Personal Business (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

Speaker 1 One afternoon in February of 2007, a man walked across an icy parking lot to the front door of a police station in Merriville, Indiana.

Speaker 1 Next to him was a police officer whose job it was to make sure this man actually went inside the station. Now, this man was very nervous.

Speaker 1 There was a warrant out for his arrest on a drug charge, and he'd been brought here to get questioned and then processed.

Speaker 1 But he hoped he'd actually get to leave again right away because he had critical information about this murder case from four years ago and he intended on trading that information for his freedom.

Speaker 1 And he was sure this was going to work since what he knew was not just a tip. This was a bombshell.

Speaker 1 But before we get into today's story, if you're a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious delivered in story format, then you come to the right show because that's all we do.

Speaker 1 So if that's of interest to you, Please invite the follow button to the most expensive restaurant in town and have this amazing five-star meal. But make sure you leave before the bill arrives.

Speaker 1 Okay, let's get into today's story.

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Speaker 1 On the afternoon of April 17th, 2003, 33-year-old John Parker Jr. sat at his desk in his office at J ⁇ J Parker Industries in Merrillville, Indiana.

Speaker 1 He was looking over some paperwork and hoping he would get at least a few minutes without any interruptions to finish reading it. Because in John's world, a few minutes were hard to find.

Speaker 1 John was the owner of J ⁇ J, which was a consulting company dedicated to training people to sell high-end vacuums.

Speaker 1 Now, vacuums were not glamorous, but his company was really successful, and running it was a lot of work.

Speaker 1 He was on his feet all day managing about 25 employees and solving constant problems, and he usually did not get much quiet time to do things like paperwork.

Speaker 1 And even though John did complain about this, the truth was he actually loved being busy. He'd always been a very hard worker.

Speaker 1 He'd started in the vacuum business as a door-to-door salesman, and even though everyone told him there was no money in vacuums, he'd proved them wrong.

Speaker 1 He was so good at sales that he made his first million dollars by the time he was just 30 years old. And now he had a whole company that taught other people how to be great at it too.

Speaker 1 But now, as John tried to get through the paperwork, his desk phone rang. He sighed and he picked it up, and it was his wife, Judy.

Speaker 1 She told him that their daughter had left her homework in his office when she was there just the other day, and she asked him if he could bring it home with him.

Speaker 1 Now, John was about to tell his wife that this was now the second time she had reminded him about this homework, but he stopped himself because right now, things were pretty good.

Speaker 1 You know, things between them were solid, and so he tried to remind himself that it was not worth messing that up.

Speaker 1 So, John and Judy had been married for 10 years, and she was his partner in life and in business. They had raised four kids together, and Judy was actually the second J in J ⁇ J Parker Industries.

Speaker 1 John knew that to everyone else, they looked like a happy, successful power couple, but the truth was much more complicated, because about a year ago, Judy had an affair, and this had devastated John at the time, but he really wanted to give their marriage another shot.

Speaker 1 They had been living in Michigan at the time, and they agreed that moving the business to Maryville, Indiana, where John was from, would be a good way to start fresh.

Speaker 1 And so far, they both felt like it had been the right call. The business was doing really well, things were looking up, and most importantly, John and Judy were actually getting along.

Speaker 1 So now, instead of getting annoyed at his wife for repeatedly asking him about the homework, he just said, sure, and that he would see her later for their date night.

Speaker 1 As soon as John hung up with Judy, he heard a knock on the door. and his office manager, Barry Jones, charged in holding more files.

Speaker 1 Barry dropped them on John's desk and said, sorry, but he needed a signature. It was for the final termination paperwork for an employee John fired whose name was Derek Hall.

Speaker 1 So a week earlier, John had made the very difficult decision to let Derek go. It wasn't personal.
Derek just wasn't a good fit. He couldn't keep up with the sales quota.

Speaker 1 And John had really high standards for his employees. That's how he became a millionaire in the first place.
But Derek somehow thought his firing was John's fault.

Speaker 1 And he'd actually showed up at J ⁇ J and made a scene in the parking lot saying that John had shorted him hundreds of dollars on his last paycheck.

Speaker 1 And when John tried to defuse things, Derek had physically attacked him. The police had to be called and they separated John and Derek before it got too ugly.

Speaker 1 And John had ended up paying Derek what he wanted since he just wanted the whole thing to be over.

Speaker 1 which was also why now he was immediately scribbling his signature on the termination paperwork and handing it back to Barry.

