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Speaker 3: You are now listening to True Murder, the most shocking
Speaker 3: killers in true crime history and the authors that have
Speaker 3: written about them. Geesy Bundy Dahmer, The Nightstalker DTK. Every
Speaker 3: week another class meeting author talking about the most shocking
Speaker 3: and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with.
Speaker 7: Your host journalist and author Dan Zufanski. Good Evening, the
Speaker 7: best selling author of Undercover of the Night, recounts Laura
Speaker 7: Akerson's disappearance and murder in North Carolina, the discovery of
Speaker 7: her remains in Texas, and the aftermath. On July thirteenth,
Speaker 7: twenty eleven, Laura Jean Akerson of Kingston, North Carolina, went
Speaker 7: to pick up her two Toddler's sons. It would be
Speaker 7: the last time she was seen alive. Two weeks later,
Speaker 7: detective searching for the missing mother made a gruesome discovery
Speaker 7: on the shores of Oyster Creek near Richmond, Texas, the
Speaker 7: dismembered body parts of a young woman whom they were
Speaker 7: able to identify as lawyer Akerson. Laura's ex Grant Hayes,
Speaker 7: the father of her two sons, and his wife, Amanda,
Speaker 7: the mother of his newborn daughter, both pointed the finger
Speaker 7: at each other as the one guilty of murdering Laura,
Speaker 7: cutting upper body, and then transporting and disposing of the remains.
Speaker 7: This is the hauntingly true story of a devoted mother,
Speaker 7: a disturbed couple, and how these horrific events came to pass.
Speaker 7: The book they were featuring this evening is Bitter Remains,
Speaker 7: a custody battle, a gruesome crime, and the mother who
Speaker 7: paid the ultimate price. With my special guest, journalist and
Speaker 7: author Diane Fanning. Welcome back to the program, and thank
Speaker 7: you very much for agreeing this interview. Diane Fanning.
Speaker 2: Good evening, Dan, I hope you're doing well tonight.
Speaker 7: I am doing very well. Thank you very much, Diane.
Speaker 7: For those out there, just for the record, Dan Fanning
Speaker 7: was our very very first guest, and here she is
Speaker 7: once again with another soon to be true crime classic.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much.
Speaker 2: Dan.
Speaker 7: Let's set up this a little bit by of course,
Speaker 7: you are a person that knows about all things Texan,
Speaker 7: So tell us a little bit where this area really is,
Speaker 7: this Oyster Creek, and before we talk about North Carolina,
Speaker 7: but where this is in Texas, and tell us a
Speaker 7: little bit about some of the two locations before we
Speaker 7: get into this macabre tale.
Speaker 2: This is a location that is near Houston, Texas, and
Speaker 2: in between Houston and Katie, Texas. The Oyster Creek runs
Speaker 2: ultimately feeds into the Gulf of Mexico. But it's a
Speaker 2: little ways in where the body parts were dumped. Is
Speaker 2: very rural area and not many houses along the along
Speaker 2: the road. And Laura was living in Kinston, North Carolina.
Speaker 2: Kinston is a small town about an hour and a
Speaker 2: half at a Raleigh, and it was where grand Hayes
Speaker 2: had been raised and Laura was in a relationship with
Speaker 2: Grant Hayes for quite some time, and that's how she
Speaker 2: ended up in the town of Kingston.
Speaker 7: Now you talk about how the two met and and
Speaker 7: a little bit of the background of Grant when you get.
Speaker 7: We get originally into this story in the beginning of
Speaker 7: the book. So Grant is a musician, and you can
Speaker 7: tell us his race as well was important to the story.
Speaker 7: And tell us a little bit about the how they met,
Speaker 7: under what circumstances did they meet and the relationship developed,
Speaker 7: because very very quickly they within a year they were married.
Speaker 7: So tell us a little bit about Grant Hayes and
Speaker 7: tell us about how they met before we talk about Laura.
Speaker 2: Grant Hayes was a musician who performed at smaller venues
Speaker 2: for the most part, becoming a staple on the Raleigh
Speaker 2: music scene. And there were a lot of people who
Speaker 2: thought he was very talented. Few disputed that when he
Speaker 2: was performing he had a mountain of charisma going for him.
Speaker 2: He was an African American man from Kinston, North Carolina,
Speaker 2: now living in Raleigh. He then was able to get
Speaker 2: work in the Virgin Islands and ultimately went there, but
Speaker 2: in Raleigh, he was performing one night and Laura came
Speaker 2: to see the show and hang out at the venue,
Speaker 2: and she went backstage and met him that evening and
Speaker 2: they just started seeing each other and discovered they had
Speaker 2: the same birthday in common. And Laura thought that was
Speaker 2: definitely a sign of fate, and that's how they ended
Speaker 2: up getting together. She believed in his talent. She started
Speaker 2: managing some of his bookings, and she then moved in
Speaker 2: with him and they had a child named Grant Junior.
Speaker 7: Now we could talk about right after they got married,
Speaker 7: say the honeymoon was over, and tell us like what
Speaker 7: you have in the book in terms of the kinds
Speaker 7: of requests now that they were married, that he asked
Speaker 7: of Laura as to talk to his fans, what are
Speaker 7: the kind of requests that you have written in the book.
Speaker 2: He wanted her to talk about sexual things with his fans.
Speaker 2: He basically wanted her to make them want him, and
Speaker 2: it was kind of a strange thing. He wanted her
Speaker 2: to Laura in the female fans and to act very
Speaker 2: flirtatious and come honish with the males. And he even
Speaker 2: wanted her to engage in sex activity if it would
Speaker 2: further his career. And when she objected some of the
Speaker 2: things he asked for, he told her, well, you're a
Speaker 2: white woman with a black man. Everybody knows your trash.
Speaker 7: Yeah. Yeah. He also at this time too, at this
Speaker 7: point even is suffering from delusions and in the form
Speaker 7: of he thinks he's a time traveler and that there's
Speaker 7: beings and that the world will end in December thirty first,
Speaker 7: twenty twelve. So, and he also has this idea that
Speaker 7: he would like to be a polygamist. And this is
Speaker 7: early on. This is why she's still pregnant. He floats
Speaker 7: this polygamist idea and you say too. Within seven months
Speaker 7: or so after the wedding, he's meeting another woman, either
Speaker 7: pretending he's single or acting like you's single. Another woman
Speaker 7: named Kristen tell us a little bit about to also
Speaker 7: demonstrate some things about his personality. Laura's friend Heidi Shoemaker
Speaker 7: tell us what that relationship was like and what did
Speaker 7: Grant think of it.
Speaker 2: Grant told her that Heidi was a bad influence on
Speaker 2: her and did not want her to have anything to
Speaker 2: do with Heidi. And I think a lot of it
Speaker 2: was Grant was a very controlling personality, and in typical
Speaker 2: controlling manner, he tried to cut her off from the
Speaker 2: rest of the world. He didn't want her to have
Speaker 2: friends outside of his friends. He didn't want her to
Speaker 2: have much to do with her brother, who was living
Speaker 2: in the area. He really wanted to have her under
Speaker 2: his control at all times, and he made things difficult
Speaker 2: for her. And unfortunately Laura was lacking in the self
Speaker 2: confidence and of the past history of a functional family
Speaker 2: to be able to push this away and to understand
Speaker 2: it really had nothing to do with her. It was
Speaker 2: all about Grant, and she stuck with the relationship. I mean,
Speaker 2: she was about to have a child and she did
Speaker 2: not want that child to be from a broken home
Speaker 2: as she was.
