The evidence for Darlie Routier's innocence is truly compelling, I summarized it below. Checked to see if this video was posted before and couldn't find it. Honestly the most well made true crime video I've seen. Here are the major points summarized;

• The bread knife prosecutors argued was used to cut the window screen, was first dusted using a fiberglass fingerprinting brush composed of similar material to the fiberglass from the screen door. The state's forensic expert, Charles Linch, relied purely on his eyesight to compare the fibers found on the knife to the fibers from the screen and determined he could not find a difference. There was no definitive scientific testing of the structural or chemical composition of the fibers. Linch reasoned that the fibers from the fingerprinting brush were a different size than the fibers from the screen, but he did not produce a report stating the exact size of these fibers. The fibers of a fingerprinting brush vary in size throughout the brush. Linch only provided his subjective opinion of the similarity between the fibers found on the knife and from the screen, he did not conduct any actual scientific testing.

• At the time of Darlie's trial, Linch was not a certified fiber analysis expert, he did not even complete a proficiency test. Previously he exclusively worked as a microscopic hair analyst.

• During a bond hearing before the murder trial, Linch testified that a hair found on the windowsill belonged to Darlie. Months later, DNA tests proved the hair was not Darlie's, but a female police officer that contaminated the crime scene. Linch's incorrect testimony was a key piece of evidence that kept Darlie in jail.

• Expert testimony of Linch helped convict 4 people, who were later exonerated and proven innocent.

• Blood splatter found on Darlie's shirt, which prosecution testified came from the motion of stabbing, could very likely have came when her husband was doing CPR compressions and Darlie was holding her boys wound closed. The CPR resulting in air rapidly leaving these wounds and splattering blood.

• Before testimony by the medical staff who were around Darlie during her hospitalization after the murders, the police department met with them and showed them graphic images of the boys after their murder and detailed images from the crime scene itself. The staff's real medical notes during Darlie's hospitalization described her as excessively crying, frightened, inconsolable. Later during trial and after the staff were shown the images, they testified that Darlie appeared uncaring and they did not see crying, sadness, or evidence indicative of a grieving mother.

• The diet pill Fen-Phen, which Darlie had taken for 4 months prior to the murders, causes severe neurological issues. The pharmaceutical companies producing the drug covered up evidence that it was nurotoxic and did not financially support any studies of the drug's effect on the human brain because they knew it was neurotoxic and did not release this information. Thousands of people that took this drug were unable to function normally, having acute memory retention problems. Fenfluramine and Phenteramine are linked to serotonin neurotoxicity, causing severe depression and short term memory loss. Some users who had taken the diet pill for just 45 days reported these neurological issues, Darlie had been taking it for 4 months. Users also reported drastic changes to their sleep habit, once being light sleepers and now able to sleep through appalling disruptions while on the drug.

• Absence of evidence of an intruder does not prove that there was not an intruder, numerous horrific crimes have happened without DNA left by the perpetrator.

• Darlie's wounds were not superficial. Her treating medical physician testified that her hemoglobin had dropped 2 grams following her hospitalization. In order for it to drop that amount a person would need to lose 2000 CCs of blood, this is half the blood in Darlie's body. After being brought to the hospital Darlie was diagnosed with acute posthemorrhagic anemia, which is severe blood loss. Darlie was on the brink of death. A large amount of blood was found on the couch where Darlie explained she was sleeping and evidence is consistent with her being stabbed while lying on her back. There is also photo evidence of bruising present on Darlie's arms while in the hospital, this same bruising became more pronounced over time. Many people believe that this bruising was self inflicted after her hospitalization in an effort to prove her story, but it was present the night of the attack.

• The Routers did not need the money. In the 6 months before the attack her husband earned $111,000 ($213,300 adjusted for inflation), from January 1996 to June 1996. The previous year he earned $264,000 ($507,000 adjusted).

I would love to hear everyone's thoughts on the video and this analysis. I find it very compelling personally. I implore you to listen to the points yourself the video is extremely well made and I did not summarize everything.

I’ve noticed in the true crime community that there is an abundance of sympathy for killers with post party depression/psychosis. Lindsay Clancy, a mother who killed 3 of her children, got plenty of sympathy on TikTok and Facebook. Killers with other forms of mental illness like Jared Lee Loughner (the Tuscon shooter) diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Adam Lanza (the Sandy Hook Elementary shooter) and Andreas Lubitz (pilot of Germanwings Flight 9525 who deliberately flew a plane carrying 149 people into the French Alps) diagnosed with depression rightly get no sympathy.