Speaker 1 Because hopefully now he would just never have to see or speak to Derek ever again.

Speaker 1 After work, around 6 p.m., John drove home, which was about 15 minutes away from the office. And when he got inside his house, he heard Judy call down from upstairs that she'd be ready soon.

Speaker 1 So he yelled back that there was no rush, and he meant it. And this was because just over an hour earlier, his older brother David had met him at the office.
and they'd gone to a buffet together.

Speaker 1 So John really wasn't hungry at all anymore. But dinner with Judy was definitely more about spending time together than actually eating, so he wasn't going to say anything about the late lunch.

Speaker 1 John made his way into the living room where his four kids were watching TV. It was his 17-year-old daughter, Christina, her 15-year-old brother Daniel, and their two younger sisters.

Speaker 1 The older kids were going to babysit the younger ones tonight so that he and Judy could go out. But when John tried to make conversation with them, Christina and Daniel gave him a cold shoulder.

Speaker 1 Now, to any other parent, this could be interpreted perhaps as just typical teenage behavior. But to John, it was more loaded than that.
So, Christina and Daniel were actually his stepkids.

Speaker 1 John had been in their life since they were really little, and he considered himself to be their dad.

Speaker 1 And John had always tried to be very involved in things like coaching Daniel in baseball and going to school concerts and parent-teacher conferences.

Speaker 1 But his relationship with these kids had changed lately. And frankly, both of the kids had really begun acting out.

Speaker 1 Christina repeatedly threw parties at their house whenever he and Judy were gone, while Daniel was combative and hung out with a group of friends who were seemingly always in trouble with the law.

Speaker 1 And this had created a lot of conflict between them and John, because he was the one who tried to discipline them, while Judy sort of always played the good cop.

Speaker 1 But John knew better than to try and force them to talk to him. So when he went in there, he just kept quiet and they all watched the TV.
Until Judy came downstairs and said she was ready to go.

Speaker 1 Hours later, just before 10 p.m., John and Judy left their dinner, got in the car, and drove back to John's office at JJ Parker Industries, which was in an office park in a secluded area.

Speaker 1 And the two of them had had a really nice dinner. However, during their meal, Christina had called and wanted to know where that homework was that John was supposed to bring home.

Speaker 1 And John, very embarrassingly, suddenly realized that despite all those reminders from Judy that he was getting so annoyed by, he had forgotten the homework at the office.

Speaker 1 So that's why they were here now, to pick up the homework on their way home. John parked the car in the lot and both of them hopped out.

Speaker 1 When they got inside the building, they found that the office manager, Barry, was still there working. Which John expected.

Speaker 1 I mean, things had been busy lately with planning seminars and finding a new hire to replace Derek and Barry was in charge of keeping it all organized.

Speaker 1 And John really didn't feel too bad that Barry was putting in so many hours. I mean, this was his job, and the company relied on him to ensure nothing major slipped through the cracks.

Speaker 1 So when Barry mentioned to John when he went inside that, you know, he actually might be heading home soon, John said no.

Speaker 1 At the same time, John saw his wife grab the homework from his desk and then hustle out to the car.

Speaker 1 And as she disappeared, John told Barry that he was sorry, but Barry needed to stay and finish what he was doing.

Speaker 1 But then, to make up for delivering this bad news, John offered Barry his leftovers from dinner. He had basically a full meal since he had not been hungry.

Speaker 1 Barry sort of grumbled about it, but said he would take the food if he was offering. And so John nodded and went outside to grab it.

Speaker 1 Moments later, John arrived at the car where Judy was waiting in the passenger seat. He opened up the back door and he picked up the styrofoam to-go box.

Speaker 1 When Judy looked back at him, he told her he was going back to give the food to Barry. And she just shrugged and said, fine, then turned back around.

Speaker 1 But right at that same moment, John heard the sound of footsteps in the concrete right behind him. But before he could turn around, he heard a deafening bang.

Speaker 1 Judy heard the bang too, which was followed quickly by a second one. And she instinctively ducked down in her seat and then looked back at John just in time to see him fall hard to the ground.

Speaker 1 And before she could do or say anything, she saw a masked person in dark clothes crouch over John for just a few seconds, and then they sprinted away from the car towards the main road.

Speaker 1 Judy leapt out of the car and ran to John, yelling his name, but he just lay there on the pavement, not moving. And then she saw this huge pool of blood forming right underneath his head.

