The Football Player, The Firecracker and The Long Fall Down

experience as a crime and court reporter. She is currently a host and correspondent for the Law and Crime Network. You can find her on Twitter at Angeanette five and Instagram at an Genette. Episode thirty three, The Case of the Football Player, the Firecracker, and the Long fall Down. Twenty year old Josh Hilberly from Tulsa, Oklahoma was many things. A MoMA's boy, a good friend, a loving big brother, and a star football player for his high school team.

The oldest of two boys, Josh's father loved to describe his firstborn son as having a smile that could light up a room. On Halloween in two thousand and eight, Josh went to a party and met seventeen year old Amber Fields. Josh was smitten from the moment he laid eyes on Amber. She was gorgeous and smart, outgoing with a rebellious streak that Josh's more introverted personality was attracted to a romantic at heart. Josh swept Amber off her

feet and they eventually began dating. Here's Chris. Josh was born and raised in Tulsa, Oklahoma. According to his little brother Zach, football was just everything in Josh's world. They're in Oklahoma, which that's big football country and being a high school football stars pretty big d in Oklahoma, so Josh's talent on the field made him really popular in school. He was six four pounds. Josh's father and his brother

loved watching Josh play football. According to them, he was just phenomenal and lit up the field every Friday night with his talent. Josh had just turned twenty a few months before meeting Amber, who was seventeen when they met, and just to note in Oklahoma age consider his sixteen. So this was two consenting adults. So the connection they both felt was pretty immediate and they began dating soon after. Josh had a really romantic streak and he used it

to sweep Amber off her feet quite literally. Amber didn't know how to dance, and so one night Josh drove them to a basketball court at a park in his neighborhood and he had Amber stand on his feet and he taught her how to slow dance under the stars.

So in the spring of Josh decided to follow his younger brother Zack into the Air Force, and Zach was in the middle of serving a tour in Afghanistan in the summer of Josh was then shipped off to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas for basic training, which last got eight and a half weeks. Amber wrote to him while he was at boot camp. She drove eight hours to the Air Force base to see him graduate from basic training. It was a big, big day

and after graduating, Josh got his orders. He was supposed to report to Eilson Air Force Base in the North Pole and North Pole, Alaska. This is pretty much in the middle of nowhere. This is when this is all unfolding. So Josh and Amber have a big, big decision to make. The Air Force is not going to let Amber live on base with Josh unless they were married. So that's the big question. Do they tie the not? Both Josh and Amber's parents felt like they were not a good

match for one another. Their personality seemed to clash, and Amber's mother thought neither Amber nor Josh were ready for the adult responsibilities that come with marriage. Despite both families thinking the young couples twenty two and Amber eight team were wrong for each other, they got married anyway in a quick courthouse ceremony in August of The wedding may have been a no frills affair, but the reception was

a fancy blowout at a local country club. Young in love and now legal in the eyes of the Air Force, Josh and Amber moved to Aileson Air Force Base in October of So Josh and Amber moved to this relatively small and remote military base. I mean, I'd never even heard of it. When I was doing the research on the story Internet, I haven't heard of it either, and I thought I had heard of all of them. It is super, super remote. I can't even imagine living in

a place like that. Think about how isolating that would be. And and in Alaska, you know, isn't it dark for much? You know, half of the year dark pretty much all of the time, which I would think could affect your your mood, your circadian rhythm, your health, And I just can't even imagine. There's a lot of factors that that

this particular location would bring into someone's relationships. So the base itself only has about two thousand one active duty service personnel, and to compare that to some of the other larger army bases, the largest one Fort brag that has about five and fifty tho active duty personnel on base. So this is like a town in the middle of nowhere, and they're moving to the North Pole place that has nine months with significant snow, with a yearly average of

fifty eight inches. The national average is twelve inches, and it's considered one of the coldest places in Alaska. As you mentioned, there's a lot of darkness because the sun doesn't come out for a good part of the year, and it has an average low night time temperature of negative seventeen degrees in January, which is pretty cold. So here you have two very young people who have rushed into marriage and are living with each other for the

first time in this harsh cold environment. So you know, Jeanette, Josh's dad thought that Josh was making a huge mistake when he started dating Amber and eventually married her. They were just so different and now they've compounded that all of that with this really remote area. What were Amber's parents thought, Well, Amber's mother also thought that Josh and Amber were not a good match. She really thought they were way too young, they were naive, and that they

looked at marriage not really in a realistic way. They looked at it more as a fairy tale and not really as this lifelong commitment that's going to take compromise and sacrifice and really work relationships. You have to keep them in a good spot, and they require a lot of thoughtfulness and work to be successful. So once the harsh realities of both marriage and Alaska start to sink in, you know, Josh and Amber, they start getting into arguments.