What makes postpartum depression/psychosis so different from other forms of mental illness that warrants this sympathy?

I am not negating the fear and sadness those close to him are feeling, I hope they find solace.

Riley is an adult that went missing without foul play. Anyone that's watched a single episode of Disappeared or similar true crime shows knows how insanely disproportionate this law enforcement and media presence is for an adult that could've just chosen to walk off and leave his past life behind. People that are actively in danger don't get the resources a drunk man wandering around a metropolitan area has received for almost two weeks now. Riley is missing but he isn't special.

There are thousands of missing and murdered indigenous women throughout this country where the extent of the search for them or investigation consists of a police officer filing a missing adult report and forgetting it. Why does Riley get infinitely more resources than other missing people? He's no more endangered than any other drunk adult in a major city on a Friday night.

I'm sure it's going to piss people off but yeah, race comes into it. This is giving big "missing white woman syndrome" vibes but Riley happens to be a man.

His life matters but so do the lives of the thousands of people that are missing that don't have the privilege of having parents that refuse to believe their son got too intoxicated to get himself home.

You know what I’ve always wondered? Serial killers with wives or girlfriends.. yet have unalived many woman 🤔 how does that work as far as stopping their thoughts to kill when it comes to them? Is it love? What made those woman different? Especially the murderers who’ve got in these relationships during the time of their killing spree.

Hello! I’m doing some research for my uni assignment and looking for cases that involves sons killing and eating their mothers, and also cases where the mother has excused their criminal son for the horrific acts they have committed and openly forgiven them/insisted they were innocent.

Please let me know of any! Thank you :)

Hey, I want to start a podcast, and the first episode I want to be about Elizabeth Short. If you have any ideas or theories sustained by evidence, you can drop some sources or your thoughts. It will help me very much, thank you. 

Edit: Thank you guys for the comments. I came up with a theory, and I don’t know if it was already out there in a podcast or book and so on. I think the killer knew what he was doing. I think he chose Elizabeth Short knowing that she had so many strings attached to her that it would be impossible for the police to follow so many leads or to even catch him. It must have been someone with so many connections that he/she orchestrated everything behind the scenes at the right time and at the right place. I don’t think George Hodel killed Elizabeth, but I think he knew who was the killer. 

This is something I came up with after I read a little about what Larry Harnisch discovered. My theory might not be good and might be debunked later when I do more research, but I can’t shake off this feeling that it’s not just one person involved in Elizabeth’s death. Thank you for your ideas and suggestions. 

I had never really read into the Scott Peterson case. I was young and only remember the People Magazine headlines. But having just done a deep dive on the case … I’m amazed at just how much reasonable doubt there seems to be for a case this “settled.”

Obviously, the circumstantial evidence is extremely convincing. Scott Peterson seems like, at best, a scumbag. But he could also be a non-criminal scumbag. He could have told Amber he went to Europe for the holidays to explain why he couldn’t see her for two weeks, and then went WAY too far once Laci went missing.

However, there’s no real forensic evidence in the case at all. There’s no murder scene, and her body was dumped and found months later. It’s tragic, but there’s very little to go on.

And there seems to be equally compelling circumstantial evidence for an alternate theory. Neighbors saw Laci walking the dog for almost an hour after Scott left. A neighbor’s house was burglarized around that time, but either way, another neighbor saw sketchy dudes in a van on Christmas Eve outside of Laci’s home. Most wrongful conviction poster children have no alternate theory (ahem, Adnan), but this seems horrifyingly possible.

I’ve been playing catch up, so it’s possible I missed something. But given that Scott has an alibi that witnesses and physical evidence confirm (he went to get the boat, she took the dog for a walk), and there’s a credible alternate theory that doesn’t seem to have been really run down, I don’t get how this could be considered settled beyond a reasonable doubt.

And I don’t think it ever could be. If Laci had been abducted by a stranger(s), that’s hard to prove at the time. For whatever reason, police at the time chose to prove Scott did it early, rather than just do surveillance as a suspect and run down other leads that hard. There’s definitely missed evidence. Barring a deathbed confession, I don’t see how anyone could investigate a random homicide 18+ years later.