Speaker 1 With her heart racing, Judy ran to the office door and screamed at Barry to call the police.

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Speaker 1 By about 10.30 that night, the parking lot at J ⁇ J Parker Industries was overrun with officers and crime scene technicians.

Speaker 1 Among them was Detective Donald Toth, who had been with the Merrillville Police Department for the last 21 years. When he first got the call, Dispatch had only known that there was a shooting.

Speaker 1 But when he arrived on the scene, a first responder told him that there'd actually been a fatality. 33-year-old John Parker Jr., who had been identified by two witnesses at the scene.

Speaker 1 The first responder also explained that when they got there, before they spoke to the witnesses, they had looked for John's wallet to identify him.

Speaker 1 But the wallet had not been in his pockets or in the car. And when Toth heard that, his first thought was that maybe this was a robbery.

Speaker 1 But as soon as he walked over and got a look at John, he immediately revised that theory.

Speaker 1 John was on his back behind a parked car, and the first thing Toth noticed was that he had a lot of nice jewelry on. Gold and diamond rings, a bracelet, and an expensive looking Rolex watch.

Speaker 1 Also, this office park was not close to anything, and it just didn't feel like the kind of place a random mugger would go looking for victims.

Speaker 1 Toth wondered if the killer took the wallet just to make police believe this could be a robbery.

Speaker 1 Because the longer he looked at John's body, the more signs he saw that this was likely an efficient planned execution.

Speaker 1 John didn't have any visible defensive wounds, and when Toth used a gloved hand to move John's head to the side, he saw a gunshot wound right behind his ear.

Speaker 1 Toth had actually been a paramedic before becoming a detective, so he knew that shot had likely killed John instantly. It also meant John had his back turned to the shooter when he died.

Speaker 1 There was an open styrofoam-to-go container of food and some car keys on the ground right next to John's body, and their placement made it feel like John might have been holding them when he fell.

Speaker 1 If John had an altercation, like with a thief or somebody who killed him in the heat of the moment, the scene would be way messier.

Speaker 1 As far as Toth could tell, the killer had just walked up to John while he was busy with something at his car, aimed the gun, pulled the trigger, and then after he died, grabbed John's wallet and then left.

Speaker 1 Which also meant the killer very likely had not been at the scene long enough to leave behind much evidence. All Toth saw were just two shell casings, and he doubted there would be footprints or DNA.

Speaker 1 And when Toth spoke to some of the other officers at the scene, he learned they'd already done a sweep of the office park, and they'd looked in dumpsters and bushes and on the roofs of all the buildings, but they hadn't found anything and they didn't see any cameras or surveillance in the area.

Speaker 1 So, as Toth stood in the middle of the parking lot and watched his officers continue to search the scene, he realized he was the lead on a case with virtually no forensic evidence, which might have been daunting, but he did have at least two witnesses.

Speaker 1 About an hour later, Toss sat down across a table from John Parker's wife, Judy, inside of an interrogation room inside the Maribel police station. He'd learned a few things about Judy already.

Speaker 1 She'd been the one who told Barry to call the police, and she was with John when he was shot. He also knew that as the spouse of the murder victim, she was his best suspect.

Speaker 1 Now, Toss didn't really think Judy was the actual shooter.

Speaker 1 But considering how pristine the crime scene was, he knew it was possible this was a hit, done by a professional, and Judy maybe could have hired them.

Speaker 1 But as Toth spoke to Judy, he started to waver on that theory. She couldn't stop crying, which made it hard for her to get her words out.

Speaker 1 And when she did speak, it was slow, like it was taking her a lot of effort to say anything at all.

Speaker 1 She did manage to give Toth a timeline, how she and John had gone out to dinner for their date, and then stopped over at the office after since one of their daughters had left some homework there.

Speaker 1 She said the office manager, Barry, had been there, and that when she had gone back to the car, she knew that Barry and John were speaking.

Speaker 1 And then at some point, John, he left the building and came out to get his dinner leftovers. And at that time, she had turned away from him and then she heard these two loud shots.

Speaker 1 And then when she turned back around, she saw John fall. And then also there was this figure in dark clothes who was sort of bending down on top of John.
And then they ran away.

Speaker 1 However, when Judy finished telling her story about what had happened that night, you know, all the events that led up to the shooting, something changed in her demeanor.

Speaker 1 You know, the shakiness in her voice and all the grief that was sort of pouring out of her to this point, it vanished.

