[SPEAKER_01]: Hello and welcome. [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome, welcome, welcome to Wake Up Wednesdays with Housewives of True Crime. [SPEAKER_01]: I have such an amazing episode today. [SPEAKER_01]: I think you guys are going to like it. [SPEAKER_01]: My good friend Katherine Schwit, she is in, while she was in the FBI and you guys know I am just obsessed. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I think it's, you know, my next life, I will be FBI agent or some sort of something like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I just try to soak in every moment that I can get with anybody in like positions. [SPEAKER_01]: And Catherine is, and I talk a little bit about her when she's on with me, but I just wanted to come on before. [SPEAKER_01]: We meet and tell you that this woman is just a true delight to be around immediately. [SPEAKER_01]: I felt a connection with her when I met her and we met a while ago and I just you guys are gonna love her. [SPEAKER_01]: She's super smart.
[SPEAKER_01]: She was in the FBI for I think she said more than twenty years. [SPEAKER_01]: And she was a prosecutor before that. [SPEAKER_01]: She is an author. [SPEAKER_01]: Her books are amazing. [SPEAKER_01]: I know a lot of you guys are readers out there. [SPEAKER_01]: So please, please, please support her because she does things that matter in this world. [SPEAKER_01]: And she was the lead on the active shooter program.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we as mothers and non-mothers and just people working out in the world, we are always thinking about that. [SPEAKER_01]: And she is one of the people that kind of put in protocols and she still talks about it. [SPEAKER_01]: She goes to schools and businesses and puts in place protective orders. [SPEAKER_01]: We talked a little bit about that. [SPEAKER_01]: We talked a little bit about co-burger and we talked about her book.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm just very excited for you guys to meet Katherine. [SPEAKER_01]: So let's get started. [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to Housewives of True Crime. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Tabitha. [SPEAKER_01]: Your True Crime Housewife. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm bringing you real crimes, real twists, and searching for real justice every week. [SPEAKER_01]: I've got a brand new disco biscuit riding shotgun. [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes a fan, sometimes a friend, but someone always fabulous.
[SPEAKER_01]: So grab whatever you're drinking these days, press play, and let's talk crime in the Carpool line. [SPEAKER_01]: Clink Link. [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome Housewives of True Crime, and today I have somebody with me that is absolutely amazing, and I cannot wait for you guys to meet Catherine. [SPEAKER_01]: I talked about actually, you know Catherine, by the way, welcome, hello. [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_00]: Hello, I'm so excited to be here.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love your podcast and your fan base, because they're so fun. [SPEAKER_00]: They're so fun. [SPEAKER_01]: It is true. [SPEAKER_01]: It's true. [SPEAKER_01]: They are fun. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay. [SPEAKER_01]: So Catherine, let me tell you a little bit about her first and then we will get into more. [SPEAKER_01]: Katherine is an author and she has a book that we're going to talk about. [SPEAKER_01]: But before you actually, is it before you were an author or you were a journalist?
[SPEAKER_01]: Still are. [SPEAKER_00]: I was a journalist journalist. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And then I went to the prosecutor's office in Chicago. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: Then she was a prosecutor. [SPEAKER_01]: Then she spent many years as an FBI agent. [SPEAKER_01]: You guys. [SPEAKER_01]: So [SPEAKER_00]: Twenty years in case you want to get out of trouble, give me a call. [SPEAKER_01]: You are the epitome of a disco biscuit and a lady boss.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I am a disco musician. [SPEAKER_01]: That's what we call super amazing women on the podcast. [SPEAKER_00]: I know it's great. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm honored to be carrying that title. [SPEAKER_00]: And really lady boss because I wasn't executive at the FBI, you know, I'm not last five years or so of my twenty years there. [SPEAKER_00]: And I was such a rarity, right? [SPEAKER_00]: I'd be like the only woman in the room because it's the FBI.
[SPEAKER_00]: So a lot of dark suits and then me. [SPEAKER_01]: And then you and you are also if you aren't in the watching us on YouTube and you don't know, but Catherine is absolutely gorgeous. [SPEAKER_01]: So I can and you are and I just it's amazing. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like you [SPEAKER_01]: I want to be in the FBI like fly on the wall and just see you come in and take people down. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so fun. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so fun to come in and be the boss at the FBI.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was just saying, no, we're not doing it that way. [SPEAKER_00]: This is the way we're doing it. [SPEAKER_01]: Right. [SPEAKER_01]: So anyways, welcome to the podcast. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm so we're excited. [SPEAKER_01]: I actually put an episode of yours and Sarah's on Patreon a couple of weeks ago.