Speaker 7: Now. It gets to the point and other than delusions,
Speaker 7: there's also hard drug use like cocaine and possibly heroin
Speaker 7: or at least cocaine at this time, and frequent drug use,
Speaker 7: and then the parties and things that are associated with
Speaker 7: musicians and playing in clubs occasionally even to the point
Speaker 7: whether there's an intervention in two thousand and nine by
Speaker 7: Grant's family and he has some delusion about fifty kids
Speaker 7: and all races and some kind of empire. So tell
Speaker 7: us a little bit more about the kinds of characteristics
Speaker 7: that she's experienced in this first year of marriage and
Speaker 7: having a child, and what was he like period.
Speaker 2: He would do some very very strange things. He had
Speaker 2: this philosophy of life that he came up with that
Speaker 2: was this strange amalgam of elements of scientology, elements of Christianity,
Speaker 2: elements of alien beings taking over the government, and feeling
Speaker 2: that they were watching him and following him and trying
Speaker 2: to keep tabs on him. And he felt that he
Speaker 2: was one of the special people and he had to
Speaker 2: accumulate wealth and build his empire because he was going
Speaker 2: to be one of the chosen ones to go to
Speaker 2: this special place when the world came to an end.
Speaker 2: And it reflected in his relationship with Laura, because he
Speaker 2: felt that she should go along with whatever he said
Speaker 2: should be done and whatever he believed, and if she
Speaker 2: got on his nerves, he would do some of the
Speaker 2: most bizarre things, like one night he was shooting at
Speaker 2: her with the baby gun in front of a friend
Speaker 2: and she was trying to get him to stop, and
Speaker 2: the only way she could get him to stop was
Speaker 2: to get out of the room. But in order to
Speaker 2: do that she had to go past him. And yes,
Speaker 2: she wasn't getting hit any place. I swore it would
Speaker 2: do serious harm, but it hurts.
Speaker 4: And.
Speaker 2: It was cruel, and he seemed to think it was
Speaker 2: all funny and no big deal. But how much of
Speaker 2: that was influenced by drugs and how much was just
Speaker 2: his defective personality. It's hard to tell.
Speaker 7: Now you're chronicle in the book that Haidi and Laura's
Speaker 7: relationship is secret because Grant disproves of it. But it
Speaker 7: gets to the point where Heidi gets a concealed weapons
Speaker 7: permit because they are caught together and he warns them
Speaker 7: and tell us about this warning. How serious is this warning?
Speaker 7: So that she goes and gets a concealed weapons permit
Speaker 7: and then recommends that Laura gets one too. Tell us
Speaker 7: a little bit about this.
Speaker 2: Well, they were getting together surreptitiously, and he just happened
Speaker 2: to come to the place that they had gone for
Speaker 2: dinner and they were out in the parking lot, and
Speaker 2: he chastised Laura and said, you know, you're not supposed
Speaker 2: to be seeing her, and you know, you people ought
Speaker 2: to listen to me because I know people who were
Speaker 2: snuff out your life so fast you won't know what happened.
Speaker 2: And I mean he threatened to kill them as they
Speaker 2: didn't stop seeing each other, and he was pretty scary
Speaker 2: that evening, And that is what prompted high to you
Speaker 2: to go and get a concealed carry license, and she
Speaker 2: wanted Laura to get one too, but Laura just didn't
Speaker 2: like guns at all and didn't want them around, so
Speaker 2: she bought Laura knife. Yeah.
Speaker 7: Now tell us the circumstances in which, again we talked
Speaker 7: about this guy's music career. Some people think he's quite talented,
Speaker 7: some people not so much. There's a lot of competition
Speaker 7: out there. He's not really paying the bills from this,
Speaker 7: but there seems to be some again, some interest in
Speaker 7: this guy's a singer songwriter. So tell us about this
Speaker 7: gig that he or someone this phone call or this
Speaker 7: opportunity that comes from the Caribbean Islands from Saint John,
Speaker 7: from manor tell us a little bit about this and
Speaker 7: then what happens as a result.
Speaker 2: Well, Krant at one point was making a decent living
Speaker 2: as a musician, but then he started spending so much
Speaker 2: money on drugs that you know, it ate it all up,
Speaker 2: and between that and his bar bills, there wasn't much
Speaker 2: less to bring out. And he got a call from
Speaker 2: a guy he had known a couple of years before
Speaker 2: who was now down working in the entertainment field in
Speaker 2: Saint John, and he was told that he could get
Speaker 2: as much work as he wanted down there. There were
Speaker 2: plenty of employment opportunities for musicians. So Grant went down there,
Speaker 2: and at that time Laura had pretty much had it
Speaker 2: and she was planning to leave him. And then shortly
Speaker 2: after he left, right before she was going to leave
Speaker 2: and head north, she found out she was pregnant for
Speaker 2: the second time. And when she found that out, she
Speaker 2: felt she had to go and try to make the
Speaker 2: relationship with Grant work. So she went back down to
Speaker 2: the Virgin Islands. That's where she discovered that he had
Speaker 2: met someone named Amanda Smith, who was someone who had
Speaker 2: a sufficient amount of money, and he convinced her that
Speaker 2: all this was all it was was Amanda was his
Speaker 2: truger mama, and she was going to help finance his
Speaker 2: career and help him get ahead, and he was only
Speaker 2: seeing her for the sake of his career and the
Speaker 2: betterment of his family.
Speaker 7: Now she had when they met. You put in these
Speaker 7: the numbers, so we're talking about almost one hundred ninety
Speaker 7: thousand in cash she had for this inheritance. She had
Speaker 7: seventy seven thousand invaluable jewelry, so a quarter million dollars
Speaker 7: and in short order. So, so what happens with Amanda.
Speaker 7: She goes back to New York. He is in he's
Speaker 7: in the Islands. Laura discovers that there's this other woman
Speaker 7: and then and has to listen to his grand scheme.
Speaker 7: That listened. He's only doing it for the betterment of
Speaker 7: his own family, just to get ahead. So you say,
Speaker 7: Laura goes back, tell us the other procession.
Speaker 2: Laura went back to the United States because their new baby,
Speaker 2: Gentle was having a health problem and it was felt
Speaker 2: the best thing to do is to go back to
Speaker 2: the United States to get him the help he needed,
Speaker 2: because he thought that he was going to need some
Speaker 2: surgery and this was something he was born with. And
Speaker 2: so she returned to the United States, and she kept
Speaker 2: waiting for Grant to come back to but he didn't.
Speaker 2: And then when Amanda, who he'd met in the Islands,
Speaker 2: moved back to Manhattan, a Grant followed her and sort
Speaker 2: of came knocking at her door after she bought him
Speaker 2: an airline ticket, and they were living together in her apartment,
Speaker 2: and Laura didn't really know what was going on. She
Speaker 2: knew that he was in New York and he kept
Speaker 2: saying it was just for the good of the family,
Speaker 2: and she wasn't really buying it anymore. But then he
Speaker 2: wanted to see their older son, little Grant, and have
Speaker 2: him up in New York for a photo shoot. Said
Speaker 2: he was going to do some commercial work with him,
Speaker 2: and he'd only be gone for ten days. Well, Laura
Speaker 2: didn't want to let her son, her little son go.
Speaker 2: She was feeling very protective and was concerned about Grant's motives,
Speaker 2: and so she just put it off and tried to
Speaker 2: put him off, and finally she relented and let him
Speaker 2: go up there. Well, the ten days stretched for a
Speaker 2: month into two months. Meanwhile, Grant's telling everyone up there
Speaker 2: that Laura is busy dealing with little gentle problems and
Speaker 2: she wants him to keep the little Grant longer. But
Speaker 2: that was blatantly untrue, and finally Laura ended up going
Speaker 2: to court on her own without an attorney and filing
Speaker 2: to get her son back. As she did that, Grant
Speaker 2: called Child Protectives Services on her and made up some
Speaker 2: stuff that wasn't true, and then he came down eventually
Speaker 2: with Grant, and when he did, he went to court
Speaker 2: and got an ex party order, which means he's before
Speaker 2: a judge without the other party, and he asks for
Speaker 2: emergency custody the two boys. Now we already had Grant
Speaker 2: in his possession. So when the judge granted the emergency custody,
Speaker 2: poor little gentleman who hardly knew his father, was pulled
Speaker 2: out of his mother's arms and taken away.