Speaker 1 And in its place, Judy became very hardened and she looked right at Toth and she said, you better find the person who did this and bring them to justice.

Speaker 1 And when Toth saw this, you know, he almost got goosebumps from it because it was such a quick departure from what had been going on.

Speaker 1 And he thought to himself, you know, either she is a great actress and this is all a big facade and she did it or she was involved, or this is genuine.

Speaker 1 She's a grieving widow who doesn't know what to make of the fact that her husband has just been killed. At some point, Toth asked Judy if she could think of anybody who might have wanted to hurt John.

Speaker 1 And Judy appeared to think for a second, but eventually she just said, no.

Speaker 1 She said that John was an incredible husband and father and they had a great marriage that they had really worked hard on and Everybody at work respected him.

Speaker 1 But then something clearly occurred to Judy because she frowned and said, actually,

Speaker 1 there was someone from work who didn't like John. His name was Derek and John had fired him recently.

Speaker 1 And after the firing, Derek had come back to J ⁇ J and started a physical fight with John in the parking lot. When Toth heard that, he perked up.

Speaker 1 I mean, a disgruntled employee was definitely somebody that he should be speaking to. And Toth was speaking to the office manager, Barry Jones, right after this.

Speaker 1 And so he figured he could ask him about that incident too.

Speaker 1 Now, Toth wasn't ready to rule Judy out as a suspect since he still needed to check her finances and talk to her friends and family about her marriage. But for now, he didn't see a reason to hold her.

Speaker 1 So he told Judy that for now, she was welcome to go home and be with her kids and, you know, grieve, and they would be in touch.

Speaker 1 Then Toth got up and he left to go to another interrogation room where Barry was waiting.

Speaker 1 The following morning, Toth walked up a flight of porch steps. He was at the home of Derek Hall, the ex-employee of JJ Parker Industries that John Parker had recently fired.

Speaker 1 Last night, Toth had spoken to John's office manager, Barry Jones, who had confirmed what John's wife Judy had said about Derek.

Speaker 1 That after he was fired, there had been this huge, ugly fight at the office between Derek and John, and Derek was the instigator.

Speaker 1 It was the only useful information Barry had given him, since he said, you know, during the shooting, he had actually been in the bathroom, and so he hadn't heard or seen anything until he heard Judy screaming for him.

Speaker 1 But the lead on Derek was enough. And the other thing was, Barry and Judy were not the only ones who thought Derek might have killed John.

Speaker 1 Just before this, Toth also spoke to John's brother, David, who was incredibly devastated and furious about his brother's death, and David had also pointed the finger at Derek.

Speaker 1 So Toth was very eager to meet Derek. A man three people claimed could be a killer.
Toth got to the top of the steps and knocked on the front door.

Speaker 1 And when Derek answered, Toth introduced himself and explained why he was there. Derek seemed stunned, but he immediately let Toth inside.

Speaker 1 Moments later, Toth was sitting across from Derek in the living room.

Speaker 1 And even though Derek seemed very uncomfortable and nervous, he told Toth he was actually glad the detective was there, because he really wanted to give his side of the story.

Speaker 1 Derek said that when he started working at J ⁇ J, he was given way more work than he'd expected. And when he couldn't keep up with it, he was fired.

Speaker 1 And then, you know, John shorted him $400 on his final paycheck. So he had gone to J ⁇ J to get the money he was owed.

Speaker 1 Now, he admitted that it did lead to a physical fight, but he said they'd only pushed each other and it ended up getting resolved, like it wasn't that big of a deal.

Speaker 1 But beyond that, Derek insisted he could not have killed John because he'd actually spent the whole evening last night at a friend's house playing video games.

Speaker 1 He gave Toth the friend's number and said, go ahead, call him. He'll confirm it.
Toth tried not to look too disappointed as he he took down this number.

Speaker 1 But if the alibi checked out, he could rule Derek out as a suspect. Now, it was possible that Derek had, you know, actually taken a hit out on John, but to Toth, that seemed unlikely.

Speaker 1 If Derek was that upset over $400,

Speaker 1 it didn't seem likely that he would have the excess cash to pay anybody to go commit a murder.

Speaker 1 But as Toth left Derek's house and got back in his car, he decided the interview was not a total bust after all.

Speaker 1 Because talking to Derek made made him realize he needed to focus more on John's business life. According to John's brother David, John got rich young and built his company very quickly.

