hannah had switched sides.
Speaker 1: She now recognized that John was dangerous and manipulative, and
Speaker 1: investigators appeared to believe her story. At least that's the
Speaker 1: impression that gave her.
Speaker 14: Do you understand now what he was trying to do?
Speaker 14: Is ability trying to like man just think he would
Speaker 14: be alot so that I wouldn't tell anybody anything.
Speaker 31: Nail like he was looking out for his best interest
Speaker 31: the whole time, and it really.
Speaker 34: Had nothing to do with the visions, because like, I've
Speaker 34: never trusted somebody that much before.
Speaker 1: With Hannah now seemingly on their side, investigators shifted focus.
Speaker 1: They pressed for details about Katie's murder. They wanted to
Speaker 1: know what Hannah knew, how she ben and anything John
Speaker 1: might have told her.
Speaker 14: The last time you want to work with him was
Speaker 14: that that Monday. That was the last time you would
Speaker 14: to work with him.
Speaker 31: So he was driving you in, passing her seat with joy, Yeah,
Speaker 31: and you want up to work with him at I.
Speaker 11: Did you sit in the car?
Speaker 14: Did he go walk around?
Speaker 9: What did you do?
Speaker 14: I sat in the car, and I remember him telling
Speaker 14: me he needed me to drop.
Speaker 16: Him off on wood He throw and so I turned
Speaker 16: and you were in a parking lot and she got
Speaker 16: out of the car.
Speaker 14: He started walking, and I didn't think to ask him
Speaker 14: what you been doing, like because at this point we've.
Speaker 16: Been dating for kind of like a while, and it
Speaker 16: was just not something that I usually do, like ask
Speaker 16: him what he's doing, or like why did.
Speaker 14: He seeing something?
Speaker 15: Had?
Speaker 1: I told investigators she had nothing to do with planning
Speaker 1: Katie's murder, and claimed shouldn't even know what John was
Speaker 1: up to. According to her, on the day of the murder,
Speaker 1: she simply gave John a ride to a remote parking
Speaker 1: lot and dropped him off without asking any questions. Investigators
Speaker 1: later concluded that John had likely lured Katie to the
Speaker 1: abandoned house where she was killed. Phone records showed that
Speaker 1: despite their separation and despite the restraining order, the two
Speaker 1: were still in contact. It seemed that Katie, ever hopeful,
Speaker 1: wanted to believe their marriage could still be saved. John
Speaker 1: used that hope to his advantage and ultimately to lure
Speaker 1: her to her death.
Speaker 14: What was his relationship with Katie?
Speaker 34: Did he still communicate with her to your knowledge? Or
Speaker 34: every time they talked, she'd call from a private number
Speaker 34: and they would only use like texting apps to talk.
Speaker 16: To each other because they hadn't her straining order, I guess,
Speaker 16: and so they were like kind of thing around talking
Speaker 16: to each other.
Speaker 1: And I also claimed that John later described the murder
Speaker 1: to her. He told her that when he stabbed Katie,
Speaker 1: the knife broke off in her neck, and as she
Speaker 1: bled to death, Katie begged him to let her go.
Speaker 9: At some point they were like on the trail leading
Speaker 9: up to the abandoned house. He told me that's where
Speaker 9: they went. He took her there.
Speaker 4: He says that they were talking for a little bit.
Speaker 29: He doesn't say like exactly the conversation they were talking,
Speaker 29: and then he just did it.
Speaker 9: And he said that he stabbed her in her neck
Speaker 9: and that there was a lot of blood, and she
Speaker 9: told him that if she lets her go, she won't say.
Speaker 4: Anything to anybody.
Speaker 1: Investigators believe that after Katie bled to death, John dragged
Speaker 1: her body into the basement of the abandoned house and
Speaker 1: covered her with planks of wood. Then he went home,
Speaker 1: met back up with Hannah, and once again asked for
Speaker 1: her help.
Speaker 4: So I went back home.
Speaker 14: John was outside, like, I didn't even go inside the house.
Speaker 14: He was outside and he was like and he used
Speaker 14: to follow me in spout car somewhere, and I was like, okay,
Speaker 14: And he had this bag.