Speaker 7: Incredible. Now there's a couple of people, other people that
Speaker 7: are important in here, especially a person named Chavon Mattha.
Speaker 7: And so tell us about the relationship that Laura has
Speaker 7: with this other woman, because there's a different world that
Speaker 7: she has where people know her a certain way. And
Speaker 7: then her life with Grant, And we have to talk
Speaker 7: about the relationship too. When you talk about she came
Speaker 7: back and was caring for her son who had gentle
Speaker 7: who had the kidney problem. In that Grant's parents are
Speaker 7: very helpful and active in the raising of these children,
Speaker 7: and even at that time, aren't they.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 2: When she came back to the United States, she moved
Speaker 2: into a rental property that Grant's parents owned. In the
Speaker 2: exchange for her rent there, she cleaned up their daycare
Speaker 2: center each night. So it's because of that, of course,
Speaker 2: the children spent a lot of time around their grandparents
Speaker 2: and and and built up a close relationship with them
Speaker 2: at that time.
Speaker 7: In this custody battle we're talking about that Amanda was
Speaker 7: the only person really bringing in any serious money. And
Speaker 7: she also had these you know, she was dedicated to
Speaker 7: Grant as well, and had some very traditional and traditional feelings,
Speaker 7: I mean or traditional ideas, and also some strong feelings
Speaker 7: for Grant, and was paying what was amounting to a
Speaker 7: pretty enormous legal bill for this custody battle, wasn't it.
Speaker 2: Yes, she was covering a lot of that, and and
Speaker 2: before she's going through so much of her money, not
Speaker 2: just for the expenses of the custody battle. When Laura
Speaker 2: counter sued on the custody agreement, the court ordered a
Speaker 2: please psychological examination of both Grant and Laura. And that
Speaker 2: is quite an expensive thing. And she's paying for that.
Speaker 2: She's paying for Grant to go on trips to Hawaii
Speaker 2: and other places to look for performance opportunities. She's financing
Speaker 2: his expeditions to New York to try to sell his
Speaker 2: the company made iPhones to Apple. He he did some
Speaker 2: that apparently it's a lot of interest in which were
Speaker 2: of rap singers, particularly ones who had been killed and
Speaker 2: it looked like he was on the verge of getting
Speaker 2: sort of dealers nose, but he had gone through whom
Speaker 2: and Walk suddenly broke jewelry Pong and pregnant with Grant's child.
Speaker 7: At the same time, we have Laura, who is you know,
Speaker 7: had some very troubled times in her life, and she's
Speaker 7: on the upswing in her life. She is working with
Speaker 7: She's met a friend through I believe Heidi named Oakshanna
Speaker 7: who's an artist, and they have this little agreement going
Speaker 7: on that they're going to be able to work with
Speaker 7: each other and a man pardon made. Laura has some
Speaker 7: art of her own that she's finally coming into her
Speaker 7: own and and and doing her art work on. Yes,
Speaker 7: so go ahead and tell us about the upswing in
Speaker 7: her life.
Speaker 2: Yeah. She started business with chavonn mathis Uh. It was
Speaker 2: a very simple thing. They had two people they were
Speaker 2: selling to one they were selling restaurants on the idea
Speaker 2: of using the paper place mats with ads on them
Speaker 2: in their restaurant and they would get free place mats
Speaker 2: for that, and the other side was selling businesses ad
Speaker 2: space these placements, and so it was going really well.
Speaker 2: I mean starting out any business is a little difficult.
Speaker 2: She had her graphic guards business on one hand and
Speaker 2: then this restaurant marketing business on the other and Chavon
Speaker 2: Mathis was her partner and they were working and building
Speaker 2: up a client tele list and having a success that
Speaker 2: was building every month, and things were going really well.
Speaker 2: On her first life. She had gotten a place of rown.
Speaker 2: She had worked a part time job until she got
Speaker 2: the business off off off the ground, and she was
Speaker 2: taking care of things in her personal life. And here
Speaker 2: is a stronger person so that be the best mother
Speaker 2: she could be. She was very, very determined to be
Speaker 2: her good mother and to provide everything she could for
Speaker 2: her boys. She wanted them to have a better life
Speaker 2: than she ever had. And she was making great strides
Speaker 2: towards that. She had a mentor and she was getting
Speaker 2: advice there. She was involved in everything in her life
Speaker 2: was looking up in twenty eleven.
Speaker 7: Now let's talk about what her real wish was in
Speaker 7: terms of the children. Just for the record, did she
Speaker 7: was her idea to get full custody? What was Grant's idea?
Speaker 7: What was her idea? And what was the dispute in
Speaker 7: terms of why were they going through this custody battle.
Speaker 7: What did she want? What did he want? Because it
Speaker 7: will be important to the rest of this story.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he really wanted full custody. He actually wanted her
Speaker 2: to just go away. He didn't see why she was
Speaker 2: important in the boys lives just because she was their
Speaker 2: biological mother. Just he had another woman who could be
Speaker 2: their mother and say that should be good enough for
Speaker 2: the boys. He did not acknowledge anything having to do
Speaker 2: with her importance and those and he and Manda to
Speaker 2: travel whenever they wanted, wanted to be free, to move
Speaker 2: to Ashville where he could sell songs he had written,
Speaker 2: and they thought that the children Shoupel would traveled with them.
Speaker 2: That wouldn't be right for them not to have those opportunities,
Speaker 2: and Laura was just standing in the way of all this. Laura,
Speaker 2: on the other hand, felt that for any child, both
Speaker 2: parents are in play important roles in their lives, and
Speaker 2: she wanted to have an equitable and pleasant sharing of
Speaker 2: the raising of the children.
Speaker 7: And of.
Speaker 2: The more signs of that Grant showed, the harder it
Speaker 2: was for her to want to actually share custody with him.
Speaker 2: And the psychologist was doing the work on writing them
Speaker 2: up and things were not looking good for Grant to
Speaker 2: even share custody, although she pointed out some flaws in Laura,
Speaker 2: which Laura took on and was willing to work to
Speaker 2: make herself a better person. Grant, on the other hand,
Speaker 2: was actually pretty furious. He wrote on his copy, he
Speaker 2: wrote all sorts of notes, and there a fanger and
Speaker 2: was that minute dial And he really just one of
Speaker 2: the kids all to himself, and his idea was my children.
Speaker 2: She was basically only the vessel that brought them flock,
Speaker 2: and he didn't see any reason why she had to
Speaker 2: be such a nuisance in his life. But when he
Speaker 2: was looking at that report that he got from the psychologist,
Speaker 2: he was in deep trouble. That looked like very possible
Speaker 2: that Laura was going to get full custody of the boys.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he wrote on this folder which they found later
Speaker 7: in the truck. It said notes bs and never.
Speaker 4: He was.
Speaker 2: He was saying that Laura was crazy, and you know
Speaker 2: he was he was the normal and stable one. But
Speaker 2: the psycho psychologist was looking at all this and saying, yeah,
Speaker 2: Laura had some emotional problems and that she needs work on.
Speaker 2: But she also Laura said, I really would like to
Speaker 2: have ongoing drug testing for both of us because Grant's
Speaker 2: got a bad history of a long history of drug abuse.
Speaker 2: And she put that in there, and she's you know,
Speaker 2: when she testified in Forts, she said, well, it was
Speaker 2: because of Grant that I wanted.
Speaker 6: That in there, and.
Speaker 2: So it was.
Speaker 7: It was a very.