Speaker 1 And in Toth's experience, those kinds of people often stepped on others to get to the top.

Speaker 1 The next day, Toth walked down a hallway at the precinct towards an interrogation room. He had confirmed Derek's alibi with his friend, so he had to move on to other suspects for now.

Speaker 1 Which was fine with Toth because he was about to sit down with his new prime suspect, who happened to be one of his former witnesses. It was John's office manager, Barry Jones.

Speaker 1 Yesterday, Toth had gone to the J ⁇ J Parker Industries office and made it a point to speak to every single employee about John.

Speaker 1 And he found out that John was a great boss who pushed his employees, but he worked hard himself.

Speaker 1 The employees also said that Judy was an essential part of the company, and the Parkers as a duo were well respected in the world of vacuum sales.

Speaker 1 But office gossip also said their marriage was not exactly happy, and it was sort of common knowledge that Judy was having an affair with Barry Jones.

Speaker 1 A few employees had even caught them having sex at the office.

Speaker 1 Now, neither Barry nor Judy had mentioned this the first time Toth had spoken to them, so now Toth had no idea if anything they had said to him was true.

Speaker 1 Barry could have been lying about being in the bathroom and was actually, you know, the shooter. Or he and Judy were maybe working together and they were both lying.

Speaker 1 Toth was leaning towards the second option because he'd also found out that Judy was going to get a big payday from the death of her husband.

Speaker 1 She was the beneficiary of a $1 million life insurance policy. And aside from that, John's general estate was worth around $2 million.

Speaker 1 Maybe he thought, you know, she and Barry wanted to take John's money and run off together.

Speaker 1 So when Toth went into the interrogation room, he intended on essentially saying that the investigation was over. They'd caught Barry in a lie and they knew what he did.

Speaker 1 But when Toth sat down and confronted him, Barry did not act like somebody who was guilty and cornered. He was charismatic and confident, and he said the affair was total office gossip.

Speaker 1 He was just good friends with Judy and they worked together closely. Barry said he and Judy and John were like family.
In fact, he said he was living with one of Judy's cousins from Texas.

Speaker 1 Now, Toth didn't really believe what Barry Barry was saying, but even though he kept pressing him, Barry stuck to his story. And eventually, Toth just had to let him go.

Speaker 1 Because without any evidence, it was just Barry and Judy's word against the employees. And even if they were having an affair, that was not enough to prove they also conspired to murder John.

Speaker 1 On Monday, April 21st, so four days after John's murder, Toth was at his desk rereading the notes from Barry and Judy's interviews for what felt like the millionth time.

Speaker 1 He was still trying to find a concrete way to link Judy and Barry to John's murder before approaching Judy about it.

Speaker 1 But so far, other than the office rumors, he hadn't found anything and he didn't really have any other leads, aside from learning that the shell casings found on the scene were from a.25 caliber gun.

Speaker 1 Which was useful to know, but it wasn't going to help him with the suspect list. Toth leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes.

Speaker 1 He'd been full speed ahead on this case since Thursday night, and he was exhausted. He was starting to consider maybe going home and getting some rest when he heard a light knock on his door.

Speaker 1 An officer poked his head in and told Toth there was somebody on line three with a tip and it sounded like a good one.

Speaker 1 Toth picked up his phone and the person on the other end of the line explained they were a police officer as well from a nearby town and they said that they had heard about John Parker's murder on the news.

Speaker 1 and realized they had some information.

Speaker 1 So about six months earlier, this officer had been called to a local juvenile detention facility to take a report.

Speaker 1 The staff there had done a random search on their kids and found that two of them had a lot of cash, over $200.

Speaker 1 Having cash was against the rules, and when the kids were asked where they got it, they said it was payment for a hit on John Parker.

Speaker 1 Now, that stunned Toth, but not nearly as much as what the officer said next. These two kids said the person who had arranged this hit was a former high school classmate of theirs named Daniel Hicks.

Speaker 1 And Toth couldn't believe what he was hearing because Daniel Hicks was John's own 15-year-old stepson.

Speaker 1 Toth had really begun to think that this murder could be a professional hit, but it did not occur to him that this hit could be linked to family and also a child.

Speaker 1 Now, the officer on the phone explained that they really hadn't taken this very seriously at the time.

Speaker 1 So no one had notified John's family or spoken to Daniel about it, which, you know, Toth did not have to point out here, but this was a huge screw-up.

