The Love Triangle, The Ladies Man, and The Deadly Loan

stand up comedian, and clubhouse app influencer. She also hosts the I Heart Media podcast Real Time Crime with Teddy Mellencamp, available now. You can find her on Instagram at Lea Lamar. Episode sixteen, The Case of the Love Triangle, The Ladies Man, and the Deadly Loan. In the mid two thousands in Mississippi lived Avis Banks and Carla Hughes, with so many similarities in any other circumstance that two women could have been friends. Avis Banks was the middle of three sisters.

Despite coming from humble beginnings, Avis had dreams of being a teacher and owning her own daycare. She was the first in her family to go to College, where she graduated kum laude. People who knew Avis described her as smart and beautiful. Like Avis, Carlo was an incredibly driven and gifted student. She was on the Honorable Student Council, the cheerleading squad. She played in the school band, and participated in beauty pageants where she won multiple crowns. Friends

described her as happy and bubbly and eternal cheerleader. She too had aspirations of becoming a teacher. So how did these two women with such bright futures and so much in common end up intersecting and tragedy? Enter Kian Pittman. Kian was Avis's fiance and Carla's closest friend. Here's Chris in two thousand and six, Avis and Kian. You know,

they're dating and they find out that they're pregnant. Because Avis came from strict parents, she was nervous to tell them that she was having a baby out of wedlock. So the couple got engaged. They were planning to get married in January two thou seven, right before the baby was due in February. As is seven years old, so you know, she's still in her twenties. Keian moved them from their small apartment to a house in the suburbs

because of gout, the expecting family, Yeah, and Chris. While all that was happening, in the spring of two thousand and six, when she was twenty five, Carla took a job at Chestate Middle School as a language artist teacher,

and this was really her dream job. It was a good town, a good position, and she was really excited about the job so much though, that she scrambled to make the move, wing to an apartment in a bad part of town, which she told her family was just temporary until she could get a better place, which really just speaks to how excited she was to make this move. When school started, she did really well, which is a surprise to know when she was everyone's favorite teacher. Even

students who weren't hers loved her the most. And Leah, do you know how Carla and Kian ended up intersecting Because Carla was new in town and she didn't know anyone naturally, she started to form friendships at school, where she met cam So at thirty one. Can was a math and science teacher. He was also a basketball coach at school, and he was super popular amongst the teachers as well they spent a lot of time together at school, and she would also sometimes visit him at a Text

Mex restaurant where he tended bar at night. So at one point they became so close that Carla brought Can home to meet her parents. But by all accounts, it was honestly, very strictly platonic, and Carla told people that Kalen's fiance Avis, knew all about her and absolutely supported their friendship. So this is kind of an interesting start. There are a lot of similarities between Carla and Avis, Kian's fiancee. Yeah, definitely seems like maybe Kian has a type.

You know, he likes a driven woman who also works in education. It seems to me that, like the idea that they were platonic is hard to believe. What do you guys think he has a type? Clearly? I think that if you're spending that much time with someone and you're introducing them to your parents, you're obsessed with them, you're in love, but you're hoping this is the one.

That's just my opin right. I've never introduced someone who's not someone I'm romantically interested into my family certainly, and I wouldn't drive them home to meet my parents. If

I'm introducing my family, I'm in love with you. That being said, Carla was new in town and was maybe desperate to make any sort of connection, whether it be male or female, and she just so happened to become friends with Kian, and because she didn't know anyone else, she really put a lot of weight into that friendship or relationship. I think feelings naturally grow if you were the opposite sex and you're spending a lot of time together.