Speaker 2: Hostile situation. Nonetheless, in June, when Amanda was about to
Speaker 2: give birth to her child, Grant was really really nice
Speaker 2: to Laura and asked her if she would, you know,
Speaker 2: take the kids for a week or two so that
Speaker 2: Samanda was about to give first. And you know, Grant
Speaker 2: cook very very nice when he wanted something from you,
Speaker 2: but no study were those kids with him. Than he
Speaker 2: was being nasty to her again and telling her she
Speaker 2: couldn't have her Wednesday night visits at all, even though
Speaker 2: the psychologists were saying that the boys were so little
Speaker 2: they needed to see each parent more with a greater
Speaker 2: frequency circation. Uh, he wouldn't let her have any midweek
Speaker 2: visits with the boys, and boy, the excuse he gave
Speaker 2: was that she was too emotional and saying goodbye to them,
Speaker 2: and she shouldn't have to kiss on her and hug
Speaker 2: on him. She should just walk away.
Speaker 7: What was the relationship between Amanda and Laura.
Speaker 2: For the record, it was a strange thing because on
Speaker 2: the one hand, Laura felt her boys were a lot
Speaker 2: safer because Amanda was there watching over them when they
Speaker 2: were with Grant. On the other hand, Amanda had been
Speaker 2: fed a one sided version of life by Grant, and
Speaker 2: she thought that Laura was psycho crazy and told her so,
Speaker 2: and so she always had this really negative view of
Speaker 2: what Laura was up to and what she wanted, and
Speaker 2: that she was crazy, and because she was believing what
Speaker 2: Grant told her, and so that was it would try
Speaker 2: to get along and and there would be a lot
Speaker 2: of friction, you know. One Laura even wrote a thank
Speaker 2: you to Amanda for taking such good care of the boys,
Speaker 2: but Amanda would come back and tell her that the
Speaker 2: kids were sick all the time because you don't take
Speaker 2: care of them right. And yet Laura wasn't doing anything wrong. Yeah,
Speaker 2: she took them out and let them run in the
Speaker 2: little sprinkler fountains that they had in the park, which
Speaker 2: were there for children to run in, but Laura thought
Speaker 2: that was wrong and that would give them colds. And
Speaker 2: whenever Laura thought there was some serious health concerned with
Speaker 2: the boys, Amanda again would say she was just crazy.
Speaker 2: So it was nothing Amanda, nothing Laura could do could
Speaker 2: shake Amanda the feelings that Laura is crazy, and so
Speaker 2: everything she said was under questioned.
Speaker 7: The most puzzling character I think here obviously is Grant,
Speaker 7: but also it's very complex character that Amanda has this
Speaker 7: person that you inherits this money from some of that
Speaker 7: she was married to that had an unfortunate accident of
Speaker 7: a swimming accent where he's paralyzed and dies. She inherits
Speaker 7: this money not through any kind of gold digging or inning.
Speaker 7: She's had her bouts with celebrity herself and talent. She's
Speaker 7: a little bit of an actress. She gets she takes
Speaker 7: some official training, but doesn't really get any big roles.
Speaker 7: So she's a talented person, good looking woman. But Amanda
Speaker 7: is listening to the kinds of delusions that Grant is
Speaker 7: saying quite often in the home, and some of the
Speaker 7: behavior that he has, which leans towards at least or
Speaker 7: is can characterize as violent, and yet at the same
Speaker 7: time she is more supportive of what Grant is saying
Speaker 7: versus what Laura is saying. She really is on his side,
Speaker 7: or at least sucked into his charisma, or at least
Speaker 7: at least on his side, isn't she Yes?
Speaker 2: And Amanda had an adult daughter from her first marriage,
Speaker 2: and her marriage to Grant was her third, and she
Speaker 2: her adult daughter. When she found out this strange life
Speaker 2: philosophy that Grant had about the aliens and this secret
Speaker 2: place to go to be for the specialble, she said
Speaker 2: something to her others. She said, you know, boy, is
Speaker 2: he serious about this? Is this a joke? And Amanda says, no,
Speaker 2: he's very serious, and it would make sense to you
Speaker 2: if you came to the place where he came from.
Speaker 2: And that really really struck Shade the odd that her
Speaker 2: mother would be so accepting of this wacky theory of
Speaker 2: life that Grant had in this sense that everybody was
Speaker 2: out to get him because he was a black man.
Speaker 7: Right now, let's go to just previous to the day
Speaker 7: in question, July thirteenth, twenty eleven, and let's talk about
Speaker 7: what Laura was doing and who was she corresponding with,
Speaker 7: because right away her behavior is when it isn't in character,
Speaker 7: people are alerted. So let's tell us just what was
Speaker 7: Laura doing on that day? What was she supposed to
Speaker 7: do and was there any what was the event that
Speaker 7: was supposed to happen that day? And tell us who
Speaker 7: in Laura's circle was in contact with her that would
Speaker 7: notice anything was a miss.
Speaker 2: Well, Laura was doing a lot of business calls that day.
Speaker 2: She was sort of heading from Kinston in the direction
Speaker 2: of Raleigh and make multiple stops along the way, and
Speaker 2: all along she was calling back to Chavonne and reporting
Speaker 2: on her success and she was having one after another
Speaker 2: after another, having a fabulous day business wise. She was
Speaker 2: supposed to meet Grant at kids place called Monkey Shows
Speaker 2: in order to visit with kids.
Speaker 7: And.
Speaker 2: Her appointments kept being longer than expected because they were
Speaker 2: all being successful. So she was winning behind schedule and
Speaker 2: she had to change the time, and Grant said, well,
Speaker 2: the boys, I'll need to take the boy's host. You
Speaker 2: can come here to my apartment and I'll pick them up. Now.
Speaker 2: Laura normally did not go there. She knew that it
Speaker 2: wasn't a good idea, and it is unclear why she
Speaker 2: felt okay going there. Was it just because she wanted
Speaker 2: so much to see her boys, or it was a
Speaker 2: sort of promise made to her by Grant in order
Speaker 2: to get her to the house. Some people that know
Speaker 2: her well have said that the only way she would
Speaker 2: have gone there was if she thought she was going
Speaker 2: to come home with her boys. And no one really
Speaker 2: knows exactly what was in her mind when she went there.
Speaker 2: In all likelihoods, she had a little tape recorder that
Speaker 2: she taped all her conversations with Grant on it and
Speaker 2: downloaded it to her computer. Everything what she had one
Speaker 2: that disappeared along with Laura, So we don't know what
Speaker 2: kind of things Grant could have said to her to
Speaker 2: get her to come to that apartment just was not
Speaker 2: anything anyone who knew her thought she would do.
Speaker 7: Now right around soon after this the next day, is
Speaker 7: it Chavonne that goes to the police in the short
Speaker 7: order and reports her missing? Tell us who reports are
Speaker 7: missing and how the police proceed.
Speaker 2: Well, Chavonne was just walking distance away from Laura's apartment.
Speaker 2: She walked up there, and it was a gated place
Speaker 2: so that she couldn't get inside, but she looked in
Speaker 2: and was able to see that Laura's car was gone,
Speaker 2: so she assumed Laura wasn't there, and she's sing her
Speaker 2: text message she sent her emails, she's telling her friend,
Speaker 2: I'm worried, get in touch with me, please right away.
Speaker 2: And the fact that she wasn't into her cellphone was
Speaker 2: a huge concerned to Chavon because ron knew that Laura
Speaker 2: always killed that phone on, always answered it in case
Speaker 2: it was something about her little boys, and she knew
Speaker 2: she would never turn it off. So that was very troubling.
Speaker 2: And she waited for a couple of days of being
Speaker 2: unable to reach her, and finally on Sundays she got
Speaker 2: the police to go to the apartment and Laura was
Speaker 2: not there, and she filled out a missing person's report
Speaker 2: on that Sunday.