[SPEAKER_01]: So some people that are on Patreon have already heard you speak, but now we get to have a candid conversation about all about you and what you've done for the past, you know, thirty years. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, that's exciting for me. [SPEAKER_00]: A lot of times I'm running so fast, I do have a podcast with Sarah Ferris, stopped the killing. [SPEAKER_00]: She lives in London, so the whole joy of the podcast is listening to her accent, as you know.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's the fun part. [SPEAKER_00]: And also, she's so gasped. [SPEAKER_00]: Like the first time the podcast [SPEAKER_00]: which is kind of a weird name, stop the killing, but that's the name of my first book, because I'm a mass killing expert in case you need some tidbits about, case you need some tidbits about mass shootings, I'm a mass killing expert, and stop the killing as a name of the podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: And on the very first podcast, she said, what is it with you guys over there and all those guns? [SPEAKER_00]: She was so London. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so let's let's talk about your first book a little bit and how you wrote that book and why you wrote that book.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did because I wrote it because I [SPEAKER_00]: was in the FBI, mining my own business handling national security matters like espionage and bank robberies and regular stuff that FBI people cover cyber threats. [SPEAKER_00]: And then the Sandy Hook massacre happened at the elementary school where twenty children and six women were killed by an individual who killed his mother first. [SPEAKER_00]: and it just rocked the country as many probably recall.
[SPEAKER_00]: The shooting was up in Connecticut and I got plucked immediately by because when you're in the bureau you do whatever you're told, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And so I got plucked to go join a team over at then vice president Biden's office to figure out what we could do. [SPEAKER_00]: And in the next few months we [SPEAKER_00]: We taught, we put into place the law enforcement training that exists now for responding to an active shooter situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the kind of a situation where somebody is shooting at the time. [SPEAKER_00]: And we pushed out run hide fight, the concept of [SPEAKER_00]: civilians need to be prepared just in case, just like stop, drop, and roll, and all this very, very serious stuff. [SPEAKER_00]: So you can see why it's fun for me to do a fun podcast now.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the first book was a product of that because the book was all the kind of the institutional knowledge that I had gained, and I was constantly being asked to speak, and being asked to write articles, and I was like, OK. [SPEAKER_00]: I got a retire. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to be kicked out of the bureau because of my age. [SPEAKER_00]: I got a write a book and get all the stuff out of my head.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I want to talk about it anymore, which didn't work out, but I thought it was going to work out. [SPEAKER_01]: Definitely did not work out. [SPEAKER_01]: You're still talking about it. [SPEAKER_01]: And you're still going. [SPEAKER_01]: You're going to large corporations talking about this. [SPEAKER_01]: You're going to schools talking about this. [SPEAKER_00]: And you know, I get called to a lot of times I get called for places, you know, they don't know what to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: The school district doesn't know what to do. [SPEAKER_00]: What where should they turn first? [SPEAKER_00]: And even big corporations, my first job out of the FBI, I went to live nation. [SPEAKER_00]: They were the ones who who had the concert that's shooting in Las Vegas, the worst shooting we've had.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they were looking for ways to fix their unending security problems and they hired a handful of us for the following year just to see if we could help to put some stuff in procedures into place for events, which we all go to concerts and you know, you think about how scary that is. [SPEAKER_00]: So a lot of very serious stuff, but usually at the executive level, to say, how can you best spend your money? [SPEAKER_00]: What can you best do?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very boring, but it's really important. [SPEAKER_01]: It is really important, and I, as just a mother of school-aged children, it's so weird to me because we never thought about this when we were in school, right? [SPEAKER_01]: And so our kids are not being taught to go under our desk for the earthquake, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Air taught now to hide and run in all these things, if a shooter comes into their school, and that is [SPEAKER_01]: So terrifying to me and then it's terrifying also that I'm not at the school and there's nothing that I can do if something happens. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, can I give you one bit of a bit of advice, a bit of thought and comfort and all your listeners? [SPEAKER_00]: The incidence of these shootings in schools is astonishingly rare.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're much more likely to be hit by a car or struck by lightning or a bit by a alligator if you're in Florida. [SPEAKER_00]: It's very, very rare circumstance. [SPEAKER_00]: It's infinitesimal amount of the injuries that occur with firearms in the United States.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in most instances, I mean, really since Sandy Hook, which was a long time ago, a thousand and twelve, there's really only been a couple of incidents, even in elementary schools or middle schools or high schools. [SPEAKER_00]: And we give huge coverage to them in the press. [SPEAKER_00]: So we feel like there's a shooter around every door. [SPEAKER_00]: But truthfully, children are like five times statistically, at least five times safer at school than they are at home.
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So it's really rare circumstance and it's not bad to talk about, you know, safety. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a good thing to talk to your kids about, but don't drop your kids off and think this is going to happen. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just incredibly rare. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, that's good to know. [SPEAKER_01]: I like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: I like that you said that because I do think that a lot of us do feel that way and yeah it is and probably more so even for me just because I do so much crime that I'm always on like high alert for everything my kids tell me all the times that I need to just take a chill pill. [SPEAKER_00]: I understand my poor children raised by an FBI agent who ended up running the FBI's active shooter program. [SPEAKER_00]: They feel like they can't do anything without a check.
