298: He Hunted Her & Planned a First Date Murder: The Heartbreaking Story of Sade Robinson

1h 9m
This week on Serialously with Annie Elise, a 19-year-old college student heads out for a casual first date, but within hours, she vanishes without a trace. Soon, a sinister trail begins to unfold: surveillance footage, suspicious texts, and a horrifying discovery along the shoreline. Unravel the chilling and heartbreaking case of Sade Robinson, where a night out with a stranger ends in unthinkable violence. What really happened after that final meal? And how did investigators piece together the truth behind one of the most disturbing crimes in recent memory?



🗣️ For more information about Sade’s Voice Foundation, go to https://sadesvoicefoundation.com/.



🔎Join Our True Crime Club & Get Exclusive Content & Perks 🔎 

Join The Club: https://www.patreon.com/annieelise



🎧 Need More to Binge? 

Listen to EXTRA deep dive episodes every week on Apple!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/serialously-with-annie-elise/id1519456164



🚩Announcements🚩

Want to Catch Annie LIVE on Tour? 🎤 

🎟Grab your tickets now for a city near you: https://annieelise.com/pages/tour



🌸 SPRING MERCH IS OFFICIALLY HERE! 🌸

Shop now at https://annieelise.com/collections/shop-all

Don't miss out before your faves sell out! 🛒🌷



Follow Annie on Socials 📸 

🩷Instagram: @ _annieelise, https://www.instagram.com/_annieelise/?hl=en

💜TikTok: @_annieelise, https://www.tiktok.com/@_annieelise?lang=en

🗞️ Substack: @annieelise, https://substack.com/@annieelise

💙Facebook: @10tolife, https://www.facebook.com/10toLIFE



⭐️Sponsors ⭐️



Mint Mobile: Get this new customer offer and your 3-month Unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at http://MINTMOBILE.com/AE.



Function Health: Visit http://www.functionhealth.com/AE or use gift code AE100 at sign-up to own your health.



Everyday Dose: Get 45% off your first subscription order of 30-servings of Coffee+ or Bold+. You’ll also receive a starter kit with over $100 in free gifts including a rechargeable frother and gunmetal serving spoon by going to http://everydaydose.com/AE or entering AE at checkout. You’ll also get FREE gifts throughout the year!



SimpliSafe: Visit http://SIMPLISAFE.com/ANNIE to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free.



Helix: Go to http://helixsleep.com/serialously for 27% off sitewide.



Shop Annie’s Closet & Must-Haves! 👗

Poshmark: https://posh.mk/Tdbki6Ae0Rb

ShopMY: https://shopmy.us/annieelise

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/shop/10tolife?ref_=cm_sw_r_apin_aipsfshop_BKN1ZMCMEZHACVFQ2R75&language=en_US



Disclaimer ‣ Some links may be affiliate links, they do not cost you anything, but I make a small percentage from the sale. Thank you so much for watching and supporting me.



🎙️ Follow the podcast for FREE on all podcast platforms! 

Apple:https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/serialously-with-annie-elise/id1519456164

Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/6HdheEH8WeMTHoe5da34qU

All Other Platforms: https://audioboom.com/channels/5100770-serialously-with-annie-elise



Get Involved or Recommend the Case 💬 

About Annie: https://annieelise.com/

For Business Inquiries: 10toLife@WMEAgency.com



Episode Sources 🔗

Capital B News

CBS58

CNN

Court TV

FOX6 News Milwaukee

Law & Crime

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Sade’s Voice Foundation

TMJ4 News

WLUK FOX 11

WISN

Yahoo News



*Sources used to collect this information include various public news sites, interviews, court documents, FB groups dedicated to the case, and various news channel segments. When quoting statements made by others, they are strictly alleged until confirmed otherwise. Please remember my videos are my independent opinion and to always do your own research. 

••••••••••••••••••



Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this video are personal and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company. Assumptions made in the analysis are not reflective of the position of any entity other than the creator(s). These views are subject to change, revision, and rethinking at any time and are not to be held in perpetuity. We make no representations as to the accuracy, completeness, correctness, suitability, or validity of any information on this video and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information or any losses, injuries, or damages arising from its display or use. All information is provided on an as-is basis. It is the reader’s responsibility to verify their own facts.

Press play and read along

Runtime: 1h 9m

Transcript

Speaker 1 Boxes were all filled with gifts big and small, but sharing pure love is the greatest gift of all.

Speaker 1 Stay cozy, my people, and have a boss here.

Speaker 3 Get into the holiday spirit with Boss and our ultimate gifting edit. Visit your nearest store or explore our curated selection online at boss.com.

