Crime Snob Podcast

A missing woman’s name on someone else’s identification. A house filled with disturbing recordings. Families who have spent years searching for answers.This week on Crime Snob, we investigate the Philadelphia “House of Horrors” and the missing women linked to 417 West Chew Avenue. We trace Raymond “R.C.” Horsch’s unsettling past, the arrest of his son Eugene that brought investigators to the property, and the photographs, writings, and recordings that raised terrifying questions.At the center are the women whose families are still waiting to learn what happened and an investigation complicated by the challenge of separating staged violence from evidence of real crimes.

Halloween night, 1974. Eight-year-old Timothy O'Bryan comes home from trick-or-treating in Pasadena, Texas, and asks for one piece of candy before bed. He picks a giant Pixy Stix. Within an hour, he's gone.The candy was laced with cyanide. Four more poisoned Pixy Stix had been handed out to four other children that night, and police raced through the night to find them before anyone else got hurt.Timothy's death became the case behind every "check your candy" warning we grew up with. But the real story isn't about a stranger poisoning trick-or-treaters. It's about the man who walked Timothy to every door that night: his father, a church deacon who said he knew exactly which house the candy came from.

At 12, Sandra Birchmore joined a police youth program, looking up to the officers who were supposed to guide and protect her. At 23, she was found dead in her apartment, pregnant with a baby she desperately wanted. Her death was ruled a suicide. Federal prosecutors say it was murder.This week on Crime Snob, we examine the allegations against former Stoughton police officer Matthew Farwell, who prosecutors say sexually abused Sandra beginning when she was 15, then killed her years later to keep her from exposing him. Farwell has pleaded not guilty, and his defense maintains that Sandra died by suicide after their final meeting.We break down the years of messages, surveillance footage, conflicting medical findings, questions surrounding the original investigation, and a startling revelation about the father of Sandra’s unborn child. What happened during Farwell’s final visit, and what did investigators overlook in the days that followed?

In April 1692, Bridget Bishop stood before the magistrates in Salem Village and swore she'd never seen her accusers before. But every time she moved her head, they screamed in pain. Men said her ghost climbed onto their beds at night. Workers said they'd found pin stuck dolls hidden in a cellar wall. And when one accuser claimed her brother had slashed Bridget's spirit with a sword, the court checked her coat and found a tear.Two months later, she became the first person hanged in the Salem witch trials. And it took until Halloween 2001 to clear her name.This week on Spooky Snob, we're telling the story of Bridget Bishop: the first woman hanged in the Salem witch trials.

Michelle Hadley had never met or contacted Angela Diaz when a detective called asking about threatening emails Angela claimed Michelle had sent. Angela was the new wife of Michelle’s former fiancé, Ian Diaz, a deputy United States marshal.Soon, men began arriving at Ian and Angela’s home after responding to disturbing Craigslist advertisements. Although Michelle insisted someone was impersonating her, police believed Ian and Angela. Michelle was arrested twice, held on one million dollars bail, and spent 88 days in jail facing the possibility of life in prison.But the digital evidence told a very different story.In this episode of Crime Snob, I break down how Ian and Angela manufactured evidence, exploited Ian’s credibility in law enforcement, and built an elaborate criminal case against an innocent woman.Content warning: This episode discusses sexual coercion, stalking, threats, and sexual violence.

Zona Heaster was buried as a woman who died of natural causes. Her mother said she knew who killed her. And she claimed Zona had come back from the dead to tell her herself.In this Spooky Snob bonus episode, we’re heading to 1897 West Virginia for the story of the Greenbrier Ghost. After her newlywed daughter’s sudden death, Mary Jane Heaster reported four visits from Zona’s spirit, each revealing something far more disturbing than the explanation she’d been given. When Zona’s body was exhumed, the doctors found injuries that made this much clear: her death was no accident.From a suspicious husband and an overlooked examination to a defense attorney who probably regretted asking about ghosts, we’re digging into the murder behind the legend and how Mary Jane’s extraordinary account made its way into a real courtroom.Was it a ghost, a grieving mother’s intuition, or a woman who knew exactly how to make people listen?Stay spooky and stay snobby. 👻

Andrea Shaw says vaccines killed her 18-month-old twins. Prosecutors say she did.Eight days before Dallas and Tyson Shaw were found dead together in the bed they shared, the twins received routine childhood vaccinations. The next day, both became sick and were taken to the emergency room, where their records reportedly referenced a possible post-immunization reaction. Their family says the symptoms continued throughout the week.But when both children were found dead on May 1, 2025, police suspected foul play almost immediately.More than a year later, Andrea was indicted on two counts of first degree murder. Prosecutors say the twins’ autopsy findings were consistent with smothering and claim Andrea changed parts of her story during questioning. Her defense says the medical evidence does not prove murder and points to the documented illness leading up to the twins’ deaths.In this episode, we break down the full timeline, the vaccine controversy, the autopsy findings, Andrea’s police interviews, why her husband has not been charged, the bond hearing that completely backfired, and the evidence both sides are preparing to take to trial.Andrea has pleaded not guilty and is currently being held without bond.So what happened to Dallas and Tyson Shaw?Was this a devastating medical tragedy, or were two children intentionally killed?Right now, the state and the defense are looking at many of the same facts and telling two very different stories.

In 1887, a 23-year-old reporter got herself committed to a women’s insane asylum with one assignment: find out what was happening inside. Getting in was disturbingly easy. Getting out would take more than telling the truth.This week on Spooky Snob, we’re talking about Nellie Bly and the ten days she spent undercover on Blackwell’s Island. From freezing baths and abusive staff to women who were locked away simply because no one understood them, her account exposed conditions the public could no longer ignore.We’re also getting into the woman behind the investigation, whose response to being told what women couldn’t do was to go out and do it anyway. Taking on a newspaper, going undercover, racing around the world in 72 days… Nellie had a lot to get done.But her asylum stay is the part that sticks with you. Because Nellie had people on the outside working to get her home. The women she left behind weren’t all that lucky.

Colleen Slemmer was 19 when she moved to Knoxville to study computers and build a future. Months later, she was lured off campus and brutally murdered by classmates. Christa Pike believed Colleen wanted her boyfriend. She would later show other students a piece of Colleen’s skull.This week, we cover the murder that sent Pike to death row, the disturbing behavior that followed, and the decades of appeals leading to an execution attempt she survived. We discuss her childhood abuse, the arguments for sparing her life, and the medical warnings her attorneys say Tennessee ignored.With Pike hospitalized after the failed lethal injection, Colleen’s mother is left facing more uncertainty after 30 years of waiting. We’re talking about how this happened, what remains unresolved, and the young woman whose life was taken long before this case became an execution headline.Content warning: Graphic violence, childhood sexual abuse, and discussion of an execution attempt.

Welcome to Spooky Snob, our October bonus series dedicated to all things spooky! Alongside our regular Monday true crime episodes, we’re bringing you an extra episode each week exploring creepy, strange, and unsettling stories outside of true crime.First up: the Perron family and the Rhode Island farmhouse that inspired The Conjuring. Before they’d even unpacked, the girls reported seeing a strange man inside their new home. The previous owner’s parting advice? Leave the lights on at night.We’re digging into what the family says happened, what Hollywood changed, and the séance that ended with Roger Perron ordering Ed and Lorraine Warren out of the house. And then the family stayed for six more years. We have questions.Would you have stayed? Because we’re pretty sure we wouldn’t have finished unpacking.