And if it's not feelings that you've had the thought, you had the thought of should I date this person, should I kiss this person? Should I marry this person and spend the rest of my life making them miserable? You know, at least I've had those thoughts. It would be hard not to. Yeah. On November twenty and six, Davis went to her job at the daycare. It was an especially busy day with more kids than usual, so she had to work two hours late. At five pm,

she was exhausted. She called Kian on her way home and told him she didn't feel like dealing with dinner, so he said he would handle it. After teaching at school, Kian went to the grocery store and picked up supplies for dinner. He had to go back to school for basketball practice that evening, so he brought the food to Carlos to store it in the fridge. She lived much closer to school than Keion did, so it made sense to leave it there as opposed to letting it spoil

in his car. After practice, Kion went back to Carla's and they chatted for about forty five minutes. Then he headed home at PM. When he pulled into the driveway, he opened the garage and as he walked into the house, he made an alarming discovery. Laying by the door, covered in blood, was his fiancee Avis. Panicked, he tried to shake her awake, even kissing her on the mouth, but it was all for not. She appeared lifeless. Kian ran to his neighbor's house for help. The neighbor called nine.

When police arrived, they saw the house had been ransacked. Police also confirmed what Kian had feared. Avis and her unborn child were dead. Someone had shot, stabbed and slashed her throat. Here's Chris, that's pretty brutal scene they're describing. There. One thing that investigators do I know from covering a lot of these cases is especially when a place looks ransacked, they look for clues of weather still was actually gone, where their valuables are gone, because that's the true marker

of a robbery. And one thing that caught their attention was that it looked ransacked, but nothing of value was really gone. The burglars, if they had been ones, left a DVD player, TV, the stereo, you know, So that's always a clue to them that something else might be going on. So they start kind of looking at the scene and it looks like a crime of passion. Those are usually ones that you know, where it's the person

has been killed in a very violent manner. Based on the evidence at the scene, the police thought that the weapon that was used might have been a five shot revolver, and then the police were able to find one piece of evidence, which was a shoe print on a kicked in door. As the fiance and the person to find the body, he was immediately brought in for questioning, and then during the questioning he actually didn't seem that upset the way that you would expect someone who just lost

their fiance and baby to be to be. He seemed apparently emotionless, and he was even angry that he was being suspected by the police despite no one even accusing him. He was super defensive and he denied having any involvement in the murder whatsoever. And that wasn't the only thing

that made detectives look at Kian. As it turns out, the same neighbor who called nm on one told detectives that Kian always came home and walked to the front door and he never used the garage, but on the night of the murder, he did go through the garage, which led police to believe that maybe he might have known there was a body there and he had to

go find it in that way. Another thing that struck police as weird was that when he found Davis, instead of calling m one on his cell phone, he called Carla. He told police this was because he was scared and panicked and asked her to come over to help him.

And even if that were true, why not then called nm on one After making this called Carla, the police asked, He told them that he was worried the call to get rerouted, which would slow down police response, so instead he ran to a neighbor's banged on the door and had them call then one one. If you believe what Kiana is saying, he just found his fiance murdered in

the garage, so he might be in shock. But I don't think if I were in shock that my first response would be to think about cell phone calls getting rerouted to various towers and think that would slow down police. I think my first reaction would just be to like call no one immediately. I don't know what do you guys think? Yeah, I completely agree with that. I think if I find a dead body, I'm not calling a friend.

I'm pretty sure my friends can't help me. If there's a dead body that the people I should be calling are the hospital, the police, anyone who can come and take care of an obvious crime scene. And I think the thing that's so interesting is that the staged crime scene,

the faked break in. You know, I know you guys are also true crime experts, So there are so many cases where there they find the body and there is some sort of stage break in, which is just like, yeah, the calls coming from inside the house, we know what's going on. This is an inside job. This isn't a random person coming in to steal something, and then it going sideways and they're like, you know what, I'm actually just going to commit murder and not take anything. You know,

that doesn't even add up. So I don't know why they would even bother with faking the burglary, because it doesn't unless they steal something. There was one thing that struck me odd about the story itself. He said that

it was easier to put groceries in her apartment. I don't know what schools you guys have been in, but almost every teacher's lounge, and I'm assuming wherever he coached basketball from there's generally refrigerators there, Like, wouldn't it make more sense to put it in the refrigerator at school? I mean, I don't know, I don't know if the school has it or not, but that to me, I was like, when I read that out, Mike, why are you putting it into friends house unless you went there

to have part of your illicit affair. Well, the other thing is that he apparently never went through the garage store. He would always be through the front door, so it's almost as if he knew he was going to find the body. He just went straight forward. And I think that that makes him even guiltier in some respect. Is it always the boyfriend? Is it always the significant other, you know, in the in the case of Scott Peterson and Lacy Peterson, yes, in the case of Gabby Patito