[SPEAKER_00]: My daughter was a teacher for several years and when she first started, I wouldn't let her. [SPEAKER_00]: I wouldn't let her like her first year. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, I'm coming down to your school as three hours away. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm coming down there and we're checking your classroom and school out before you start teaching. [SPEAKER_00]: Her principal was probably happy when he transferred to another school. [SPEAKER_01]: You're like sending emails like every day.
[SPEAKER_01]: What do you guys did to do this protocol today? [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: What about this? [SPEAKER_00]: What about that? [SPEAKER_00]: But I think that, you know, it's understandable that parents worry and I will, I mean, I will just add this final thing. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm halfway through a book just for parents. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to write a book just for parents to help them understand what they need to be worried about, but also what they can do.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that's good. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, I like that. [SPEAKER_01]: And let's now talk about, well, let's talk about, first you were a prosecutor, which is interesting in today's day and age, especially because we're recording when the Diddy trial just wrapped up. [SPEAKER_01]: And we also had the Karen Ray trial wrap up. [SPEAKER_01]: And we also today is the day that we Brian Cobrager is going to plead guilty. [SPEAKER_01]: It's a crazy, it's a crazy week.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a hat trick. [SPEAKER_01]: It really is. [SPEAKER_01]: A trail hat. [SPEAKER_01]: What do you mind talking about this Brian Cobrager trial really quick? [SPEAKER_01]: About the plea? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I can talk about it for I do. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I'm not.
[SPEAKER_00]: When somebody, when the evidence is pretty overwhelming, the best thing that a defense council can do is to convince his client to take a plea deal and then negotiate the best plea deal. [SPEAKER_00]: They have very strong evidence. [SPEAKER_00]: The evidence was strong. [SPEAKER_00]: Strong. [SPEAKER_00]: Strong. [SPEAKER_00]: Drive everywhere, turn your phone off right before you commit murders, turn it back on. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, hello.
[SPEAKER_00]: I believe you're DNA blind. [SPEAKER_00]: And leave your DNA behind. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: I think that's okay. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: So, I mean, the evidence was very strong. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't pretend or hope that something's going to get thrown out. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, maybe the DNA sample gets polluted in it gets thrown out. [SPEAKER_00]: Then you still have the cell phone evidence. [SPEAKER_00]: Then you still have this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then you still have, so it's really hard in an aggregate sense. [SPEAKER_00]: When you have a lot of evidence, the best thing that a fence council can do is it's pleading out. [SPEAKER_00]: And even though [SPEAKER_00]: You know, not everybody loves that. [SPEAKER_00]: It's part of our legal process. [SPEAKER_00]: Most cases are flat out. [SPEAKER_00]: That's just the reality.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know I've seen in the news that one of the victims' families is really having a hard time with it. [SPEAKER_01]: And you can understand why, but there's also three other victims families that supposedly aren't upset about it. [SPEAKER_01]: And then you also think about if it was to go to trial, how much that family was going to be put through. [SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that, you know, I spent a lot of years in the court in the courtroom in the court house and I'm very comfortable in a court house and it took me a while to realize that, you know, not everybody is, right? [SPEAKER_00]: They don't know what's going on. [SPEAKER_00]: They don't know who's talking to who or why they're talking. [SPEAKER_00]: Why is the judge talking to the attorneys when they're not saying it out loud?
[SPEAKER_00]: The judge is using all these words and I don't understand them and that guy is up there lying and he's you know how come he's allowed to lie up there. [SPEAKER_00]: It's really hard on victims and families to go through a trial and you cannot you cannot over you cannot over explain that to them because they they haven't been through it before so they don't know everything is very personal and then [SPEAKER_00]: Then before a trial, there are endless motions that have to be argued.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then during a trial, there are motions that are argued. [SPEAKER_00]: And then after the trial, there are motions and papers and motions and papers. [SPEAKER_00]: And then there's an appeal. [SPEAKER_00]: If somebody's found guilty, there's an appeal. [SPEAKER_00]: And then there's all the appeal stuff is legalities. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's not a re-waying of the evidence. [SPEAKER_00]: It's what is this legal case saying? [SPEAKER_00]: What's this little legal precedent?
[SPEAKER_00]: And what is the rule about this? [SPEAKER_00]: And did the police do that? [SPEAKER_00]: And did the judge properly instruct the jurors and the victims and the families? [SPEAKER_00]: You know, unless they're prosecutors themselves don't really know what all that means. [SPEAKER_00]: It just drags it out and drags it out. [SPEAKER_00]: A plea ends it. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't appeal your plea.