They're fighting more and more, and both would call home crying to talk to their parents. So it's about November and winners approached and the days are getting darker. The isolation is wearing on Josh and Amber, but they get some good news. Amber is pregnant. Josh and Amber find out they're having a baby boy, and they decided to name him Levi and although having a baby on the

way should have been really happy. Josh and Amber, we're finding that being away from their support systems, their friends and family in Alaska was really sending them down this this really dark path that they just weren't prepared for. They weren't mature enough to handle it. Yeah, you have Alaska, new marriage, an air Force space, that's a lot for these young people. We're going to take a break. We'll

be back in just a moment. So we just learned that in January it's negative seventeen degree and for all we dark. And this is when all of this is playing out for Josh and Amber. I mean, can you imagine being in that situation? Absolutely not. It sounds like hell to me. Winter affects me. I think it affects a lot of people. But what this is like a winter on steroids. This is a whole another level. Not only that she you know, Amber is pregnant, which means

she's got all of these swings whatever, you know, hormones raging. Yeah, and none of it's her fault. It's all her body making another human being. That that's compounded by everything else. Right by January of eleven, Josh Nimber's relationship was on the rocks and teetering on disaster. Amber was still in her first trimester pregnant with little Levi. She and Josh would argue constantly, neither ever knowing what would set the other off. On January second, Josh Namber had been fighting

because Amber wanted take out and Josh did not. Amber started making dinner. Josh quote got in her face, knocked a dinner plate and drink out of her hand, and then grabbed her breasts. Josh squeeze so hard he broke blood vessels and bruised Amber. It seemed like Josh has been trying to pop her implants. Amber filed a police report against Josh for domestic abuse. The reports stated that officers took photos of the wounds and also took Josh into custody to cool down for the night, but no

charges were filed. Just a few months later, the young couple got hit with another blow. In May, even Josh's discharge from the Air Force due to misconduct for drug use. Josh had allegedly been using oxycotton. The troubled couple moved back home to Tulsa, Oklahoma, and into a twenty fifth floor apartment of the University Club Tower building. The University Club Tower is pretty well known. It was built in ninety six and was the first building in the United

States to be designed by using a computer. It has an interesting design. In the first eight floors are the parking structure for the residents, so and then it shoots up into the sky with the rest of the building. And Josh and Amber moved into the University Club Tower the first week of May eleven, and pretty quick it becomes apparent that Alaska and the isolation from friends and family may not have been at the root of their problems, so Josh and Amber pretty quickly Josh and Amber fell

back into their routine of arguing. Their fighting escalates and on May twenty eleven, Josh is now the one filing a protective order against Amber in Tulsa County District Court. Josh alleges that Amber grabbed the floor lamp and threw the lamp at him, heating him in the head and wounding him. Josh reported that the paramedics had taken to the hospital where he had received ten staples and eleven stitches.

That's pretty gash. However, nothing came of Josh's protective order filing because neither Josh nor Amber showed up at the court hearing on and the case was dismissed, which we often see in cases of domestic abuse. You and I have covered a lot of stories. Somebody reports and then they don't show up to finish the report. That's kind of common, unfortunately. You know, maybe there's a cooling off

period and they don't follow through. Yeah, I mean, what other things do you think could have been going through Josh's mind for not showing up. Look at our culture and you know this whole idea that men are the big, strong ones, right, and for a lot of men coming to terms with the fact that they may be a victim,

that is very embarrassing. And you know, it's possible that Josh felt a lot of shame over the abuse he was suffering at the hands of Amber, and that could have possibly played a part in him not showing up for that hearing. And the CDC actually reports that one in seven men will experience physical violence by their intimate partner at some point in their lifetimes, and at least three million acts of domestic violence will occur annually to men.

So men can definitely be victims of domestic violence. This isn't uncommon, you know. I think it's almost like a first Men are human too, and it doesn't matter your gender. Anyone can be an abuser, and I think it's hard for some people to wrap their heads around that, even though I think we're learning more about that if you if you really look at these issues and pay attention.