It’s so tragic. Scott seems like a dirtbag, but it’s not clear to me that he’s a murderer. I’m sure this is controversial to some of you. However, coming at this with fresh eyes (but again, maybe missing things), I just don’t see how he is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Sup sub, so, Wendy Murphy (she’s a long time attorney who’s been on CNN, NBC and other networks, also wrote a few books!) came into our restaurant the other night, we ended up having a great convo with her about different cases and such. Her insight and how she backed her theories was so cool to listen to

Here is her take on the Jon Benet Ramsey case:

• The Dad did it, he was pimping her out and exploiting her for child porn purposes, and she OD’d on the medication he was using to sedate her for various uses of said exploitation. JBRs official cause of death was Respiratory Arrest, caused by an overdose of this drug (I can’t remember the name for the life of me, I’m sure someone familiar with the case does, almost positive it begins with a “B”)

-The fibers from a certain sweater were found in JBRs crotch region and could only have come from someone who owned said sweater.

• The Ramsey’s were being investigated for Child Porn traced to their laptops before this whole ordeal happened, Wendy also claims this was his only job and he’d been doing it for a long time. She also believes his ambitions to exploit his children led to the death of his other child that died from a previous marriage under similar circumstances.

-The Pineapple found undigested in JBRs system was likely given to her ( by her parents) to aid with the ingestion of insert sedative drug I alluded to above

• She also believes JBRs dad didn’t have a real job and distributing child porn was his means of income

• The reason we keep seeing these clear as day sham suspects come up every so often is because of the statue of limitation laws in Colorado. If you don’t solve a murder within 10 years, the case record becomes public UNLESS you find a new suspect. That’s why you got that idiots from Thailand in 06 and the diddler POS from a couple years back. It’s a sham to keep the case record private because if it got out, the whole world would see clear as day that the Ramseys are guilty, and the biggest reason all this stuff has stayed suppressed is because JBR was being pimped and exploited to wealthy and high powered people

-It had nothing to do with the brother, he was 9 and to young to do anything fatal to JBR

• JBRs genitals were damaged severely which she feels further proves her notion that she was being drugged heavily and subsequently abused

• the damage to JBRs neck area was from her dad shaking her to try and wake her when she was unresponsive

-When asked about the Pineapple, both of her parents were extremely cagey, it also made 0 sense why the spoon in the pineapple bowl was never dusted for finger prints

This is all I can remember right now (it’s 2am my time) and if anything else she said comes back to me I’ll follow up.

Hope this helped 😬

So I listened to Annie Elyse Serialsly podcast ep on Nicole /Chris Watts.I’ve always thought she knew more than she claimed but now I’m convinced she may have been the mastermind. A few things stand out to me : her cellphone pinged in Chris area at 6:15 the morning of the murders. She doesn’t clock in until 2:15 that day to work. There is record of her calling a clinic and inquiring about OxyContin and if it can cause a miscarriage.

Edited to add re Chris Watts

I'm guessing this is a hot take, but if someone committed their crime dozens of years ago and hasn't violated since to the best of our knowledge, of what benefit is putting them away for life now? I understand why many people would want to do that. These people tend to believe a large purpose of the justice system is retribution/vengeance.

But there's another view that the main purpose of the justice system should be correction and prevention, rather than vengeance. For anyone in that camp, I'm not understanding how that view is served by sending someone away who seems to have shown for decades that they've changed, or the incident was a one-time occurrence.

I mean maybe a lifetime of complete forfeiture of things like privacy, so that law enforcement is constantly monitoring the person's activities more so than your average citizen? I could see that. But decades later going to prison for something you did decades ago just doesn't sit right for me, with no evidence of transgressions in the period between. But again, I totally understand how if your view is that it's just good to punish people for the sake of punishment when they do wrong, then I get the position.

So I've been discussing Asha Degree's case on her subreddit and would like to hear you guys' response to my findings and theory in regards to this case.

Let's start with the eyewitness reports. These only started to roll in after a missing persons report was released to the public describing Asha's age, weight, height, time and location of her disappearance. None of the these individuals came forward with their sightings independently but rather they reported their alleged sightings to police after the authorities had already provided extremely pertinent external details in her case. The trucker who claims to have spotted Asha on Highway 18 asserts that he paged other truckers to alert them that an adult female may be on the side of the road (and there have been no other truckers who stepped forward at the time to confirm this). Truckers drive thousands of miles and see different people each day. Is it plausible that he had her confused with someone else he'd seen on a different day or route? Is it possible that he didn't see anything at all? Mind you that he was traveling highway speeds and it was storming which would've created poor visibility conditions. The vast majority of eyewitness reports are false leads resulting from people concocting false memories - why are people not willing to entertain the idea that he is not telling the truth, has his memories mixed up or that he merely interjected himself into the investigation thinking that he'd be of help or to get some attention? The trucker came forward 2 days after her disappearance and told police that he suspected the whole time it was a battered housewife fleeing her husband, not a tiny child as most people allege. He only believed it was Asha after her description was given which enabled him to create a narrative around the information provided. It's very easy to claim to be a witness to something and match your alleged sighting to the child's description when police have provided you all the details of the person and where they were last seen.