Speaker 5 A suspicious death investigation underway following a gruesome discovery.

Speaker 6 It's shocking.

Speaker 8 I've never covered anything like this before.

Speaker 4 Some breaking news tonight and an investigation underway after a bizarre discovery.

Speaker 10 A parkgoer had spotted a severed human leg.

Speaker 6 Their daughter was found dead and dismembered after a first date last April.

Speaker 5 She had the most angelic blow in aura on her.

Speaker 11 I just mentally, I can't accept it. I feel like I might lose the last piece of my sanity if I do.

Speaker 6 It's an unimaginable pain the parents of Sade Robinson simply cannot escape.

Speaker 5 Cutting off the breasts, dismembering limbs, beheading her.

Speaker 8 Those acts, simply put, ladies and gentlemen, are the acts of a killer.

Speaker 8 Hey, True Crime Besties, welcome back to an all-new episode of Serial Asleep.

Speaker 8 Hello, hello, hello.

Speaker 10 Welcome back to an all-new episode of Serialessly with me, Annie Elise, your true crime bestie, here to break down another case for you today.

Speaker 10 Now, look, today's case that we're going to be talking about is one that happened just last year and it drew everyone's attention.

Speaker 10 And I have received so many requests from you guys to cover this case.

Speaker 10 There also, when it first had emerged, there were a lot of unanswered questions at the time, but now it's back in the headlines because the trial just recently wrapped up and it shed a lot of new light on what we thought this case really entailed.

Speaker 10 So today, because you guys have been requesting it, because there is still so much information that hasn't really been talked about and details that weren't really shared, I wanted to dive into everything, who the victim was, what her story was, and of course, the journey to getting her justice.

Speaker 10 So today's case, we are going to be talking about the story of Sade Robinson. In 2024, Sade Robinson was 19 years old and living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Speaker 10 And Sade was absolutely beautiful on both the inside and the outside.

Speaker 10 And you know, when you kind of like look at a picture of somebody and you can almost just tell the kind of person that they are from that picture alone? That's how it was with Sade.

Speaker 10 And based on how her family and friends described her, her bright and happy smile that she possessed in almost every single one of these photos, it really did encompass the kind of person that she was.

Speaker 10 Her grandmother, Linda, also described her as being the sweetest person and somebody who was happy all the time.

Speaker 10 Her mother Sheena described her as someone who had this almost angelic glow and aura about her, which I have to say, that is like the nicest way that you could describe somebody.

Speaker 10 Saying that they have this this angelic glow and an aura. I'll be honest, I don't think anybody's ever described me that way.
Probably the opposite.

Speaker 10 They probably like, probably describe me as like a black cat energy, but you know, whatever.

Speaker 10 But no, so everybody just said Sade was like this beam of light.

Speaker 10 Now, some other descriptions of Sade were that she was very independent and that she was the kind of person who made sure that everyone around them was always taken care of, always happy, always had a smile on their face.

Speaker 10 And apparently she also had this very unique laugh, which was described as quote, unmatchable and iconic.

Speaker 10 Like if Sade was laughing from a different room or from, you know, feet or yards away, you just knew it was her. You knew that it was her laugh.

Speaker 10 So all in all, she seemed like truly a one-of-a-kind person. Someone that was unforgettable with her friends and her family, with anyone she came into contact with.

Speaker 10 Now, like I mentioned, Sade was only 19 years old, so she was still very young in so many ways.

Speaker 10 Yet, despite her age, she was more than on the right track and she had already made a lot of big strides toward the future that she wanted for herself.

Speaker 10 And really, if I'm being honest, I would say that for her age, she was more than above average when it came to her achievements. Like not a lot of 19-year-olds were doing what Sade had done.

Speaker 10 From day one, Sade had always been this like hustler and go-getter. If she wanted something, she was going to get it one way or another.

Speaker 10 She would figure out how to do it, but she would always get to it through hard work. She would never cut corners.
She never expected any handouts either or that things would be easy.

Speaker 10 She just would work hard and grind for the things that she wanted. And basically, if anybody out there were ever to call Sade lazy, they would be like a bold-faced liar.
Just not at all true.

Speaker 10 She even graduated high school a semester early, and she immediately enrolled into the criminal justice program at Milwaukee Area Technical College. College.

Speaker 10 She was set to graduate at the end of spring 2024. On top of that, right out of high school, she immediately began working two jobs.
Like I said, a hustler.

Speaker 10 She worked at a local pizza shop called Pizza Shuttle, and then she also worked at a local country club.

Speaker 10 And something that I made note of when looking at her background was that even the people that she worked with had a lot of positive things to say about her, about her character, about who she was overall as a person.