So men represent as much as fIF of all cases of domestic partner violence, and male victims are also less likely to seek out medical care, so that the incidences of domestic violence on men may very well be under reported because of that whole societal norms about viewing men as the big, burly types and it's probably just you know,

embarrassing for them. So the National Domestic Violence Hotline has reported that when they hear from male contacts that reach out daily, that these men feel emasculated and like less of a man when undergoing situations of abuse at the hands of spouses or partners, and some have even reported feeling so ashamed that they don't want to acknowledge the abuse because they fear that if they do, it will

make the situation real. So at this point, neither Josh nor Amber seem like angels when it comes to domestic violence. But I think we need to remember that both of them are really pretty much kids. She's nineteen and he's still twenty two. So how does a young man who's just twenty two years old process being domestically abused, especially one who grew up in the hyper masculine world of football. And did Josh even know there was help out there for him? It just feels like both of their parents

worst nightmare was coming true. Just eight days after Josh's twenty third birthday, at four pm on g In seventh, two thousand eleven, a Tulsa nine one one operator received a strange call. Someone had witnessed a man fall out of the twenty five story window at the University Club Tower building and watched him plummet seventeen floors to his death. The body landed on the roof of the building's parking structure.

Take a listen to the nine one one call the park department and I just saw someone jump out the window out of the probably the seventh nineteenth Flooria University Club Power Department at keventh Eaton, Denver. Let me keep the neighbor of that place is University University Club, which is them. Some were on the way, all right, I could not smoking figure out here looking right at there. I'm looking right at it, and he the glass broke

and he fell down. Well, the people, okay, I don't want to three four or five, seven, eight, ninety eleven, twelve four We all right, thank them. When first responders arrived to the roof of the parking deck, they found Amber distraught and crying next to Josh's broken and dead body. Amber was led away by police officers who also arrived,

and Amber was begging everyone to quote fixed Josh. The detectives and police officers who arrived on the scene at first believe they were dealing with an accidental and tragic death. So that's pretty shocking. It's awful. I can't even imagine seeing something like that. So when law enforcement gets to the University Club tower, they think they're just dealing with a freak accident that somebody might have fallen out a window. They asked Amber to come down to the station to

file a report. Amber's grandmother comes with her. At around six pm, Amber and her grandmother are sitting alone in a police interrogation room. Amber starts talking to her grandmother, and the officer who brought them in to file the report watches them on a closed circuit monitor, and he decided to record the conversation. The officer didn't tell the

grandmother or Amber that they were being recorded. So Amber is distraught and she starts telling her grandmother what happened, and her grandmother instinctively tries to get Amber to stop talking to no Avail. We can listen to a little excerpt of what the officer recorded. Josh just dead, and I'm here. I didn't just lose my husband. Genie and Patrick lost their son. Sad lost his brother, his grandma's poor Grandma's gonna have ar attack when she finds out

there her little Josh is gone. Well, I kept seeing like I just held his broken body. I wonder if his parents know yet. I'm sure if they did, they were right. They kept saying, if we stay together, I'm going to kill him. So did this happen? How did this happen? Why did he have to follow the window, fall out of window. I'm a horrible person who could do that? Who could do that? Push my husband and make him fall up the window? Did you intentionally know?

Of course, not that's what they're gonna take it. I just keep watching him fall over and over and over, getting my head watching him flail. I think that, you know, my last thought was please catch yourself. You know. I just want to know what was going through his head, if he knew he was going to die, if he said a prayer, or if he cursed my name, or if he just I thought that he could catch himself too. And then just watching him in the ground. That's crazy.

When that officer who was recording her that Amber says she actually pushed Josh before he stumbled and fell through the window. The case now goes from accidental to a possible homicide investigation. Amber is arrested on a second degree murder charge and taken into custody. Just hearing that is so chilling. I mean, she's clearly broken up about it. It's not like some of the other interrogation things where we've heard like people singing or doing really weird things.

She does sound broken, but she did say she pushed him, so we don't know the situation between them. When that happened. Hours after Josh Hilberling fell to his death on June seven, two eleven, investigators believe they have what amounts to a confession to at the very least second degree murder from his wife. When detectives searched Josh and Namber's apartment, they found a clean and tidy place with no signs of a possible physical fight. Nothing seemed out of place. Officers

also found a bag pack that belonged to Josh. Amber story was that she and Josh had been fighting that day because Josh was planning on going to a music festival with his friends and he was going to sell pills at the festival. She explained that this is why the police found Josh's packed bag. Amber also told investigators that Josh grabbed her by the shoulders so hard his grip left marks and a scratch, and that she had

pushed him in self defense. She claimed that Josh had stumbled back into of the window and the window had broken. Before Amber knew it, Josh had fallen to his death. But when detective stuck deeper into Josh Naber's relationship, they found the protection order Josh had filed against Amber just weeks before his death. Detectives felt the protection order pointed