Brian Laundry, yes, is it always the case? No, However, they are the first person suspected, right, And if we look at it with that lens, I mean, he finds her and he claims he's not sure what happened, so much so that he kisses her. He tries to wake her up, so he thinks she might still be alive. He wastes valuable time then calling Carla and not using his cellphone to call them on one himself instead of

running over the neighbor. So at this point he thinks she might still be alive, and his first reaction is to call Carla. But also, I mean the fact that he's kissing a body that is obviously in a pool of blood. I mean, if there was stab wounds, if it wasn't just gunshot, if there was more going on there, you know, like if he had said CPR, that's one thing. But yeah, you don't revive someone with a kiss. I honestly think the kiss on the lips is more indicative

of guilts. It's almost like I'm so sorry, you know, and it's like just the last time I'll get kissed this person sort of thing. Well, I would he even tell police that he did that, because it's not like they were testing her lips for his d n A. I don't even think they could do that. It's just a weird detail to even include. Yeah, if he'd gotten her blood on his lips or somewhere and he thought they'd be testing he maybe he was telling him that

so they knew why. Right, But he as a teacher, and generally, if it's a public school and whatever, I think, especially a coach would probably have CPR training. Why because students have accidents and if the nerve she's too far away, you want the teacher to be able to do something about it. Right, So his first instinct is a kiss and not Cprso the next day police showed up at

Chastain Middle School to speak with Carla herself. At school, she told detectives about her close friendship with Kian, but adamantly denied anything romantic was going on. Wanting more information, she was asked to come to the station, which she agreed to. It was there that Carla's story changed. While she still corroborated Keian's story about the groceries and denied having anything to do with Davis's murder, Carla admitted that

things were in fact physical with Kian. Take a listen to some of her interview, being a passionate towards each other. But in the most maybe it's just a little kisses. But as far as she's life is full of al balone romantic lover and said, that's not what it was in mind. It wasn't we're going to take a quick break. We'll be back in just a moment. It seems to me like Kean and Carl are really having an affair. And it also seemed to be the worst kept secret.

At the middle school they worked at, they were using the students as messengers, you know, like we used to back in the day with notes and passing them. I mean, that's pretty terrible to include their students in that. And witnesses from school said that they've been seeing canoodling and cuddling around campus. People from the bar he on work that said they'd witnessed them full on making out. I mean Jeff, I don't know what you make of that, but it sounds to me like there was probably more

going on than even she told the police. Yeah. I mean, first off, changing your story is an immediate issue, and that always points to guilt. That she automatically was happy forthcoming. It's a major red flag, I would say, for the investigation. But as it turns out, Kian was actually fooling around

with a lot of different woman. He was known as a ladies man who had multiple girlfriends, one of which was a thirty year old woman named Brendan, who was the mother of a student on the basketball team that Kion coached. While all this should point to his guilt, it actually ended up helping him because Brenda would serve as an alibi for Kian. He was allegedly texting her during the entire basketball practice the night of the murder.

It just appears that he got so lucky by being a ladies man that he was able to have an appropriate alibi for not being a murderer, right, I mean, I think, well we've seen that though, where just because he's a cheating, lying jerk doesn't necessarily make him a killer. No, but there should be a separate jail for people like that. I mean, it's crazy that they were so brazen about it that it was like this worst kept secret at a middle school. It's not even high school where these are,

you know, closer to young adults. I mean, these are young kids who they were using and their affair, which is really uncool. I also wonder if the kid whose mom was having an affair with him knew that his mom was having an affair with his coach. I mean, that's pretty terrible too. Yeah, that's an awful way to

find out that's why you're benched on varsity. I also watching that interview felt really sick to my stomach watching Harla just take random cell phone calls during her interrogation by the police, and she was so relaxed about it. You know, she was like, yeah, I told him, like, this isn't what this is like. We're not like, we're not love basically, it's just, you know, it's not like that.