Speaker 1 But he wasn't focused on, you know, the right and wrong of it. He was just focused on figuring out what happened.
And so Toth got the names of these two kids with the cash from the officer.

Speaker 1 And when he hung up, he immediately sent some of his own officers to track these kids down. Then Toth put in a call to Judy.
He needed to bring her son, Daniel, in for an interview.

Speaker 1 And since he was a minor, Judy was going to have to come too.

Speaker 1 Late that same night, actually after midnight, Toth was once again inside of an interrogation room with Judy.

Speaker 1 But this time, instead of answering questions herself, Judy was sitting at the back of the room, watching while her son Daniel sat at the table with Toth and a few other detectives.

Speaker 1 Toth had spoken to Judy right before this, and she had seemed genuinely shocked to hear that her child apparently asked somebody to kill John.

Speaker 1 She told Toth there had to be a mistake here, and she was happy for police to speak to Daniel directly because that would allow them to clear this all up.

Speaker 1 Toth had decided not to ask Judy about the affair with Barry at that moment because she was being very cooperative, letting them speak to her son, and he also just didn't want to upset her and have her change her mind.

Speaker 1 They also had not been able to find those two kids that Daniel supposedly hired. And so right now, Daniel was the only one he could speak to.

Speaker 1 And so now, watching Daniel, Toth could see he was acting like a typical young person who was in trouble.

Speaker 1 He seemed nervous and he was blinking a lot and he kept rearranging his hands like he wasn't really sure what to do with them. And so Toth decided his best approach was just to be direct.

Speaker 1 Maybe he could scare the truth out of Daniel. So right off the bat, he told Daniel he knew about the murder for hire and he told him to explain himself.

Speaker 1 And to Toth's surprise, Daniel took a big breath and then said it was true. He had actually paid two friends some money he had saved from his allowance because he hated his stepdad.

Speaker 1 John was always on his case and yelling at him, and Daniel just wanted it to stop. But Daniel said he didn't want John to die.

Speaker 1 He was adamant that he had just asked his friends to, you know, teach John a lesson and beat him up. Todd thought about this.

Speaker 1 It was possible that Daniel was telling the truth here, and the two kids in the detention center either lied or had decided on their own to kill John. But that felt a little far-fetched.

Speaker 1 Because why would these kids lie to get themselves in more trouble?

Speaker 1 Todd thought it was much more likely that Daniel was the one who was lying, and Toth was not about to let Daniel go anywhere until he found out for sure.

Speaker 1 So he told Daniel and Judy that he was sorry, but they were going to have to take Daniel into custody.

Speaker 1 Then Toth called some officers in to make the arrest, and as he left the room, he could hear Judy and Daniel sounding completely shocked behind him.

Speaker 1 Now, at this point, even though Toth had been up all night and he was totally exhausted, at the same time, he actually felt far more alert than he did even in the couple days before.

Speaker 1 Because now it felt like they really were, you know, making movement on this case.

Speaker 1 And so instead of trying to get some rest back at his house, he went back to his office, poured some coffee, and kept on working.

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Speaker 1 On May 15th, 2003, so almost a month after John Parker's murder, Detective Don Toth sat at his desk reading some copy for a flyer and making some last-minute changes to it.

Speaker 1 So far, it said that police were looking for information about John Parker's murder in Merriville, and it offered a reward to anybody who came forward.

Speaker 1 Toth planned to pass these flyers out all over town tomorrow to see if the public could maybe give him a new lead.

Speaker 1 It was sort of an act of desperation, because while this case had seemed close a couple times to being wrapped up, you know, just a few weeks ago, now it was pretty much dead.

Speaker 1 It had taken police a while, but they had finally found both of those kids from the detention center that Daniel apparently hired to, you know, rough up his dad, who ultimately apparently killed him.

Speaker 1 And the kids admitted to meeting with Daniel and accepting the money. But it turned out there was just no way they were actually the murderers.

Speaker 1 One of them had been thousands of miles away in Las Vegas when John was killed, and the other had been in detention at a juvenile facility.

Speaker 1 And so since Toth could not prove the assassins Daniel hired had actually killed anyone, he'd had to let Daniel go. But that didn't mean Daniel was innocent here.

Speaker 1 Those two kids had said that Daniel did ask for John to be killed. not just beat up.
So Daniel was lying about that.

Speaker 1 And Toth didn't think someone who wanted to kill his father had just stopped wanting to kill his dad all of a sudden.