Speaker 1: John loaded what investigators believed was a trash bag full
Speaker 1: of his bloody clothes in Hannah's car. Then he told
Speaker 1: her to follow him as he drove Katie's vehicle to
Speaker 1: an empty parking lot.
Speaker 16: And I followed him and he.
Speaker 5: Just throve like.
Speaker 14: For a long time because he didn't get on the
Speaker 14: highway at all.
Speaker 1: John parked Katie's car, removed the license plates, and climbed
Speaker 1: into Hannah's vehicle. The two then headed back home, but
Speaker 1: not before stopping at a couple of dumpsters, where John
Speaker 1: disposed of the place, the bag of bloody clothes, and
Speaker 1: anything else that might tie him to the crime.
Speaker 8: When he threw the clothes away or at the bags away,
Speaker 8: did you know at that point in time what was
Speaker 8: in the bagh?
Speaker 4: Okay?
Speaker 14: Then what happened?
Speaker 9: Did you go home?
Speaker 1: Hannah claimed that as she drove John around that day,
Speaker 1: she had no idea she was essentially acting as his accomplice.
Speaker 1: She said she didn't even know Katie was dead until
Speaker 1: days later, after the body was found and after the
Speaker 1: story hit the media.
Speaker 14: When I woke up in the morning, my mom had
Speaker 14: like sent me like the news story that like a
Speaker 14: body was found in the mint house, and I was
Speaker 14: just like I immediately got like home chilled, and.
Speaker 16: I was like, oh my gosh, what is going on?
Speaker 14: Like I used to do that all the time.
Speaker 4: It was really scary.
Speaker 14: And I immediately moved him up and I showed him.
Speaker 1: Hannah said that once she learned about Katie's murder, the
Speaker 1: truth slowly began to sink in. At first, John denied
Speaker 1: having anything to do with it, but deep down she
Speaker 1: knew he was lying. Eventually, he admitted to what he'd done,
Speaker 1: though he rarely talked about the details, and whenever Hannah
Speaker 1: tried to ask him, he'd turned it back on her,
Speaker 1: making her feel guilty for even bringing it up.
Speaker 35: It was just so crazy because like I didn't know
Speaker 35: what to think, and he had told me, like the
Speaker 35: poo' even want to talk to you, like you to
Speaker 35: lie in the road.
Speaker 14: You're gonna go to jail, like you know, you get
Speaker 14: to see him, mom, Like like the way that I felt,
Speaker 14: it felt like I did it. You knew, Like why
Speaker 14: didn't he fell about it?
Speaker 11: He killed her?
Speaker 14: She never like came out and said I killed her,
Speaker 14: but like.
Speaker 4: But he knew when you're good that he did it.
Speaker 9: Yeah, did you Jim?
Speaker 31: Hey, John's joking, he said, he's just he would just
Speaker 31: brushing off like he like you.
Speaker 14: Want to talk about that right now? Like kind of
Speaker 14: you show them the one to know for asking it.
Speaker 1: Considering Hannah's relationship with John, that she was sleeping with him,
Speaker 1: running with him, and protecting him. It would be easy
Speaker 1: to doubt her story, but honestly I don't. John completely
Speaker 1: played her for his own benefit, and I do believe
Speaker 1: that he turned her into an accomplice without her even
Speaker 1: realizing it. Doesn't even by the way the investigators treated Hannah,
Speaker 1: I don't think they doubted her story either.
Speaker 14: I'm not saying that you knew what he was about
Speaker 14: to do, Annah, Okay, And.
Speaker 31: Quite honestly, I don't think that you had a hand
Speaker 31: in it at all.
Speaker 35: Anybody who thinks that like I would do there.
Speaker 14: Here's what I think.
Speaker 12: Okay.
Speaker 14: One, I know he took advantage of you.
Speaker 17: He trusted you.
Speaker 31: And he lured you in, promised you whatever, told you whatever,
Speaker 31: and then made you do stuff that in the long.
Speaker 1: Run was good to save him and his return to
Speaker 1: Simpsonville was a good thing for several reasons. For one,
Speaker 1: she was safe and no longer on the run with
Speaker 1: a killer, and it also gave investigators another potential witness
Speaker 1: that could testify against John when his case went to
Speaker 1: try But that would only matter if they could actually
Speaker 1: find him and catch him.
Speaker 9: We're still nothing for John while he's out there.