The other eyewitness states that he saw Asha walking south on Highway 18 and did 3 consecutive U-Turns to ask her if she was okay. He states that she was wearing a dress (no dress was found missing from Asha's wardrobe and it was 35 degrees outside) and also states he that pulled up directly beside her, more than likely catching a glimpse of her and realizing that this 4'6 60lbs individual with pigtails and hairbows dangling everywhere was a child, and that when he went to ask her if she was okay, she darted off 600 ft (a distance as long as two football fields) into the night, heading down a completely dark, wooded area towards a shed. Now the problem with this eyewitness report is obvious: For starters, Asha was described as being an extremely anxious, paranoid, apprehensive child that was so scared of strangers that she would refuse to let the her Aunt through the front door even if her Aunt would repeatedly state who she was and confirm her identity. I have no reason to believe that a child this hyper aware of her surroundings would allow a complete stranger to circle around her not one but three times in the middle of the night off of a dark, desolate highway road at 3 o'clock in the morning and wait until the third U-Turn to dart off, especially given the fact that she was terrified of the dark and didn't have a flashlight with her. My next point is this: if you circle around someone three times, you are obviously very concerned with their safety. So if you pull up beside someone and you watch them frantically run a length as long as two football fields - which I imagine takes a minute or two - why would you drive off as if it's nothing, especially when you caught a glimpse of this person and could tell they were a child? And again, he only came forward with this information after police had given the description of her likely last location. Eyewitness reports are misleads nine times out of ten so why are people treating them like gospel in this situation?

Then we get to the forensic element of the case. Bloodhounds were brought in after Asha was reported missing but were not able to trace her scent past her driveway. Rainy conditions would've aided the dogs in locking in moisture and picking up a scent, yet they still could not detect her scent in the shed, on the highway or on the path leading to the shed. When authorities investigated inside of the shed, they found generic items (hair bow, candy wrapper, pencil) which bloodhounds once again could not trace to her. These items have yet to be confirmed as belonging to her through any sort of forensic or DNA analysis, which the FBI has every incentive in the world to because it confirms their theory and proves that they were on the right track. The fact that they haven't come forward with any information confirming her presence in that she indicates that they can't. How could a 9 year old who ran into a small, contained shed and entertained herself with hairbows, candy and pencils not leave behind a single shred of evidence that she was physically there? Additionally, this was a shed with dirt flooring. It was pouring in Shelby, North Carolina that night which would've created a murky, sodden surface for muddy prints to be collected. Yet, there were no footprints, fingerprints or body indentations located in this shed. If there is zero physical evidence that she was in the shed, ran to the shed or was walking down a highway 2 yards away from the shed then what reason do people have to believe that she was outside at all?

So all in all: there's no physical evidence linking her to being outside, eyewitness reports only came in after her missing reports case made the news and bloodhounds couldn't trace her scent beyond that of her driveway.

Statistically, Asha was far more likely to succumb to death by the hands of her parent(s) than by the hands of a child rapists killer prowling the rural backroads of North Carolina at 3:00 in the morning during a storm. "But the FBI cleared her parents" right, because the FBI has never been wrong or made errors in investigations before. "But her father still participates in awareness walks" He's not viewed as a suspect by authorities, so why wouldn't he? If he wants to appear concerned and keep the heat off of himself, his best bet is to continue to be involved in her case, cooperate with authorities and bring positive publicity to his reputation and image so as to not raise suspicions publicly or privately in his own home. "Well how do you explain the backpack that was found in a wooded area a year after her murder" Is it entirely possible that the perpetrator intentionally threw it there a year later to throw the authorities off track and send investigators on a wild goose chase? Let's not act like criminals haven't planted false evidence before. "But her parents passed a polygraph test" since when are polygraph tests 100% accurate and reliable?