[SPEAKER_00]: If a judge accepts the plea that both parties have agreed to, [SPEAKER_00]: That's it. [SPEAKER_01]: That's it. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm okay with this plea deal to be honest with you because the only thing they're doing is taking the death penalty off the table. [SPEAKER_01]: And as we know, he probably wouldn't actually be put to death in his life.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, and there's a lot of even if they had gone to trial and then there'd be a whole other trial for whether or not he could be sentenced to death. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a whole separate sentencing hearing that goes on and on where everybody comes and repeats it would take [SPEAKER_00]: a few years for that separate sentencing hearing about death penalty, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So first you can then the death penalty all of that time and then all the appeals based on that, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And how fast do we put people to death who are convicted and sentenced to death? [SPEAKER_00]: Not very fast. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, not very fast.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's a it is a it's I appreciate that it's frustrating for the family members, but the [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's important to recall, as you're frustrated about it, if somebody's frustrated about it, that we all want to see everything go to trial. [SPEAKER_00]: But that's not necessarily the best thing for the victims, for the prosecutors, for the community, to drag this out and have it go on and on and on is difficult when you don't even know the outcome of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And truthfully, I think research tells us that even when somebody's [SPEAKER_00]: You know, family member, even when somebody's family members killed and somebody's convicted, trials don't necessarily give family satisfaction. [SPEAKER_00]: It just continues their agony. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And you have to consider that as a prosecutor.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think you feel like it's going to and at the end of the day, probably you walk away, you know, like, well, that didn't do actually anything because, right. [SPEAKER_01]: what happened was I lost a loved one and it doesn't matter that Sam Dicker Harry, you know, right, got found guilty.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he'll continue to be around for years and, you know, [SPEAKER_00]: what privileges is he getting and how come he gets a television in his cell and you know, you know, I mean all of that endless discussion that doesn't end it. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean send him off and getting somebody's life in prison is a pretty substantial sentence. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean we have a lot of people in this country.
[SPEAKER_00]: Huge percentage of people who are in jail right now are in there for a life or essentially life. [SPEAKER_01]: And he does not have to say why he did it. [SPEAKER_01]: He doesn't have to say anything, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Right now. [SPEAKER_01]: That's right. [SPEAKER_00]: So I did. [SPEAKER_00]: I know that's the thing that people also get frustrated about.
[SPEAKER_00]: You want an answer to why the one thing that most [SPEAKER_00]: surviving family members want or victims who did survive want is why did this happen? [SPEAKER_00]: And it's a rare circumstance when a defendant says why. [SPEAKER_00]: But it could be in a plea agreement that even in a plea agreement, the prosecutors have to prove their case, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And so they'll have to write up a proof of the case.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in some cases, you do get a defendant who makes admissions or says some things that help or apologize right a letter to the family and apologize for their conduct or something. [SPEAKER_00]: None of that's going to happen until the end of the end of the end. [SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, they may get an apology letter or some feeling of his sense of responsibility out of it, out of the plea deal. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, well, I hope so, man.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, and oh, I have another question for you. [SPEAKER_01]: You might know the answer too. [SPEAKER_01]: Sure. [SPEAKER_00]: I'll make it up. [SPEAKER_01]: Right. [SPEAKER_01]: All this, there was a huge gag order. [SPEAKER_01]: By that going to be released and will we know anything more than what we've got? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, the gag orders generally, you know, in general, any gag order is issued to prevent prosecutors who don't generally say anything, but sometimes do.
[SPEAKER_00]: And defense counsel from saying things. [SPEAKER_00]: So the gag order can only hold for the length of the case. [SPEAKER_00]: So once the case is resolved, if defense counsel wants to say something, if the prosecutors want to say something, they absolutely can. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, good. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, now it brings me to your book because you're new one, because you are finding answers for families.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like I want to say I'm not, but the FBI and the Detroit Police Department are, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: But I am so excited about elevating this story so people can see what an amazing [SPEAKER_00]: thing is happening and Detroit has been going on for six years under the radar, like nobody knows this story. [SPEAKER_00]: When I talked to people about it, initially when I was working, I'm working on this book for six years.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I started talking to people about it, they were like, is this a, is this like a true crime fiction story you're writing? [SPEAKER_00]: That's what they said to me all the time. [SPEAKER_00]: They're like, so this is fiction. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: It's real. [SPEAKER_00]: Really? [SPEAKER_00]: It's, it's real? [SPEAKER_00]: It's not like a, so that's true crime, but it's true crime fact. [SPEAKER_00]: It's, it's actually true crime.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is actually, is the meaning of true crime, exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: It's the meaning of true crime. [SPEAKER_01]: So yes, so tell us about it and how did we get here? [SPEAKER_00]: So here is the elevator speech, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Kind of. [SPEAKER_00]: This is, so stick with me and believe this is a true story. [SPEAKER_00]: There was a Detroit detective who many years ago her name is Shannon Jones. [SPEAKER_00]: She was assigned to the missing person's cases and Detroit.