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Speaker 2: Details, Oh North Caroline. Meanwhile, when Heidi finds out that
Speaker 2: Laura's missing, Heidi lives up in Raleigh, and so she
Speaker 2: goes computer and she makes gets a CD disc and
Speaker 2: a flux drive and fills it up with all the
Speaker 2: material from a special mailbox that she and Laura shared,
Speaker 2: and it was where Laura used it for a reposit.
Speaker 2: All the messages and the recordings and everything else that
Speaker 2: has anything to do with the kids and the custody fight.
Speaker 2: And she took that information first to Kinston and reported
Speaker 2: that the last place Laura was was in Rallie. Then
Speaker 2: she also dropped from Raleigh. When the Hinton police found
Speaker 2: out that Rabigh was slocation, they breathed the Raleigh Police department,
Speaker 2: and it was the Raleigh police found Laura's call.
Speaker 7: Now, just for the record as well from Heidi and
Speaker 7: from Chavon, her two closest friends. Did she tell them
Speaker 7: specifically that Grant was violent and was and she felt
Speaker 7: threatened or her life at risk at all by Grant?
Speaker 2: She told him if anything, she told Heidi, if anything
Speaker 2: ever happened to her, Grant did it. If Chavonne, I
Speaker 2: knew there was a constanty battle, I knew there was
Speaker 2: bad blood between them, But she really didn't know a
Speaker 2: whole lot about Grant himself. She did know that Laura
Speaker 2: was devoted to her boys.
Speaker 7: Right now, right away. In most as we know in
Speaker 7: these stories and fictional and otherwise, that there's only the
Speaker 7: people that are most up on the suspect scale, are
Speaker 7: people closest to the person in question. So let's sort
Speaker 7: of fast forward this a little bit in terms of
Speaker 7: what does Grant Hayes do, what's the first thing he
Speaker 7: does do officially? What does Amanda do? What does the
Speaker 7: family do? Tell us how they proceed In the next, say,
Speaker 7: forty eight hours.
Speaker 2: There are many trips to Target and walmartt there's typical
Speaker 2: salt purchase. There are the purchase of coolers and garbage
Speaker 2: bags and gloves, and then there is a rental of
Speaker 2: a U haul vehicle. Uh, there is a piece of
Speaker 2: antique furniture that Amanda says, we need, we need to
Speaker 2: load up and take out to my sister. She said
Speaker 2: that it was because she thought the grant had sold
Speaker 2: everything else she had with value that that might be next.
Speaker 2: It was a fine piece of furniture. It was a
Speaker 2: castle antique, so it was very valuable. And but what
Speaker 2: no one knew she was taking out there. In addition
Speaker 2: to that, we're coolers that were full of body parts.
Speaker 7: Now the thing is they have what we talked about
Speaker 7: is they went shopping. So we know that from videotape
Speaker 7: that he went and got Duffel bags, he got goggles,
Speaker 7: plastic tarps, industrial trash bags, and the very very important
Speaker 7: reciprocated reciprocating saw and certain blades and Duffel bags. A
Speaker 7: little bit later and a little bit later as well,
Speaker 7: they get myriadic acid. So tell us what the police
Speaker 7: do find at the house or pardon me, maybe we'll
Speaker 7: go backwards here. Sorry, let's talk about because very important
Speaker 7: Amanda's daughter, Shay and what she knows and what she
Speaker 7: is witnessed to.
Speaker 2: She knew that Amanda and Grant or having to move
Speaker 2: out of their apartment before they were evicted. They said
Speaker 2: their plans were to move in with Grant's parents down
Speaker 2: in Kinston, and so she knew that was going on.
Speaker 2: And when her mother asked her to come take care
Speaker 2: of the boys, get them out of the house so
Speaker 2: that we can get some packing done, she did it.
Speaker 2: She had aside from the fact that her mother took
Speaker 2: a piece of furniture actually she considered to be something
Speaker 2: that would one day be hers and turned it over
Speaker 2: to her aunt. That kicked Shaye off a bit. Shaye also,
Speaker 2: when she found out she was going out to visit
Speaker 2: her aunt, wanted to go along, and her mother just
Speaker 2: told her she was selfish for wanting to do that,
Speaker 2: and so Shaye was not aware of what was happening
Speaker 2: in that home, but she was aware that there was
Speaker 2: a lot of chaos going on, and she was angry
Speaker 2: at her mother for not including her and in the
Speaker 2: trip out to see someone who was a very important
Speaker 2: part of her life growing up. Then when the police
Speaker 2: came and told her that they were looking for her
Speaker 2: mother and did she have any idea where she was well,
Speaker 2: she told them that they went to Texas, and so
Speaker 2: the police decided they needed to go to Texas too,
Speaker 2: and they passed Grant and Amanda returning to North Carolina
Speaker 2: without knowing they were passing them while they were on
Speaker 2: their way out to Texas.
Speaker 7: When police do finally get around to looking at the
Speaker 7: residents to form a residence of Amanda and Grant, what
Speaker 7: is the one thing that is tailtale and they notice
Speaker 7: immediately and is of interest.
Speaker 2: The bathroom in the hallway smells of cleaning materials. It
Speaker 2: is thick and spin and immaculate as it was never used.
Speaker 2: There are no rugs are there's no shower curtains. There's
Speaker 2: nothing in there, hardly at all, and it's been completely
Speaker 2: cleaned out. They asked Shay about that bathroom and she said, well,
Speaker 2: that's the one the little boys use, that's the one
Speaker 2: that's always full of their bath toys, and yet there
Speaker 2: was nothing in there, and it had all been moved
Speaker 2: to the other bathroom, and that didn't make a whole
Speaker 2: lot of sense, and she didn't understand it, and of
Speaker 2: course at that point in time, and the police couldn't
Speaker 2: know what to make of it.
Speaker 7: It was also the bleach stain at the front door,
Speaker 7: which was of interest to the police as well.
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a very large bleach stain on the
Speaker 2: carpet right by the front door, just before it turned
Speaker 2: to tile, and it was very large, and it was
Speaker 2: very unexpected in that spot because that's not a spot
Speaker 2: where you wouldn't normally think that you'd even have bleach.
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, you might use it in the bathroom
Speaker 2: or the laundry room or the kitchen, but not by
Speaker 2: the front door. So that was very suspicious right away.
Speaker 2: And Shay had said when she came in the house,
Speaker 2: it smelled like bleach, and that didn't make any sense
Speaker 2: to her because bleach always gave her and her mother
Speaker 2: such horrible headaches, so it didn't make sense that her
Speaker 2: mother was cleaning with her mother never cleaned with bleach.
Speaker 2: So with every piece of information the police got, it
Speaker 2: became more and more suspicious.
Speaker 7: Now on their trip, they go to see Amanda's sister
Speaker 7: and so it's Karen Barry. And this is the most
Speaker 7: fascinating part of this story. It really is incredible some
Speaker 7: of the dialogue in this and again, of course, with
Speaker 7: my imagination, others will be reading and conjuring up the
Speaker 7: same images. So tell us about the meeting with her
Speaker 7: sister and the kinds of questions that they're asking. Again,
Speaker 7: innocent questions to some, but the kinds of questions they're
Speaker 7: asking of the sister and her son. And I guess
Speaker 7: he has a couple sons, So tell us, look good,
Speaker 7: has a.
Speaker 4: Couple of.
Speaker 2: She has a couple of grown sons. And Amanda and
Speaker 2: Grant are asking them. I, since one of the boys
Speaker 2: has a business of removing faral hogs from people's property,
Speaker 2: ask them if hogs will eat human remains. And then
Speaker 2: they have a long conversation about that, and then they
Speaker 2: get to well, aren't there alligators in Oyster Creek? And
Speaker 2: won't alligators eat human remains? And the boys sort of thought, oh,
Speaker 2: these are just city people that don't know anything. You know,
Speaker 2: Grant's just a city boy and he doesn't know about this.