Speaker 1 But since Toth knew Daniel was at home babysitting his younger siblings during the time of John's murder, Toth figured he'd likely gotten somebody else to do it.

Speaker 1 But Toth couldn't just keep talking to Daniel because Judy had gotten a lawyer and they were now not letting Toth question the family members at all anymore, which was very frustrating.

Speaker 1 since Toth wasn't done with Judy either. Out of everyone, I mean, she benefited the most from John's death because she was a beneficiary on his life insurance.

Speaker 1 And she was very likely having an affair with his office manager, Barry. And so maybe part of her motive could have been just to hide the affair from him.
And then also Barry.

Speaker 1 I mean, he's potentially having this affair with Judy, John's wife. I mean, he might have a motive as well to get rid of John to just keep this thing a secret.

Speaker 1 Also, he definitely seemed to think that John was, you know, a pretty tough boss. And so maybe he just had had enough and he was complicit or actively involved in getting rid of John.

Speaker 1 He was also at the scene of the crime right when it happened. And since there weren't any cameras, Toth couldn't actually confirm Barry's version of events.

Speaker 1 But at this point, Toth didn't have the evidence he needed to prove any of these suspects actually killed John or hired somebody to do it.

Speaker 1 And he also didn't have enough evidence to eliminate them and narrow down his pool further. Instead, Toth had just kept adding to it.

Speaker 1 Because as of this week, he was also considering John's brother, David, as a person of interest.

Speaker 1 A few days ago, some officers had been called to Judy's house because John's brother David had stopped by her house and gotten into a verbal fight with the family.

Speaker 1 And this was not the first time this had happened. Apparently, David had gone over there and threatened the family before.

Speaker 1 One time, he had even damaged their car. This kind of behavior could mean David was just lashing out because he was grieving.
But it also could mean he was erratic and potentially violent.

Speaker 1 Plus, he had been with John on the afternoon of the murder at that buffet, and he knew that John was going to have dinner with his wife later.

Speaker 1 So he could have guessed that John would check in at the office after they were done eating, since he was a famously hard worker. Toth sighed and took a break from looking at this flyer.

Speaker 1 His brain was fried, but he felt hopeful these flyers would give him the tip he desperately needed to break this case. And so the next day, Toth and some other officers passed these flyers out.

Speaker 1 But then weeks went by with no no tips. And even though Toth did eventually get a few responses to the flyers, none of them gave him any actual evidence.

Speaker 1 So, over the next few months, Toth spent his days in his office poring over files for something he missed, or maybe a witness they didn't interview, or evidence they'd maybe overlooked.

Speaker 1 But there was just nothing. And as the months turned into years, Toth had to turn to other projects.
And eventually, the John Parker murder case went cold.

Speaker 1 Four years after John's murder, on an afternoon in February of 2007, Toth arrived at work for the day and headed to his office.

Speaker 1 Now, he had not forgotten about the John Parker case, but he was not actively investigating it at this point.

Speaker 1 In fact, all his cases had been winding down because he was planning to retire in just a few months.

Speaker 1 But, right before he actually got to his office door, a narcotics officer caught up to him and asked for a word.

Speaker 1 The officer explained that he knew Toth wasn't on their narcotics team, but they had a warrant out for a man involved in one of their drug investigations.

Speaker 1 And they had realized this man had some crossover with one of Toth's homicides from 2003, the John Parker case. Toth stopped in his tracks and immediately told this officer to go get him an interview.

Speaker 1 And sure enough, later that day, Toth sat down with this man who was very chatty and seemed extremely eager eager to talk.

Speaker 1 And the first thing this man did was explain that the person he lived with knew John Parker, and they had admitted to him that they were directly involved in his death.

Speaker 1 And when this man told Toth the name of this person, Toth couldn't believe it. He leaned back in his chair feeling both relieved and also disturbed.

Speaker 1 He was relieved because he finally knew who John Parker's killer was, and he was disturbed because this case was now way more twisted than he had ever imagined.

Speaker 1 Based on the police investigation and multiple confessions, here is a reconstruction of what investigators believe happened to John Parker on the night of April 17th, 2003.

Speaker 1 At around 10 p.m., the killer crept slowly through the shadowy parking lot at J ⁇ J Parker Industries. They were wearing a mask and dark clothes, and they were carrying a.25 caliber gun.

Speaker 1 They could see John's car by the office entrance, with Judy sitting inside of it. But she was not the killer's target.
John was. And John was also near the car.
He was not inside of it.