[SPEAKER_00]: She was the only one assigned. [SPEAKER_00]: And she'd be again to find and Detroit is not a small city. [SPEAKER_00]: She began to find that sometimes her missing person cases were turning up in the old paper cold case files in a warehouse like twenty miles away. [SPEAKER_00]: Old cold case murder files. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so we have an actual murder and then a missing person. [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she begins to kind of lace some of these together and she thinks to herself. [SPEAKER_00]: What else is in those cold case files in the warehouse? [SPEAKER_00]: And so anytime she gets a chance and she's looking for somebody, you come into the police department and you say, my uncle disappeared in November of nineteen eighty five. [SPEAKER_00]: And we haven't seen him since.
[SPEAKER_00]: He would go back to the warehouse and look in November of nineteen eighty five to see if there was a cold case murder because she found that these cold case murders [SPEAKER_00]: The victims were buried without a name. [SPEAKER_00]: They were never identified before they were buried.
[SPEAKER_00]: So over time, she realizes within a short period of time, she has about three hundred, cold case murders where their victims have not been identified and they're all buried in poppers graves in the Detroit area. [SPEAKER_01]: Three hundred, that's a lot. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a lot.
[SPEAKER_00]: Over a seventy-year period, [SPEAKER_00]: She calculates that for seventy years Detroit has been burying people who were murdered, burying them without a name because once somebody dies, you got to get them in the ground. [SPEAKER_00]: But they don't know what was. [SPEAKER_00]: The case was never solved. [SPEAKER_00]: The files were paper. [SPEAKER_00]: They were sent down to the warehouse. [SPEAKER_00]: That was it. [SPEAKER_00]: Just kind of like, just it's done.
[SPEAKER_00]: Done and over with. [SPEAKER_00]: So. [SPEAKER_00]: She had met my friend Leslie Larson, who's an FBI agent, who runs, Leslie and I had worked together when I was working briefly in the Milwaukee office, and she was brand new hired. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, she runs the Detroit Forensics team. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just the third busiest team Forensics team in the United States for the FBI.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have seventy members of the team that do everything from [SPEAKER_00]: I know blood, fingerprints, digging up bodies, evidence collection. [SPEAKER_00]: They did the plane, the guy who came in on the plane and tried to blow himself up while lighting explosives in his underwear on Christmas day several years ago. [SPEAKER_00]: We call him the underwear bomber case.
[SPEAKER_00]: She, her team went out to the airport on Christmas day to pull the evidence out of the plane and take the underwear off the guy who was trying to blow himself up. [SPEAKER_00]: And they do every crazy thing, right? [SPEAKER_00]: So they're, they're, every few years they dig for Jimmy Hoffa because the, the crime mob who's, uh, you know, [SPEAKER_00]: a teamster man who was missing, who went missing, not far from the house where I grew up.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm from Detroit, I should say. [SPEAKER_00]: So this was intriguing to me that she was in Detroit and I learned about this from her initially. [SPEAKER_00]: Six years ago, I was talking to her and she said, so this detective came to me and said, judge, judge, judge, judge, judge, a, three hundred cases. [SPEAKER_00]: I have DNA on about a hundred of them. [SPEAKER_00]: So I need the DNA for the other two hundred.
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's go out to the cemetery and dig them all up. [SPEAKER_01]: And your friend was like, let's do it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: Also two lady bosses. [SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely, two lady bosses, right? [SPEAKER_00]: So Shannon Jones from the police department, Leslie Larson from the FBI, then Ladana from the prosecutor's office and this person from the state police and this person from the all women. [SPEAKER_00]: So the book is called women who talk to the dead.
[SPEAKER_00]: women who talked to that because all women who decided to do this for five women forensic anthropologists. [SPEAKER_00]: The guys who can, the ladies who can dig into a bag of bones that's dug up and pull out a bone and tell you which of the two to three hundred bones from the body that is with their hands. [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes they're not even looking. [SPEAKER_00]: They just feel it with their hands.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then they pull the bone up and they say, this is the one we want. [SPEAKER_00]: We need this clavicle. [SPEAKER_00]: We need this cubus. [SPEAKER_00]: We need this. [SPEAKER_00]: This is a phalanche. [SPEAKER_00]: It's no good for us, right? [SPEAKER_00]: They know all the names of all the bones. [SPEAKER_00]: Of course, there's a trained in it. [SPEAKER_00]: And they know which ones are the best ones to get DNA.