Speaker 2: And Grant also asks them about going shark fishing, and
Speaker 2: and then they want to know about any deep holes
Speaker 2: on the property, and they ask about the septic tank,
Speaker 2: and they ask about the well and all sorts of
Speaker 2: strange things. And poor karens this is her little sister,
Speaker 2: or much younger sister, and she can't quite wrap her
Speaker 2: mind around what is going on and what might be happening.
Speaker 2: I think she's had the red flags waved in her face,
Speaker 2: but she's just torn. I mean, this is her sister.
Speaker 2: Her sister couldn't be meaning what she was saying is
Speaker 2: what she's thinking. But she was getting increasingly uncomfortable with
Speaker 2: them being there. And then there was the fact that
Speaker 2: the boys were with them. Both of them mentioned that
Speaker 2: they had been told they can't take the boys out
Speaker 2: of the state, and here were the boys, and it
Speaker 2: was it was getting increasingly uncomfortable, and she basically just
Speaker 2: was so relieved when they finally left. Soon after they left,
Speaker 2: the police show up, and that's when.
Speaker 7: Sorry, go ahead, Well, the thing is, what we've skipped
Speaker 7: over a little bit, is what exactly Laura did a
Speaker 7: pardon me Amanda did say to her sister? What question
Speaker 7: was asked? And what did she tell her sister? Very
Speaker 7: very very important, So what was actually said to her
Speaker 7: sister and what was the circumstances?
Speaker 2: Karen finally asked what the heck is going on? And
Speaker 2: Amanda said, I hurt Laura. I hurt her bad. Karen
Speaker 2: didn't really want to know anything more. And Amanda and
Speaker 2: Grant took the family's boat out onto Oyster Creek at night,
Speaker 2: late late at night, and then returned.
Speaker 7: And.
Speaker 2: Karen knew something really bad was happening, but she didn't
Speaker 2: really know what and she didn't want to believe what
Speaker 2: her common sense was telling her. And it wasn't till
Speaker 2: the police got there that she finally admitted to herself
Speaker 2: and to them that she thought Laura was probably there
Speaker 2: in the place they should look, the creek.
Speaker 7: She also said to Laura, had a pardon me that
Speaker 7: Amanda had said to her, or pardon me that Karen
Speaker 7: had said to her? Are you just covering for Grant?
Speaker 7: And she nodded her head.
Speaker 2: Yes, which is quite important she did. She did. But
Speaker 2: the question is was Amanda telling her sister she was
Speaker 2: covering for grant in order to tell her sister what
Speaker 2: she wanted to hear, or because it was the truth
Speaker 2: that was the big question.
Speaker 7: Sure, now, like you say, police are there shortly after.
Speaker 7: This is not much of a trail here, if this
Speaker 7: is a master plan, she says, can I pray first?
Speaker 7: And then she tells them everything that she knows. She's
Speaker 7: just a very honest person, doesn't want to be burdened
Speaker 7: with this thing at all. So now, how do police
Speaker 7: proceed once they have this.
Speaker 2: Information, Well, they put send divers into the creek, and
Speaker 2: they even have a man with a gun in a
Speaker 2: boat in case alligators approach. But it turned out the
Speaker 2: biggest problem that the divers had were with the lily
Speaker 2: pads that were covering a big portion of the surface
Speaker 2: of the creek across the street, and they had to
Speaker 2: keep pushing them aside all the time, and the water
Speaker 2: was deep and dark, so dark that they were literally
Speaker 2: doing like snow angel motions on the bottom of the
Speaker 2: creek to try to find body parts. They were mostly
Speaker 2: hoping to find her foot and she had a tattoo
Speaker 2: on it and that would identify her quickly, but they
Speaker 2: never did find any of the to see they did
Speaker 2: find all leg parts, they did find body parts, and
Speaker 2: then ultimately they found Laura's head.
Speaker 7: They also Karen had also grabbed a machete that Grant
Speaker 7: had and secured it, put it, wrapped it with a
Speaker 7: rag and put it in the garage and kept some
Speaker 7: other things that at least that the police had. Didn't
Speaker 7: know what their evidentiary value were, but they grabbed like
Speaker 7: over one hundred items. And yeah, of course they were
Speaker 7: looking at autopsy to confirm that these parts of a
Speaker 7: torso actually were Ackerman Akerson. So now, so how do
Speaker 7: Amanda and Grant? What do they do in the under
Speaker 7: these circumstances? What happens?
Speaker 2: They returned to Kingston and they were at Grand's parents'
Speaker 2: home when the police came and picked them up, and
Speaker 2: the police questioned them and charged them with Laura's murder
Speaker 2: as soon as they knew they had Laura's body. And
Speaker 2: then it got excessively weird because Grant claimed all he
Speaker 2: was doing was protecting his wife, because his wife had
Speaker 2: gotten into a fight with Laura and caused her to
Speaker 2: fall and hit her head. And Amanda was saying she
Speaker 2: didn't even know that Laura was dead until she arrived
Speaker 2: in Texas that she didn't know Laura's body was sitting
Speaker 2: in her guest bathroom for a couple of weeks days
Speaker 2: while they were going about normal family life, so to speak.
Speaker 2: She was there alone. She never looked in that bathroom,
Speaker 2: she never checked anything out. She was oblivious, according to her.
Speaker 2: But none of that seemed to hang together too. Well,
Speaker 2: that's a little too hard to believe that there could
Speaker 2: be a body in your bathroom and it was cut
Speaker 2: up into pieces and put into cohlers, and you had
Speaker 2: no idea that it was there.
Speaker 7: They separate at first, they're jointly charged, and then of
Speaker 7: course he wants to put the blame on her, and
Speaker 7: so they're separated, and so he goes first, and his
Speaker 7: trial is first. Now tell us again, it's you know,
Speaker 7: I find fascinating about this is that there is some
Speaker 7: really good lowering going on here. When in the first
Speaker 7: trial with Grant, the address to the jury from the
Speaker 7: defense is quite good, it's quite convincing. And yet that
Speaker 7: you get the prosecutions addressed to the jury and it
Speaker 7: is even better. But very very interesting because this really
Speaker 7: explains the first degree murder charge, the malice, premeditation planning
Speaker 7: and deliberation. And really this is the crux of this case,
Speaker 7: because it ends up being quite a circumstantial case, really
Speaker 7: despite all this physical evidence. So let's talk about what
Speaker 7: the defense for Grant Hayes is. What is their theory,
Speaker 7: What do they try to put across to the jury.
Speaker 7: Tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 2: They are trying to trying to convince the jury that yes,
Speaker 2: Grant was guilty both of the body, but he did
Speaker 2: it only to protect his wife, his family. He he
Speaker 2: had nothing to do with Laura's death. He was he
Speaker 2: was out of the room when the fire the fight started. Uh,
Speaker 2: he didn't know what was going on. He came in
Speaker 2: and Laura was on the floor. And the defense was
Speaker 2: adamant that this is just a man protecting his wife.
Speaker 2: The prosecution, on the other hand, had not only the
Speaker 2: evidence of the emails and text messages that Laura had saved,
Speaker 2: but they also had Laura's journal about it, and they
Speaker 2: had the history between them and how badly that had gone.
Speaker 2: And they also had the report of the psychologist who
Speaker 2: said that Grant in all likelihoods.
Speaker 3: Okay, round two.