Speaker 32: There's no telling him what.
Speaker 14: He's going to do.
Speaker 31: Did he ever talk about going in my Togo or
Speaker 31: Canada or flying anywhere?
Speaker 14: Loo first where she talked about going to Mexico.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, when it came to John's whereabouts, Hannah didn't have
Speaker 1: much to offer. As far as anyone knew, John might
Speaker 1: not have even been in the country anymore, and the
Speaker 1: investigation into Katie Blauvelt's murder remained open and unresolved for years.
Speaker 36: This week marks three years since twenty two year old
Speaker 36: Katie Blauvelt was.
Speaker 6: Brutally murdered in Simpsonville.
Speaker 36: Police say her estranged husband, John is a suspect in
Speaker 36: her murder, but Simpsonville Police say he's been on the
Speaker 36: run since they found her body in a cellar of
Speaker 36: an abandoned home.
Speaker 6: Now.
Speaker 36: He was last seen on the West Coast back in
Speaker 36: twenty sixteen and not been seen since.
Speaker 1: By twenty twenty one, investigators had renewed their efforts to
Speaker 1: find John. Part of that effort meant bringing Hannah Thompson,
Speaker 1: now twenty two years old, back into the interview room.
Speaker 4: John is not a good.
Speaker 9: Person, obviously, and we were trying desperately to find him, Okay,
Speaker 9: but we're still looking for and he needs to be
Speaker 9: responsible for what he's done.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 1: During this follow up interview, hadn't made a disturbing admission.
Speaker 1: She told investigators that she'd remained in regular contact with
Speaker 1: John for years after returning to Simpsonville in twenty sixteen.
Speaker 9: And how are you guys communicating?
Speaker 29: But to began communicating on Facebook Messenger, and then after
Speaker 29: that we were talking on Snapchat. Like at first we
Speaker 29: were talking every single day, multiple time, like for hours
Speaker 29: a day. I was the one that stopped communication with him,
Speaker 29: and I had just decided to do it.
Speaker 21: I didn't tell him like I'm not going to talk
Speaker 21: to you anymore, I don't think, And so I think
Speaker 21: the conversation was pretty like no substance to really just
Speaker 21: maybe like hey, how are you? Where was he?
Speaker 19: Then?
Speaker 9: I know that he was living with somebody who you
Speaker 9: girl that he said that they were dating. She had
Speaker 9: her own house.
Speaker 4: I think I think it was an apartment. But he
Speaker 4: also did like meet her parents and like they had
Speaker 4: gone to her.
Speaker 9: Parents' house stuff like that too.
Speaker 14: So what's the girls?
Speaker 4: I don't know where was that at?
Speaker 9: I don't really know. Whenever I would ask him like
Speaker 9: where he was, he would not tell me. He'd say like,
Speaker 9: I'm not telling you that, or.
Speaker 12: I can't tell you that.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, by the time Hannah made this admission, it had
Speaker 1: been nearly a year since she'd last heard from John.
Speaker 1: Even so, the information helped investigators narrow their search. In
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, about six years after Katie's murder, John
Speaker 1: Blavelt was finally.
Speaker 37: Found tonight, an Upstain man on the run since twenty
Speaker 37: sixteen who investigators say killed his estranged wife, is now
Speaker 37: in custody. The victims family just confirmed to us John
Speaker 37: Blovelt was arrested in Jackson County, Oregon. Online record show
Speaker 37: he's been booked into that local detention center today.
Speaker 1: After his arrest, John made several jail house calls to
Speaker 1: friends and family. The recordings gave investigators a glimpse into
Speaker 1: his state of mind, as well as the events that
Speaker 1: led him to go on the run.
Speaker 33: Oh you're not even in prison yet.
Speaker 19: No, I still got to go to trial and everything.
Speaker 19: I'm going to be in his jail for two to
Speaker 19: three years.
Speaker 5: Oh no, I think you are in prison.
Speaker 19: Oh okay, that's why I need a lawyer. I got.
Speaker 19: I signed up for public defender. But you know they're
Speaker 19: like fresh out of college. They don't give a shit
Speaker 19: what happens. They just need to do their car. So
Speaker 19: but I could get a real attorney, but we'll see,
Speaker 19: I'm going to be in this jail for years. You know,
Speaker 19: they're not going to give me a pond because they
Speaker 19: know I'll run, because I just ran for six years.