[SPEAKER_00]: So Leslie Shannon talks Leslie into digging up two hundred bodies. [SPEAKER_00]: And over the next five years, they do. [SPEAKER_00]: It's crazy now. [SPEAKER_00]: The other thing about it is, I wanted to write this book and it's everybody said, oh, you're gonna solve two hundred murders. [SPEAKER_00]: That's amazing that they're gonna solve these two hundred murders.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you know, it's more than that to Shannon and Leslie because if they get DNA, this is what they're thinking. [SPEAKER_00]: If we get DNA, we can find that DNA match somebody and tell them their family member [SPEAKER_00]: died and was murdered. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Instead of just being Uncle Joe who disappeared. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, because when you'd somebody disappears, you always think they're somewhere. [SPEAKER_01]: Right, exactly.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they've been in the back of your head that thinks maybe they just went to the live a different life somewhere. [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there are people who [SPEAKER_00]: There are, they have, I'll tell you just like a little bit of the end story, not to, you gotta read the book to find the details, but the book, the reason I wrote the book now is because they don't have two hundred murders solved, but they do have dozens of people already identified and they're reconnecting them with family members, which they said was their number one priority.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're beginning to solve the murders because they're picking up additional evidence. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, when a person is killed and they're unidentified to a law enforcement office, if you don't know who that person is, right? [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, now we have a little bit better with, you know, facial recognition and things like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you have a person who [SPEAKER_00]: You know, a fifteen year old girl who left her house because her stepfather was abusing her and she lives on the street for a year or two and then she gets into a situation where she's killed. [SPEAKER_00]: And she has no identification on her. [SPEAKER_00]: Please don't know who she is. [SPEAKER_00]: They don't know what leads to follow.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so, as that as it is, I mean, part of it is there weren't leads to follow on some of these cases. [SPEAKER_00]: And in other cases, there just probably weren't people that, you know, the police were being hounded to solve their missing person case, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Some cases, they just weren't.
[SPEAKER_00]: But in many cases, we're not talking about like a fifteen-year-old cheerleader who disappears from a, you know, a nice neighborhood, whatever that means. [SPEAKER_00]: We're talking about a guy who walks away from his house, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Or a woman who walks away from her parents' house, an adult. [SPEAKER_00]: And when an adult disappears, sometimes people just assume that they're someplace else.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I have an uncle that's, he's not a drifter, but he's kind of a drifter, you know? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And so we don't see him all the time. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that he would be one that would have something happen to him. [SPEAKER_01]: And for years, we probably would not even think about it. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: And exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think a few, you know, the book just came out.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's in, just so I can say this, it's in print in ebook and audio book. [SPEAKER_00]: And so anybody wants to read it, women who talk to the dead. [SPEAKER_00]: They can find it on my website, KatherineShwhite.com or any place where you buy books or listen to them or rent them, librarians. [SPEAKER_00]: If you bookstores and have it, they'll order it. [SPEAKER_00]: They can. [SPEAKER_00]: Libraries can order it. [SPEAKER_00]: So you don't have to pay for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just it's an incredible story. [SPEAKER_00]: But what I was going to say is, [SPEAKER_00]: that a lot of times we, I really wanted to tell the story right now without all the cases solved because I want people to see that law enforcement. [SPEAKER_00]: In this case, these women [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, we're so tenacious and they never gave up. [SPEAKER_00]: And even Leslie Larson said that to me at one point.
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, I want the public to know that when everybody else gave up on these files, these sixty-year-old murders, we weren't given up. [SPEAKER_00]: Because I said, I said to her, I want it, I want to write this book. [SPEAKER_00]: And she's like, I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: I said, yeah, I want to write this book. [SPEAKER_00]: She said, what do you want the public to know? [SPEAKER_00]: She said, I really want them to know. [SPEAKER_00]: Law enforcement doesn't give up.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't give up. [SPEAKER_01]: It's truly, it's truly incredible that these women are doing this and they're still going. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's, it will be going on for, well, and I think one thing that I thought I wanted to, we, I had a, uh, somebody read the book recently. [SPEAKER_00]: They, they wrote a review and they said, I'm a true crime junkie. [SPEAKER_00]: I've never read a book like this.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's because this was, this is like inside baseball, you know, as we would say here in the States. [SPEAKER_00]: This is inside baseball. [SPEAKER_00]: I went to the cemetery. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm taking the readers to the cemetery. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm taking the readers into the room. [SPEAKER_00]: I sat in the room while they went to the files. [SPEAKER_00]: and decided which people to dig up in which one's not to and why.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I went to the cemetery several times, you know, as they struggled through five years of digging, they dug for one week every summer for three months each summer for five years. [SPEAKER_00]: And I'd go to the cemetery and spend the whole day watching their struggles to do this. [SPEAKER_00]: And yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: good parts and bad parts and disgusting parts, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Talk to them about it so that the reader is there with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, they figure out how to do this and the troubles that they had and figuring out whether to do it. [SPEAKER_00]: And I didn't even know as I was working on it if they would even accomplish it, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And they've gotten to this point and I thought, well, they got to the point where they finished the digs. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna write the book now. [SPEAKER_00]: And then maybe I'll do something else about the solving of the murders.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's some murders that are discussed in the book and who did them and what they found out and families connected, but not two hundred. [SPEAKER_00]: And even after there was a serial murder in Detroit that was convicted, [SPEAKER_00]: During this time period, one of the eleven victims was buried in a poppers grave because they didn't know. [SPEAKER_00]: They didn't know who the eleven victim was. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and they found it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Leslie found out who it was and went to the family and I told him. [SPEAKER_01]: Wow. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, I think this is not a spoiler alert because this isn't in the book because I kept the book at a certain point. [SPEAKER_00]: So it's going to be, and I think I'll probably reissue the book with some epilogue to tell the stories as they solve the murders. [SPEAKER_00]: But the Leslie went to the woman. [SPEAKER_00]: She went to the woman to this house.