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Speaker 2: It had a personality disorder and he needed to be
Speaker 2: seeing a psychiatrist to address that issue and identify which
Speaker 2: personality disorder it was, whether it was antisocial or borderline
Speaker 2: or whatever. And that was very damning information that was
Speaker 2: presented by the psychologist. And to me, one of the
Speaker 2: things that was most chilling in that courtroom was when
Speaker 2: they played a song had written about Laura called Broomstick Rider,
Speaker 2: and it was a very hate filled song about threatening
Speaker 2: to kill.
Speaker 7: Her, and.
Speaker 2: It really showed where his heart was. And the whole
Speaker 2: time that song was playing and the jury was listening
Speaker 2: to that song, Grant was sitting there at the defense
Speaker 2: table just bebopping his head to the music. He was
Speaker 2: really enjoying listening to that hateful invective that were the
Speaker 2: lyrics of his songs.
Speaker 7: Yes, yes, now what was really important too, and really
Speaker 7: part of his not so defendable defense is that supposedly
Speaker 7: this woman that was always fighting for custody for her children,
Speaker 7: that loved her children more than anything, went over to
Speaker 7: his home because she was going to sign a document.
Speaker 7: Now tell us about the details of this document, because
Speaker 7: again this is very very important in this case.
Speaker 2: There was a document that was found in his apartment
Speaker 2: that was signed by Laura, and they did have handwriting
Speaker 2: specialists verify that it was Laura's handwriting where she agreed
Speaker 2: to give up custody of the boys in exchange for
Speaker 2: twenty five thousand dollars. It said that she would be
Speaker 2: able to see the boys at with the permission of
Speaker 2: Grant Hayes now number one. Grant. Demanda no longer had
Speaker 2: any money, so they didn't have twenty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: The other thing is is that no one, no one
Speaker 2: that knew Laura, believed that she would take and give
Speaker 2: up custody for any sum of money, but she signed it.
Speaker 2: My theory on the case, which the prosecution tends to
Speaker 2: believe too, is that there was some coercion used that night.
Speaker 2: Was the nick they found on one of her neckbones
Speaker 2: because a knife was held to her throat possibly, and
Speaker 2: why did she seem to have received the fatal blow
Speaker 2: right there where that bleach stain was by the door.
Speaker 2: I think that what happened was that Laura did what
Speaker 2: she had to do at that moment, couldn't resist the
Speaker 2: temptation before she left that apartment of reminding them that
Speaker 2: she had a tape recorder and she had everything that
Speaker 2: was said that night and everything that happened recorded on
Speaker 2: that tape. Interesting, and that's why she died right then
Speaker 2: and there.
Speaker 7: Now we won't have time to go through the entire
Speaker 7: trial at all, but suffice to say that there was
Speaker 7: two separate trials, both pointing fingers at each other, trying
Speaker 7: to claim that they weren't the murderer. They were just
Speaker 7: a part of the disposal of this woman, with Amanda
Speaker 7: having of course, claiming to have much less of a role,
Speaker 7: and unbelievably really for a lot of it, where she
Speaker 7: didn't know this, and she didn't know that, she didn't
Speaker 7: look here, she didn't look that way, She had no idea,
Speaker 7: so it seems quite implausible. Basically, his trial, again, we
Speaker 7: just talked about his demeanor where he's enjoying listening to
Speaker 7: his murderous lyrics in his tunes, which seemed to be
Speaker 7: eerily and that's why they were admitted into the trial
Speaker 7: that they had some relation to his character and his
Speaker 7: feelings for his wife Laura. So tell us about the
Speaker 7: outcome of the first trial, and then I guess importantly
Speaker 7: what happens with the Amanda's trial.
Speaker 2: Grant was found guilty of first degree murder and he
Speaker 2: was given life without parole. He has since gone through
Speaker 2: the appeal process and lost. Amanda, on the other hand,
Speaker 2: the defense did manage to put some doubt and endure
Speaker 2: his minds about how much she was involved, and she
Speaker 2: was convicted of second degree murder and she will probably
Speaker 2: get out of prison after serving fourteen years.
Speaker 7: Interesting. I think that the prosecution, though, was really I
Speaker 7: think there were dead said on having them both convicted
Speaker 7: a murder, and I think given the limitations that the
Speaker 7: case presented for them that they still did exceedingly well.
Speaker 7: But it seemed that the prosecution really was if they
Speaker 7: really had to focus on anyone, they really wanted to
Speaker 7: make sure that Grant Hayes really went down for this murder,
Speaker 7: didn't they?
Speaker 2: Yes, they did, And I do think that they were
Speaker 2: probably equally complicit, and because of the way everything was
Speaker 2: carried out, and the fact that Amanda, while great was
Speaker 2: out shopping and things, was home alone and could have
Speaker 2: called the police and didn't. She was aware of what
Speaker 2: was going on, and she was an active participant in
Speaker 2: what was going on. So I think she got off easy,
Speaker 2: easier than she definitely deserved.
Speaker 7: But at least.
Speaker 2: She did have to pay a price. And Amanda will
Speaker 2: spend some of what could have been the best years
Speaker 2: of her life behind bars, and there is some justice
Speaker 2: for Laura Akerson.
Speaker 7: Patsy Grant, pop pardon me. Patsy Hayes had some letters
Speaker 7: from Amanda. Again, you talked about the character of Amanda,
Speaker 7: and we talked about the plausibility of her story and
Speaker 7: her comp compliccency in this murder tell us because she
Speaker 7: appeared in Amanda's trial. Patsy Hayes had letters that Amanda
Speaker 7: had written to her that she could convey some of
Speaker 7: that letter to Grant in prison. So what was the
Speaker 7: contents of those letters?
Speaker 2: She was sending messages of love through Patsy to Grant
Speaker 2: because two people sitting in jail cannot write to each
Speaker 2: other when they're co defendants, So to.
Speaker 7: Speak, And.
Speaker 2: So she was constantly talking about how much Grant now
Speaker 2: she would see him, making suggestions to him about meditating
Speaker 2: and things of that nature to keep his head on straight,
Speaker 2: and extremely supportive messages that if she hadn't known what
Speaker 2: he was up to every step of the way, it's
Speaker 2: hard to believe that she would have been that way.
Speaker 2: I mean, if she was totally innocent, surely she would
Speaker 2: have been outraged and what he had gotten her into.
Speaker 2: But there was no signs of that, none at all.
Speaker 7: You don't really point the finger, but it's nice that
Speaker 7: you show and not tell. She asked the same questions
Speaker 7: as Grant does. She wants to know about the gaiters
Speaker 7: and the eating of the bodies, and so these are
Speaker 7: beyond the realm of questions you would ask under any
Speaker 7: kinds of circumstances, regardless, aren't they.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And she's there for the little walk around the property,
Speaker 2: trying to find a place to dispose of the body,
Speaker 2: like the septic tank. And you know, how can you
Speaker 2: do something like that to your own sister? How can
Speaker 2: you wrap her up in something like this and put
Speaker 2: her in such a horrible, horrible position. And no one
Speaker 2: wants to get up on the witness stand and testify
Speaker 2: against her sister and say such horrible things about her.
Speaker 2: But Karen had to do that because she knew it
Speaker 2: was the right thing, and she didn't want to be there.
Speaker 2: She didn't want to be in that courtroom. She didn't
Speaker 2: want any part of it. It would but Amanda did
Speaker 2: that to her and put her there and compromise things
Speaker 2: with her own daughter, Shay too. It's just unbelievable the
Speaker 2: callousness that a man to shed to everyone around her
Speaker 2: who cared about her at one time.
Speaker 7: But we also have to remember the king of all manipulators,
Speaker 7: as this grant person who had a folder on his
Speaker 7: computer and calling Laura hole and diminishing her role even
Speaker 7: though she was the mother of these children. He made
Speaker 7: the choice to be with her. It just seemed that
Speaker 7: when he found someone else to use then these person,
Speaker 7: this person was trashed and he sucked all the money
Speaker 7: out of Amanda, and just in time to get her
Speaker 7: into a life in prison. So this person is really
Speaker 7: and no loyalty towards, it seems, anybody. And yet at
Speaker 7: the same time, he's been charismatic enough to con every
Speaker 7: single one of these people and their loyalty is incredible
Speaker 7: if you really think about it.