We kind of know that she's lying because while she's telling police that they're not that serious, but we know that she took him home to her family, so it was at least serious enough that she wanted her parents to meet this guy, yes, and that they had students corroborating in their rooms, so inappropriate. Yeah. But once again, at this point in the investigation, all of this just points to that they're all kind of jars, not that

anyone is potentially a killer. Days after the murder, police got a break in the case when a man came to them with a gun that he thought may have been involved with the murder. The man was Patrick Hughes, Carlo's cousin. The gun was a five shot revolver, the same type police suspected was used to killed Adas. Patrick told police that three days prior to the murder, Carla came to him in fear. She said she was afraid of crime in her neighborhood and wanted a gun for

her own protection. Her cousin Patrick tried instead to give her mace, but Carla insisted on a gun, so he loaned her the revolver. He also gave Carla a hunting knife just in case. Four days later, Carla returned the gun to her cousin, but a few things were missing. That hunting knife he loaned her was gone, and also missing from the gun where it's five bullets? Patrick asked Carlo what happened to the bullets, and Carla responded that

she had gone target today. Yeah, it was not lost on police that Carla had previously told them that she never carried or had access to a gun. Following this revelation, Carlo was arrested and charged with two capital murder charges, one for Avis and the other for her unborn child, Here's Leah. Friends and family were shocked that sweet and

driven Carla could have done this. Yeah, they were chocked that the so were the police, and the police were talking enough that they served Carlo with a warrant for her apartment. When they searched and followed through with that search warrant found a pair of shoes that matched the shoe print that they had found at Avis's house that

had kicked in the door. The police were hoping Carlo would turn on Kian once they confronted her with this evidence, because they thought he was the real killer, but she

never did. This is just one of those moments where part of me is thinking what she manipulated into committing the murder by him because he wanted to get out of the potential marriage and fatherhood and didn't want to have her baby and wanted to keep living this wild multiple girlfriend lie for and he maybe he saw an opportunity because Carlo was so in love with him, or it just odd now having this information, knowing that she was so cool, calm and collected in the interrogation office

and just taking cell phone calls, it just points to so much guilt. The ease of which she was lying is striking. She lied about the affair, she lied about having access to a gun. I wouldn't know she was lying had I not known she was lying, I think Keian maybe maybe he manipulated her, or maybe he knew that she wanted to be his only girlfriend. I don't know, but I do think he knew more than than was

being said. Well, he was with her before and after basketball practice, and so I think we can surmise that she gave us was probably killed during the basketball practice if Carlo was the one to pull the trigger, so what his basketball partners an hour and a half, So that gives her a pretty small window to go do that. And then she saw him right after that, so you would think he might notice that she was maybe upset

or nervous or something like. If he knows her that well, that he's having an affair with her, he might notice that she just killed someone, don't you think, because we know that he went to the garage door instead of the front door, Wally walks in. Is there a possibility that exists that he was told the information by Carla after and they made the plan, and he was like, Okay, now that this is done, like, don't worry, no one

will figure it out. Maybe after they took her in and and charged her with two capital murder charges, maybe he even said don't worry, like I got your back sort of thing or whatever it is, so that she would take off the heat. You know. I don't know if Carla and Kon corroborated on this or if she acted alone, but I feel like he definitely knew. Yeah, I think he knew. I don't know to what extent his involvement actually is, but I think he knew somehow.

I mean, guilty is charged. They found the pair of shoes in her house that matched to the footprint on the door. I mean, the gun is missing five rounds of fire and the knife is gone. Oh, she was stabbed and shot. On October five and nine, the trial started, and immediately prosecutors made it clear they would be seeking the death penalty for Carla. It's important to note that Kian was never charged with anything in connection to the murder.