[SPEAKER_00]: She connected it with this woman and said, hi, do you know where your dad is? [SPEAKER_00]: And she said, no, my dad left my mom while my mom was pregnant. [SPEAKER_00]: and Leslie said, yeah, he didn't mean to. [SPEAKER_00]: You dad was murdered. [SPEAKER_01]: My gosh. [SPEAKER_01]: And they just thought he just up and laughed. [SPEAKER_00]: Her whole life. [SPEAKER_00]: She's in her thirties. [SPEAKER_00]: Her whole life.
[SPEAKER_00]: She thought maybe her dad had just walked away or had to walk away or something. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, he chose another life. [SPEAKER_00]: He didn't. [SPEAKER_01]: Wow, that's incredible. [SPEAKER_01]: I think this would be a really good podcast, Katherine. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, let's do it. [SPEAKER_01]: Let's do it. [SPEAKER_00]: We can do one case at a time. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: It's ongoing. [SPEAKER_00]: It is ongoing.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that's I love that about that's why I want people who read the book and people who I want them to be engaged in involves and that's excited as I am about how I'm going it is. [SPEAKER_00]: It's a credible story. [SPEAKER_01]: I think that [SPEAKER_01]: And that's why I think it would be a great podcast, too, because there's just so much information. [SPEAKER_01]: There's so many people that are going to be affected by this in a good way.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's super heartbreaking and tragic, but it is so uplifting that there are people out there that are still working for the dead. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think it's a, you know, I love that you said it just that way. [SPEAKER_00]: People out there working for the dead because Leslie told me she's like, when I'm there and they're underground, I can hear them. [SPEAKER_00]: I, I have to speak for them.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the reason I called it women who talked to the dead is because [SPEAKER_00]: Every person I talk to, who sent me to another person on my qualshai talk to, who else should I talk to, don't understand what's going on. [SPEAKER_00]: Every person they sent me to, female. [SPEAKER_00]: And I said, do you realize that only women are leading this whole effort? [SPEAKER_00]: And they were all very, you know, well, we're just doing our jobs.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So I talked to the like, no, no, I'm exactly a picture here. [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: And I did talk to the forensic anthropologists about that aspect of it. [SPEAKER_00]: Why are the women doing it? [SPEAKER_00]: And what do the women have? [SPEAKER_00]: And so that's in the book too. [SPEAKER_00]: So it's really, there's a little bit about DNA and there's a little bit about the dynamics of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then a lot of [SPEAKER_00]: kind of inside baseball about what it takes to exume bodies. [SPEAKER_00]: We hear about that, right? [SPEAKER_00]: But what does it take to exume a body? [SPEAKER_00]: It's pretty credible. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, everybody has to read this. [SPEAKER_01]: If you don't read it, then listen to it on audio. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: So I'm obviously we all listen to podcasts. [SPEAKER_01]: So we love audio.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can buy it. [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: That's why I had to do an audio. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just rolling out. [SPEAKER_00]: This week is a matter of fact on all the audio platforms. [SPEAKER_00]: They do all their due diligence on the platforms. [SPEAKER_00]: I think I saw it on Kogo already and whatever who over owns overdrive. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a library one and I saw it on audiobooks. [SPEAKER_00]: It should be an audible, today, or tomorrow, I think.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So probably by the time this plays. [SPEAKER_00]: Awesome. [SPEAKER_00]: It should be on all platforms. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: It'll be great. [SPEAKER_00]: It's pretty exciting. [SPEAKER_01]: It is, I'm really exciting. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm really excited for you because I think that this is just the beginning of this and for everybody involved in it. [SPEAKER_01]: And I am just truly, I think you are an incredible human being.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you're so kind. [SPEAKER_01]: We're so nice. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm so happy that we connected and Catherine and I get along so well. [SPEAKER_01]: This is wonderful. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, and also, before I forget, I saved this box so I could say, I need to buy more of this. [SPEAKER_01]: I gave Katherine five crimes. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, if you haven't tried it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yay. [SPEAKER_00]: Look at the skin. [SPEAKER_00]: Look at this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Beautiful. [SPEAKER_00]: If I crimes. [SPEAKER_00]: If I could be your advertiser, five crimes. [SPEAKER_01]: I'll set you up for that. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so body charm. [SPEAKER_00]: Five crimes body charm. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so I love the other products. [SPEAKER_00]: This one in particular is like run and thin. [SPEAKER_00]: So remind me. [SPEAKER_01]: I will, I'm going to send you some just for being you and you have to do that. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to, but you can also get your five crimes at five crimes.com. [SPEAKER_01]: That's FIVE, crimes.com and you can. [SPEAKER_01]: be like Catherine a little bit to move the skin. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know that you could be an FBI agent, but I can totally shoot. [SPEAKER_00]: If you get if you get a part in a show, I can coach you. [SPEAKER_00]: I've done that. [SPEAKER_00]: I've done my share of that. [SPEAKER_00]: Have you done that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, do you remember I love her any version? [SPEAKER_00]: She was just passed away. [SPEAKER_00]: She was she was great and she was that I was with her. [SPEAKER_00]: I was her handler so to speak when she was done at Quantico filming something and she was awesome and she's running around like Charlie's Angel with the gun. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm like Annie, we got to have you hold the gun the right way and so here's how you put handcuffs on a guy and so yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm happy to do that for anybody who happens to need that. [SPEAKER_01]: That's so fun. [SPEAKER_01]: I just want to do that just because you know [SPEAKER_01]: And Katherine also told me she's going to help me get into the FBI citizen academy. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, you're going to help me with the FBI friends. [SPEAKER_01]: I think I will be able to get in now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Citizens Academy is an exclusive group of people who learn [SPEAKER_00]: In the FBI offices, for several weeks in a row, you learn what the inside stories are on everything the FBI does, espionage, criminal cases, white collar cases, evidence collection. [SPEAKER_00]: They let you play with toys. [SPEAKER_00]: They let you usually go to the range and chew guns. [SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of fun.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yes, I have to wait until May to apply again, but I'm going to do that. [SPEAKER_00]: We'll do a little portion. [SPEAKER_00]: We'll try. [SPEAKER_00]: We'll try. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's a great. [SPEAKER_00]: I loved being in the FBI. [SPEAKER_00]: It's a great job. [SPEAKER_00]: But I will say that I love writing now because it allows me to share things in a different way, just like the podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I get a chance to talk to people outside the FBI, which is fun. [SPEAKER_00]: And people who I'm not arresting. [SPEAKER_01]: And you can also listen to Katherine on stop the killing. [SPEAKER_01]: And do you guys do new episodes every week? [SPEAKER_01]: How do you do that? [SPEAKER_00]: Not every week. [SPEAKER_00]: What we do is by season.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we're in the middle of recording a bunch of [SPEAKER_00]: For this coming season, I'm two subrivers from Columbine High School. [SPEAKER_00]: Somebody who survived the shooting in Las Vegas. [SPEAKER_00]: And how impacted them and what they're doing, but it's not just about victims and survivors. [SPEAKER_00]: It's the podcast is about [SPEAKER_00]: You know, prevention.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a conversation with the, you know, it's a conversation with the people in your neighborhood. [SPEAKER_00]: Like that's basically what it is. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like if you invite everybody over for a glass of wine, you'd listen, you'd chat about how could I have prevented this? [SPEAKER_00]: What happened in that situation? [SPEAKER_00]: Hey, you know, I'm scared about this. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to be scared about sending my kid to school.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's talk about that. [SPEAKER_00]: So it's stuff like that. [SPEAKER_00]: It's a really fun and positive kind of environment that you wouldn't expect. [SPEAKER_00]: With this podcast called Stop the Killing. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: And it's two disco biscuits. [SPEAKER_01]: Do you guys have also heard? [SPEAKER_01]: I had Sarah on. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, why is that? [SPEAKER_01]: Also, she is totally not using love her.
[SPEAKER_01]: She lives in London, but she's a she's a new teenager. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: She's a Kiwi. [SPEAKER_01]: She's a Kiwi. [SPEAKER_00]: and she has several of her own podcasts. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, she's on a little bit of a stall right now because she's having some health issues which all of her fan base knows and she's overcoming them. [SPEAKER_00]: But yes, I know. [SPEAKER_00]: I shouldn't say fan base. [SPEAKER_00]: That sounds arrogant.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't mean it that way. [SPEAKER_00]: Our listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Listeners. [SPEAKER_00]: Team. [SPEAKER_00]: Party. [SPEAKER_00]: Community. [SPEAKER_00]: Community. [SPEAKER_00]: I like community. [SPEAKER_01]: That's why it's just disco biscuits and disco biscuits.
[SPEAKER_01]: We do have we do have some male listeners not a lot of them, but maybe ten percent. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, maybe oh, that's pretty good, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, all right. [SPEAKER_01]: So check out Catherine, Schwite, wherever you can. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, you're all over the place. [SPEAKER_01]: So not too much. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, too much. [SPEAKER_00]: It's a little bit too much.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I do, I'm on, I'm on at K H White K A T E S C H W E I T on instant everything. [SPEAKER_00]: So it could find me there. [SPEAKER_01]: Follow her there also. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, you play back onto my podcast again. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, let's talk about cases. [SPEAKER_00]: Let's talk about pieces. [SPEAKER_00]: Always happy to talk about it. [SPEAKER_00]: I love it. [SPEAKER_00]: All right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to hold you to that and we're going to do, um, we're going to do our next one about a cake. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I love it. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: All right. [SPEAKER_00]: All right. [SPEAKER_00]: Take care.