Speaker 19: The day I ran, I wasn't staying at my house anymore,
Speaker 19: and I was on my way home from work or
Speaker 19: something from somewhere because I just like to stop buying
Speaker 19: and check on my dog. And I saw the police
Speaker 19: at my house knocking on my door, so I said, okay,
Speaker 19: I'm leaving, and then I left, and you know, almost
Speaker 19: almost for a while. And then I was working for
Speaker 19: a while and I met a girl and I lived
Speaker 19: with her for like four years, and then one morning
Speaker 19: the US Marshals came. I was out in front tending
Speaker 19: to my vegetable garden and the US Marshalls just pulled
Speaker 19: up in the driveway. But that night I got the
Speaker 19: best sleep that I've had in six years. So I
Speaker 19: guess as a positives too, yeah, I.
Speaker 9: Was.
Speaker 19: I've been anxious, you know, I've had that anxiety depression
Speaker 19: the whole time. But I'm actually feeling really good now,
Speaker 19: I'm at peace.
Speaker 1: During these calls, John said more than once that he
Speaker 1: was relieved to be caught, happy even that he no
Speaker 1: longer had to live his life constantly looking over his shoulder.
Speaker 19: I was on the run for six years, man, I was,
Speaker 19: and I was used to the pace. Every night. I
Speaker 19: would pace in the living room until like three thirty
Speaker 19: four o'clock in the morning, fully dressed like ready to run,
Speaker 19: you know what I mean. It was like when I
Speaker 19: seen the Marshals like pull into the driveway, like ten dudes,
Speaker 19: guns out and I just swear, dude, I smiled. I
Speaker 19: was like, I was like, I can't believe it's over.
Speaker 19: I got in the I got in the truck and
Speaker 19: the Marshal was like six years a long run, man,
Speaker 19: and I was like, oh, I'm glad you finally found me.
Speaker 19: I was like, it was a nightmare.
Speaker 1: What's most disturbing about these calls is what John didn't say.
Speaker 1: Not once did he mention Katie, her family or show
Speaker 1: a single hint of remorse. Like a textbook narcissist, every
Speaker 1: word was about himself and the supposed peace he'd finally found.
Speaker 9: Even after the.
Speaker 14: Fact, Why do you say that she never cried about her.
Speaker 4: I feel like.
Speaker 14: I'm not get at me I crying about it.
Speaker 1: In later phone calls, John shared more about the six
Speaker 1: years he'd spent on the run. He described how he'd
Speaker 1: managed to weasel his way into another woman's life, lying
Speaker 1: about his name, his past, and who he really was.
Speaker 19: Then I met that girl, been real good. I maintain
Speaker 19: her budget on diet, turned her life around. We bought
Speaker 19: a house together in September. I said three years to say.
Speaker 21: Look poor.
Speaker 19: We bought a house all in her name. And then
Speaker 19: I got arrested. The US marshals tracked me down and
Speaker 19: I called her like a week later from jail, and
Speaker 19: she was like, fuck you, you ruin my life. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 19: you didn't know about anything. I guess no, hell no,
Speaker 19: I didn't. I had a fake name. I was going
Speaker 19: by Ben. I like that name too. We had a
Speaker 19: good time. We had a good life. Man. We had
Speaker 19: a house, We had a dog, do three cats. I
Speaker 19: didn't work for two years. I worked for the first
Speaker 19: two years we were together. I was a landscaper, small
Speaker 19: and lawns, building fences and stuff like that. Right, and
Speaker 19: then that guy retired. He retired, so and I was
Speaker 19: out of a job. And she was like, well, you
Speaker 19: can just stay at home, just piece the house clean,
Speaker 19: take care of the dog. And I was like all right.
Speaker 1: Once again, this narcis seemed either blissfully unaware or simply
Speaker 1: incapable of understanding that by dating this woman, living with
Speaker 1: her for years, and hiding his past, he'd made her
Speaker 1: a victim as well. So he's being arrested on charges
Speaker 1: out of South Carolina for murder?
Speaker 4: Are you serious? Year? He would do random on jobs.
Speaker 4: He was basically here watching my.
Speaker 33: Cat, so my dog all the time.