I'm not understanding how the theory of her being lured outside by a pedophile at 3 o'clock in the morning during a storm, running into an opportunistic predator off of a rural highway, being the victim of a hit and run, being eaten by wild animals or running away to start a new life makes more sense than her father disciplining her to the point of intentionally or accidentally killing her, burying her body in the woods of North Carolina and then leaving behind a trail of amateurish false evidence (pencil in the shed, backpack found in the woods along the freeway) to purposefully make authorities look in every direction but his? Most of us don't want to have to accuse a parent of killing their own flesh and blood. But in the case of Asha Degree, it's where all the arrows keep leading to: her father, her household, her parents. I think it's misguided to rule them out when they are objectively most likely to be the culprits.

This was an intelligent, precocious 9 year old girl that was absolutely terrified of the dark, animals, strangers and thunderstorms - Yet intentionally placed herself in a predicament in which she'd have to deal with all of these things all at once? Yet didn't bring a coat, umbrella or flashlight during a long trek down a rural highway at 3 o'clock in the morning in 35 degree weather? She was afraid to play outside by herself yet executed an elaborate plan to leave her residence in the middle of the night and managed to not leave behind a single forensic clue? Not buying it.

If you can entertain the idea of her leaving the house voluntarily, can't you entertain the idea of her leaving the house involuntarily or not leaving the house at all?

Her father left the house that night. There isn't much information in regards to where he went - evidently he made a late night run to a candy store and didn't return home until later - but he left and the time frame of it is sketchy. Why is it too much to consider that she might've gotten in the vehicle with him that night and something transpired where he ended up killing her? Why is it incomprehensible that a parent harmed her when they're statistically more likely to do so than a random stranger?

Let me put this another way. How does an intelligent, overly-cautious 9 year old girl terrified of darkness, storms and wild animals leaving her home during a storm at 3:00 in the morning, walking down the highway with no coat, umbrella or flashlight, hiding in the woods and encountering a pedophile or serial killer make more sense than suspecting that the people closest to her had something to do with this?

Saw a YouTube video on why true crime was not very critical of the incompetence of cops. But it's like true crime doesn't examine the why of crime much ever. Why so little social commentary ( especially as Americans with a society riddled with murder and violence ) , little data analysis , almost no facts or data ever come up ever. Crime is very gendered , it's 90% plus men , crime is very much about the access to guns , crime is very much about targeting vulnerable and close ( like in one's home) people. Why don't we talk about that much more ?

Casey Anthony will do or say anything to make her life easier.

I believe that she knows what happened to her daughter, but I don’t think it was an intentional murder. Killing your child does not make your life easier. It makes it much harder. If Casey just wanted to party she could have given Caylee to her grandparents, who would have happily taken her in by all accounts.

Another redditor had a theory that Casey would give Caylee some kind of sleeping medication so that she would fall asleep easier. This makes sense, given Casey’s tendency to take the easy way out in just about everything she does. The theory then, is that Caylee’s death was caused by an accidental overdose. “Zanny the nanny” was actually just xanax (or some other substance).

But what about the duct tape and the internet search history? I think this was intentionally done by Casey to set up an alibi.

The search for “foolproof suffocation” was done on Casey’s Mother’s computer, not her own.

I believe Casey Anthony duct taped her daughter’s deceased body and intentionally planted evidence on her mother’s computer to give some credibility to the idea that Caylee was kidnapped/murdered by her parents as a way to cover up her own negligence.

Edit: After reading this article in which Baez alleges that Casey’s father made the search as a means to kill himself out of guilt, I now believe that Casey Anthony made that search because she wanted to commit suicide after finding out that the sleeping medication killed Caylee.

If you re-listen to the original 911 call, and replace every time she mentions “Zanny” with sleeping pills the entire meaning of the phone call changes.

I believe that Anthony told several half-truths as a way to lead people away from the truth.

The answer was in plain sight all along.

First let me say, obviously I think OJ was guilty.

I have studied this case since it happened and vividly remember it being all over the news since the day of the murder.

Now all through the trial and subsequent media related to it people have spoke about OJs rage issues, his temper, his anger and how he finally snapped that night.

But since that night (counting the vegas robbery, that was not a violent crime) there doesn't seem to have been any real instances of him losing control. I've seen people confront him in the street, he lost EVERYTHING, the image and the legacy he so deeply cared about, spiraled into drug addiction but still no loss of control.

The biggest question for me, with regards to 'what if we are all wrong about the real murderer' is just how on earth did he never once show that angry crazy side of himself again??

Was it just his love for Nicole being so strong and toxic that it made him act like that, surely not?

Although it’s clear he held compassion for Jeffrey up until his death, Lionel’s reflections suggest he also felt some degree of responsibility for his son’s crimes.

Should he genuinely hold himself accountable?