Throughout the trial, the courtroom was described as incredibly tense, with people either staunchly believing in Carla's guilt or her innocence. The judge even had sheriff deputies sitting at the end of each courtroom road to control emotional outbursts from both

Avis and Carla's families. Despite having once been close friends lovers, Kian became a star witness for the prosecution, and perhaps the most tense moment of the trial, Keian said his affair with Carlo was just physical and meant nothing to him all with Carlo watching. Take a listen to some of Kian's testimony. Did you kill as planks? No? No? Do you feel a responsibility for her days? Yes? Damn

my head. If I wouldn't have staying faithful to who I watched, women h fine and thinking poorly, making bad choices, what made a bad choice to sleep around and flare with other women's sham levins would have never taken place from oh Man, I don't know if I would be able to just sit there and watch that as the person who is probably an actual love of them, you know, the prosecution between a Carlo as a jealous and scheming mistress.

He said that they were able to show her cell phone records placing her within quaite five miles of Avis's home the night of the murder between five thirty to six. The cellphone records show that Fund was where he said he had been that night, between the school, the grocery store, of basketball practice, and Carlo's perfect On the other side, the defense pointed the finger at Kian, calling him a womanizer who didn't want to have the baby that APIs

was having. He had the motive they were saying the prosecution was saying, and the opportunity to kill his fiancee. The defense pointed out that his house was close enough to the school he could have killed Avis before practice and still made it back without raising any concern. He also had been at Carlo's house. He had access to that gun and those shoes because he'd been at Carlo's house. He wore the same size as Carlo, which is a woman's tin, and could have taken her shoes to Framer.

The defense also brought up that it was well known that Kean had borrowed Carlo's shoes before in the past. Let's stop here for another quick break. So there were some things that neither the defense nor the prosecution could really explain. One of them was that Carla never had any gunpowder on her hands, but Kean did. So that is weird and it definitely points the finger at Keion. But the prosecution had an expert testified that the gun

from Carlo's cousin was the murder weapon. We seemingly know for sure that the gun Carla got from her cousin was used to kill a Vis. The question is who was the one who fired it. I think the other thing that's interesting is is it possible he loaded the guy? Is it Paul Stable that he actually is? Yeah, I mean it seems to me, you know, now, in our culture, look at how you know, woman were kind of realizing

how women are treated. This idea that she's painted as like kind of like the jealous, scheming mitch stress who would do anything to get her man like that seems to me a little unfair to paint her in that way. Obviously, she was involved potentially in some way in this murder. Could have been him, could have been he could have been the one to ask her to get the weapons,

because it does frame her complete. And I think it's so interesting that he had gunpowder on his hands she never did, and that it's something no one could explain. Why didn't they figure out how to explain it? Why is that something that was just somehow overlooked. If you look at Kian and he has a history of being having several girlfriends, which to me says he knows how

to manipulate people. He also knows how to we've a worry or a lie around where he's been, or who he's been with, or who that other person is if somebody runs into them, or how to keep things separate. And he knows how to figure out an alibi because cheaters need alibis for the people that are accusing them of cheating. Right, not the cops. I'm talking about all

the other women they're they're messing around with. Right. It's interesting because if you really like someone and they're going away or bread coming you, or not going enough attention, you might do whatever they say just so that they stay, or that you like them, or you get desperate or whatever it is, and maybe this is a point of desperation. But on the other hand, it also seems clear that this could have been a complete set up and it

was his way of getting out of all of the relationships. Actually, both Avis and Carla seemed very bright young women, as we learned, and you know, for Carla to get herself into that situation and she's guilty of at least knowing about it and helping, if not committing, it's just so tragic. You know, no one deserves this kind of death. I really can't decide in my mind what I think actually happened. After just eight hours of deliberation, the jury found Carla

guilty on accounts. Instead of the death penalty, Carlo was handed to life sentences. When the verdict was read, she collapsed, crying hysterically. Following the trial, Keian left Mississippi and later married. Carla has since been denied a new trial. Shameless plug. If you're enjoying Crazy and Love, leave us a review to view our recent documentary Murdered Missing in Montana. You'll find it streaming now on Peacock. Follow us on Instagram

at Katie Underscore Studios. Crazy and Love is produced by Stephanie Lydecker, Jeff Shane, Chris Grieves and me Courtney Armstrong. Editing and sound designed by Jeff ba. 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,