Speaker 2: Yes, And but the other side of this to remember
Speaker 2: is what Shae said. That's Amanda's daughter, Shay said. Everybody,
Speaker 2: he said, everybody points to Grant, that says he's the
Speaker 2: master manipulator. But what they're forgetting is that in Amanda,
Speaker 2: Grant met his match. She was every bit the manipulator
Speaker 2: that he was.
Speaker 7: Wow, so he's finished with his appeal processes. How close
Speaker 7: did you come? Did you make any effort? What was
Speaker 7: their response? Was there any did you reach out to
Speaker 7: either one of these four any kind of interview? And
Speaker 7: what was the response?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Well, you know, when I was working on the book,
Speaker 2: Grant had an appeal coming up, so he certainly did
Speaker 2: not want to talk to me. And Amanda I got
Speaker 2: no response, no response. I didn't even get a call
Speaker 2: back from her attorney. So yeah, a lot of times
Speaker 2: you just can't get through those barriers.
Speaker 7: Very interesting too, that the loyal friends Auksanna and Chevin,
Speaker 7: Chavn and Heidi were really prominent in these trials and
Speaker 7: helped as much as they could and offered as much
Speaker 7: as they could, and very good and reliable witnesses when
Speaker 7: they were called upon what they Yes, they were, and.
Speaker 2: It has got to be such a horrible, horrible thing
Speaker 2: to to not only lose your friend, but to have
Speaker 2: to get up there in the courtroom, not once, but
Speaker 2: twice to relive all of this misery and grief again.
Speaker 2: You know, it's the loss is horrific enough, and you,
Speaker 2: once it happened, you hope to try to heal from it.
Speaker 2: But these women they couldn't. They couldn't do that. They
Speaker 2: didn't have time to do that. Things just kept moving
Speaker 2: and moving, and they had to be there to testify
Speaker 2: a Grant's trial. They had to testify at Amanda's trial,
Speaker 2: and they really paid a price of friendship, and they
Speaker 2: stayed with their friend Laura to the bitter end for
Speaker 2: as long as it took.
Speaker 7: Now, what about Patsy Hayes and her husband, what what
Speaker 7: was their position through this? Are they still loyal to
Speaker 7: their son? And you can also tell us where the
Speaker 7: two boys and of course the Lily who was the
Speaker 7: offspring of the child from their marriage. Grant and Amanda.
Speaker 7: Tell us where those children are and who's taking care
Speaker 7: of them?
Speaker 2: The three children are all together with Grant Senior and
Speaker 2: Patsy Hayes. They are raising those three children, and you
Speaker 2: know their grandparents. This is a tough road to hoe
Speaker 2: for them. And on top of that, they lost their
Speaker 2: daycare center because once the news of this crime spread out,
Speaker 2: no one wanted to bring their children there anymore. It
Speaker 2: didn't no longer felt like a safe place. So they
Speaker 2: lost but their livelihood, they lost their and now they're
Speaker 2: raising a whole nother family and it's like they're starting
Speaker 2: all over again.
Speaker 7: Incredible. And do you know, is there any talk about
Speaker 7: what has happened with the boys and Patsy or anything?
Speaker 7: Is there any other stories in the follow up? I
Speaker 7: don't how big was this story in the media and
Speaker 7: was there sort of a diminished interest once the trial
Speaker 7: was finished? Tell us a little bit about how important
Speaker 7: or big a story this was in the media.
Speaker 2: The story was huge, particularly regionally. There was a lot
Speaker 2: of coverage of it. There was also a lot of
Speaker 2: coverage up in Michigan, where Laurel was originally from, and
Speaker 2: out in Houston where the bodies were dropped. It was
Speaker 2: big news. But once the trials were completed, it sort
Speaker 2: of faded out of the limelight, as those things usually do,
Speaker 2: and the Shay who knew Grant, Little Grant and in
Speaker 2: Gentle very well and had taken care of them on
Speaker 2: multiple occasions. She is living out west now, but she
Speaker 2: is the half sister of Lily, and she takes that
Speaker 2: extremely seriously as their responsibility, and she always makes it
Speaker 2: out for the joint summer birthday party. The three children
Speaker 2: have kind of close together birthdays and so they all
Speaker 2: have one big party for all three of them, and
Speaker 2: Shay is always there for that. She wants to continue
Speaker 2: to have a major role in little Lily's life, and
Speaker 2: I think more power to her. Lily has lost both
Speaker 2: of her parents to incarceration and it is at least
Speaker 2: for now as orphaned as the two little boys are,
Speaker 2: so it's good that she has her half sister in
Speaker 2: the picture.
Speaker 7: What's fascinating about your book, too, is that normally we
Speaker 7: have one trial and sometimes we have flea agreements, and
Speaker 7: well we have two full blown trials here, and the
Speaker 7: thing that normally doesn't happen is the defendant taking the stand,
Speaker 7: and with the case of Amanda, she does take the
Speaker 7: stand and makes for some very riveting and interesting reading
Speaker 7: because of course there's always something trotted out through the
Speaker 7: defense through your own lawyer and then a able bodied
Speaker 7: prosecutor can really savage that flimsy or yes, yeah, the.
Speaker 2: Prosecutor was amazing. I mean Amanda got up there with
Speaker 2: her sweet little girlish voice and was talking sweet and
Speaker 2: got a breathless and telling this story of her victimization
Speaker 2: by Grant, and the prosecutor got up there and she
Speaker 2: just was like a terrier. She wouldn't let go. And
Speaker 2: finally Amanda snapped and snapped at her and showed her
Speaker 2: true nature on that witness stand, and it was it
Speaker 2: was pretty amazing, cross examining and very revealing.
Speaker 7: Absolutely, Yes, you've painted a very interesting portrait and very
Speaker 7: very vivid portrayal of these two characters, especially well and
Speaker 7: Laura as well, Laura and Grant, Amanda and this confluence
Speaker 7: of events and the daughter Shay and the friends that
Speaker 7: the loyal friends, and just two parallels to people on
Speaker 7: the same trajectory, but people that were trying. Laura was
Speaker 7: desperately trying to rebuild their life and go in a
Speaker 7: completely different direction, and these children were just like a
Speaker 7: tug of war between this psychopath and his desires and
Speaker 7: Laura and came to a tragic and very very incredible story.
Speaker 7: I want to thank you very much, Diane for coming
Speaker 7: on and talking about your latest bit of remains. For
Speaker 7: those might want to contact you or see your other work,
Speaker 7: do you have a website that you might direct them to,
Speaker 7: and you do Facebook as well.
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm on Facebook, and I'm also I have a
Speaker 2: website which is Dianesanning dot com. And I've got sample
Speaker 2: chapters of my works on their all fourteen of my
Speaker 2: True crimes and ten of my novels, and they can
Speaker 2: take a sample of that there and read about each
Speaker 2: one of those books.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that's fantastic, Dan, and thank you again for coming
Speaker 7: on and for always, like always, a great interview and
Speaker 7: as always, a fantastic book Bitter Remains. I want to
Speaker 7: thank you very much for coming on, and I know
Speaker 7: I'll be hearing from you again soon because you're very,
Speaker 7: very prolific authors, so I'm sure he got something into
Speaker 7: works right now as we speak.
Speaker 2: I most certainly do, Dan. I wouldn't let you down.
Speaker 7: Absolutely well, thank you, Dan, and hope to hear from
Speaker 7: you again soon. You have a great evening, and thank you,
Speaker 7: thank you
Speaker 2: Dan, bye bye, good night,