Speaker 1 He was standing right outside one of the back car doors. It was open.
and he was rifling around, you know, inside the car, looking for something.

Speaker 1 And as the killer stared at John, thinking about what they were going to do next, they thought about John, who this man was, and how controlling and selfish he was.

Speaker 1 He had made the killer's life a living hell. And now, the killer was going to get retribution.
So, while John continued to have his back turned, the killer silently walked up right behind him.

Speaker 1 They raised their gun, aimed at the back of his head, and they fired. And it was a direct hit that hit him right behind the ear.

Speaker 1 And John fell so fast that when the killer fired a second time, they just missed. Now, the killer had never murdered anyone before, so they were shocked by what they had just done.

Speaker 1 But they were kind of jostled back into reality when they heard John's wife, Judy, yelling out and screaming.

Speaker 1 And so quick as can be, the killer grabbed John's wallet so the police would think this was maybe a robbery gone wrong. And then they turned and sprinted off into the night.

Speaker 1 Much later that night, the killer waited at home. until the person who had masterminded this whole thing arrived and they gave them a hug and said they had done a good job.

Speaker 1 The mastermind then took the gun, John's wallet, and the clothes the killer wore during the murder and told the killer they were disposing of them. And the killer just listened, feeling very relieved.

Speaker 1 He trusted the mastermind more than anybody else in the whole world because, after all, she was his mother.

Speaker 1 It would turn out, Judy had convinced her own 15-year-old son, Daniel, to murder his stepfather, her husband.

Speaker 1 Judy wanted to get out of her marriage with John, but she knew if she divorced him, she would have only gotten half of his estate and their business.

Speaker 1 And so with his death, she could get the whole thing. Now, she had actually already tried to kill John, just unsuccessfully.

Speaker 1 First, she had tried to poison him, but when that didn't work, she had hired a hitman herself. But that also failed.

Speaker 1 So finally, she asked Daniel to help by promising that he would get some of the money. And she had also enlisted her daughter, Christina, who was the one who found the gun to kill John with.

Speaker 1 Daniel actually tried to hire somebody else for the job, but then ultimately just did it himself and used his younger siblings for an alibi, saying he was at home babysitting.

Speaker 1 And the man who told all this to the police was Christina's husband, who she married two years after John's death.

Speaker 1 And once her husband gave authorities the whole story, police interrogated both Christina and Daniel, who eventually confessed.

Speaker 1 Judy was convicted of murder and sentenced to 33 years in prison, while Daniel got 23 years in prison. And Christina received five years for her part in the murder as well.

Speaker 1 Christina would die in 2013 from a drug overdose. Daniel was released in 2017 and Judy was released in 2022.

Speaker 1 A quick note about our stories. They are all based on true events, but we sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved, and some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes.

Speaker 1 The Mr. Ballin podcast, Strange, Dark, and Mysterious Stories, is hosted and executive produced by me, Mr.
Ballin. Our head of writing is Evan Allen.
Our head of production is Zach Levitt.

Speaker 1 Produced by Jeremy Bone. This episode was written by Kate Murdoch.
Story editing by Karis Pash Cooper.

Speaker 1 Research and fact-checking by Shelley Hsu, Samantha Van Hoos, Evan Beamer, Abigail Shumway, and Camille Callahan. Research and fact-checking supervision by Stephen Eyre.

Speaker 1 Audio editing and post-produced by Witt Lacasio and Cole Lacasio. Additional audio editing by Jordan Stidham.
Mixed and mastered by Brendan Kane. Production coordination by Samantha Collins.

Speaker 1 Production support by Antonio Minata and Delana Corley. Artwork by Jessica Klogston-Kiner.
Theme song called Something Wicked by Ross Bugden. Thank you for listening to the Mr.
Ballin podcast.

Speaker 1 If you enjoyed today's story and you're looking for more bone-chilling content, be sure to check out all of our studios podcasts. There's this one, the Mr.
Ballin podcast, as well as Mr.

Speaker 1 Ballin's Medical Mysteries, Bedtime Stories, Wartime Stories, Run Fool, Redacted, Late Nights with Nexpo, and A Twist of History.

Speaker 1 All you have to do is search for Balin Studios wherever you get your podcasts. To watch hundreds more stories just like this one, head over to our YouTube channel, which is just called Mr.
Ballin.

Speaker 1 So, that's going to do it. I really appreciate your support.
Until next time, see ya.

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