to Amber being the abuser in their relationship. When investigators spoke with Josh's family, his father told him that Josh had called him on June seventh, just hours before his death, to tell him he couldn't take the fighting and abuse anymore. Josh's father said Josh had packed a bag and wanted his father to come pick him up. His father was

at work and told him he couldn't come until later. So, according to Josh's dad, earlier in the day on June seventh, Josh called him to tell him that he couldn't take the abuse from the fighting anymore, and he asked to

be picked up. Josh said told Josh he couldn't come right away because he was at work, and that he'd come after he was done, and that would be the last time that Josh's father spoke to his son, and that call really haunts his father to this day and he regrets that he didn't come get Josh when he first called. But according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the most dangerous time for victim of abuse is when

they finally decided to leave that abuser. And of course, Amber claimed that Josh hadn't actually packed the bag to leave her, but he had packed the bag because he was planning to go to a music festival with some friends where he planned to sell some pills, which is part of what Josh had been doing apparently, and part of what the strife was in their relationship now that he was out of the Air Force and didn't have a job, and that this was the whole reason that

they were fighting to begin with. They were fighting because he was leaving to go hang out with his friends. Let's stop here for another break. Yeah. The toxicology report from Josh's autopsy came back clean. There were no drugs, no alcohol in his system, which seems to poke a

hole in Amber's story. Investigators also spoke to one of Josh and Amber's next door neighbors, and he tells them that he heard Amber yell no, no, no, and then charging footsteps before hearing the sound of glass breaking, and then hearing Amber scream oh my god, Oh my god, oh my god. On June eight, investigators bump up the

charges against Amber to first degree murder. Amber Hilberling was released that afternoon on a two D fifty thou dollar bond, that's according to jail records, and while Amber is awaiting trial, she gives birth to Levi on August six. Amber has offered two different plea deals that would have dropped her sentence down to five years with fifteen years of role, but Amber declines both of those authors. She maintains her innocence and that what happened to Josh was simply a

horrible accident. I know. She also maintained that the push was an accident, that they were in a fight, and she didn't realize that those windows could break. You would think on a floor of a building you would have some pretty maybe shatterproof glass or something like that, but in this case, obviously they didn't. And it's just absolutely horrible. This was, I hate to say it, a story where the parents might have been right, and maybe they should

have waited a little bit. Definitely, I think anybody that young really needs to think twice before committing to a relationship long term. To me, when I hear about people having children so young, I mean, think about how your brain matures, how you mentally and emotionally mature or not when you're that young. And that's why when I see people getting into these things at sex just such a young age and and mistaking probably infatuation for actual love. I really want to just walk up to them. Do

you know what you're doing? Do you know what you're thinking. I'm not saying it can't work out for the best, but I really think you got to think twice. Sometimes we may never really know absolutely without a doubt, what was going on it. You never know what goes on behind closed doors. I truly believe that with relationships, even if you think you know a couple really well, you

don't know what goes on. Amber's child began on March eleventh, thirteen, and she took the stand on March sixte Amber testified that she pushed Josh in self defense and that she never intended to kill her husband. Amber further explained that she could not have anticipated the window breaking on March eighteenth, two eleven, just seven days after her trial began. Amber is convicted of second degree murder. This does not require

under law that the prosecution prove intent to kill. The jury only deliberated for three hours, and the judge upheld the jury's recommendation of a twenty five year prison term. In March of the Joshua Hilberling Estates sued the University Club Tower about the thin windows. The suit was eventually dismissed because it was filed after the time window to

file such cases had closed. Sadly, after a failed appeal, Amber was found dead by hanging in her cell on October and autopsy found cut scars on Amber's wrists and arms, as well as meth anphetamine and her bloodstream at the time of her death. Before her suicide, Amber told the corrections officer quote she said, I have to live with that I killed my husband, and I'm going to have to tell my son someday that I killed his father. Thankfully, Josh Nambrason is thriving with amper side of the family

Shameless Plug. If you're enjoying Crazy and Love, leave us a review and listen to season three of our hit series The Piked and Massacre. New episodes there every Wednesday wherever you get your podcasts, and don't forget to follow us on Instagram at Katie Underscore Studios. Crazy in Love is produced by Stephanie Lydecker, Jeff Shane, Chris Grieves and me Courtney Armstrong. Editing and sound designed by Jeff ta. Crazy in Love is a production of I Heart Radio

and Katie Studios. For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Stay safe, lovers,