Speaker 1: When John's girlfriend learned the truth, she was devastated, And
Speaker 1: who wouldn't be imagine living with someone for nearly six years,
Speaker 1: loving them, trusting them, only to find out they were
Speaker 1: wanted in another state for murder, that the name and
Speaker 1: the backstory they'd given you were complete lies. The man
Speaker 1: she thought she knew had been living a double life.
Speaker 1: But this woman wasn't the only one to face the
Speaker 1: fallout with John Bars. It was finally time for Hannah
Speaker 1: Thompson to face justice as well.
Speaker 38: There is also a second suspect in Katie's death. Hannah
Speaker 38: Thompson was John Blauvelt's teenage girlfriend who fled the state
Speaker 38: with him. She is now twenty five in charge with
Speaker 38: obstruction of justice and accessory after the fact.
Speaker 1: Despite the charges against her, Hannah agreed to testify against
Speaker 1: John at his trial without any promise of leniency from prosecutors.
Speaker 1: Unlike John, Hannah's remorse seemed genuine, and as the star
Speaker 1: witness for the state, she helped ensure that John Blauvelt
Speaker 1: received the prison sentence that he deserved.
Speaker 33: On Friday, a jury found John Tufton Blavelt guilty of
Speaker 33: murdering his estranged wife in twenty sixteen. Blavelt, the former
Speaker 33: US Army recruiter out of Greenville, now a convicted killer,
Speaker 33: was sentenced by the judge to life without the possibility
Speaker 33: of parole.
Speaker 1: As for Hannah, she pleaded guilty to her charges and
Speaker 1: received probation for helping John flee after the murder. Her
Speaker 1: reduced sentence reflected both her cooperation with investigators and the
Speaker 1: fact she was only seventeen when she ran away with them.
Speaker 1: There's no question that Hannah was also a victim in
Speaker 1: this case. John clearly manipulated her, but one thing about
Speaker 1: her lenient punishment still feels hard to accept. After returning
Speaker 1: to Simpsonville in twenty sixteen, Hannah stayed in contact with
Speaker 1: John for years, and she didn't tell investigators about this
Speaker 1: until twenty twenty one. She said nothing knowing that Katie's
Speaker 1: family was still suffering. She said nothing knowing that a
Speaker 1: killder was still out there. It could strike again at
Speaker 1: any time. Maybe a more fitting punishment would have been
Speaker 1: a prison sentence that matched the years she kept this secret.
Speaker 1: But that's just my opinion. What do I know, I'm
Speaker 1: a podcaster. In the end, what matters most is that
Speaker 1: Katie's family finally got some measure of justice and hopefully
Speaker 1: a bit of peace. And knowing that John Blovelt will
Speaker 1: spend the rest of his life behind bars, that's one
Speaker 1: thing that we should know about Katie.
Speaker 30: One of the things I had was something about her
Speaker 30: laugh and her big eyes and her smile, and she
Speaker 30: just had a true heart. And her name is Katie,
Speaker 30: but her name is Catherine, and it meant innocent.
Speaker 19: And pure, and that's what she was.
Speaker 1: And we lost that the murder of Katie Blovelt wasn't
Speaker 1: a crime of passion or a moment of rage. It
Speaker 1: was the calculated act of a man who understood appearances,
Speaker 1: how to weaponize them, and how to hide behind them.
Speaker 1: As a soldier, a recruiter, and a husband, John Blovelt
Speaker 1: knew exactly how to make people believe he was something
Speaker 1: worth trusting. But beneath that uniform an easy smile, was
Speaker 1: a manipulator who saw others as tools to use, to control,
Speaker 1: to discard. He fold his wife, his girlfriend, his community,
Speaker 1: and for a time, even the system meant to hold
Speaker 1: him accountable. In the end, John's greatest deception wasn't how
Speaker 1: he escaped justice. It was how long he convinced everyone
Speaker 1: that he was one of the good guys. If nothing else,
Speaker 1: Katie's murder is a reminder that trust should never be automatic,
Speaker 1: because anyone can wear a uniform that hides their deception,
Speaker 1: and sometimes that person wearing it is a monster. We
Speaker 1: hope you enjoyed that episode, like we hope you enjoy
Speaker 1: all episodes of Certain Scale, which are available on our website,
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