Speaker 10 And I'm skipping ahead a little bit, but I am going to just kind of jump into why we're talking about this case today.

Speaker 10 Because it was after she had failed to show up at one of her shifts at Pizza Shuttle that people immediately felt like something was wrong.

Speaker 10 And what's interesting about that, and I want you to make note of, is that usually if a 19-year-old skips out on their work shift, it typically is not a huge red flag.

Speaker 10 We know that a lot of 19-year-olds are not very reliable, right? They're drinking, they're partying, they're doing whatever, even though I get it, it's underage, like they're 19.

Speaker 10 I mean, hell, usually if a 19-year-old didn't show up to work, you probably wouldn't think that something nefarious was going on.

Speaker 10 You would just think maybe they're hungover, maybe they got a new job, maybe they're just quitting, who really knows?

Speaker 10 But the point being that when Sade didn't show up, they immediately knew that something was wrong.

Speaker 10 And I should just take a moment to mention here too, that even though Shade was born in Mississippi originally, Milwaukee was now her home and it's what came to be her home.

Speaker 10 Her family had moved there when she was only two years old. And once her parents split up, she would split time between Milwaukee with her mom and then Florida where her dad Carlos lived.

Speaker 10 So Milwaukee was mainly what she knew from a very young age.

Speaker 10 So now that we've gone over a bit of Sade's background, who she was as a person, what she liked to do, her jobs, I want to get into more of the root of the case, the foundation of why we're here, and unfortunately, more of the disturbing and very heartbreaking parts of Sade's story.

Speaker 10 So April 1st, 2024 was supposed to be a big day for Sade. You see, she had a date, and it was a first date at that.
Now, for some people, the idea of going on a first date is a literal nightmare.

Speaker 10 It's awkward. You have to go through a lot of things.
You have to figure out what you're going to say, what you're going to wear. Is it going to be like a super uncomfortable, awkward dinner date?

Speaker 10 What are you going to ask the other person? It can just be like, you know, foreign. It's a lot.
I personally, when I think about first dates that I went on, it's like a horror show. I hated it.

Speaker 10 But Sade did not feel that way. She was not dreading it, not even a little bit.

Speaker 10 Now, whether it was because she was really into this new person that she was meeting, or if she was just the type of person who didn't stress about this kind of stuff, I'm not entirely sure.

Speaker 10 Maybe it was a little bit of both. But regardless, she was clearly very excited about the date.

Speaker 10 And she was telling pretty much anyone in her life that was willing to listen all about the exciting news, all about this first date. And that's not an exaggeration either.

Speaker 10 She even told one of the workers in her apartment building that she was going on a date that night, and she was telling them how excited she was, a maintenance worker at her apartment complex.

Speaker 10 So her friends knew, her co-workers knew, everyone knew. And all day long, Sade prepared for her date.

Speaker 10 She was going through the tedious process of deciding what she wanted to wear, how she was going to do her hair, her makeup, all the fun stuff, you know, that us women have to worry about.

Speaker 10 And that day, Sade and her date, 33-year-old Maxwell Anderson, were texting back and forth non-stop, deciding what place they wanted to go, where their first date was going to take place.

Speaker 10 And apparently, Sade had told him that she was in the mood for seafood that night, which, lucky for her, Maxwell knew of a couple places in town that they could go to.

Speaker 10 In fact, both of the places that he had suggested were restaurants or bars that he had previously worked at.

Speaker 10 So he had a really good idea of where to get the best food, where to get the best drinks, things like that. So the two of them started their night at a restaurant called Twisted Fisherman.

Speaker 10 They ate dinner, they chatted, and apparently the date was going pretty well because instead of calling it a night, they decided to keep the night going.

Speaker 10 Sade and Maxwell decided they were going to go to the next location. They were going to go to a bar called Dukes on the Water.
Now, Maxwell was a bartender, and he had been for years.

Speaker 10 So just like the twisted fisherman, Dukes on the Water was also somewhere that he had previously worked. So the two of them arrived at Dukes around 6.15 p.m.

Speaker 10 and they ended up staying until around 9 p.m. or so.
So again, this date was seemingly going pretty well. They were having a great time.
They weren't going to call it a night and wait for date two.

Speaker 10 They just wanted to keep it going. Even after Dukes.
Because after Dukes that night, Sade and Maxwell went back to Maxwell's place. This was around 9.24 p.m.

Speaker 10 Now at this time, it seemed like everything was okay. A nearby surveillance camera caught two people arriving at his home, which presumably was Maxwell and Sade.

Speaker 10 So, by all accounts, you would think that this night went extremely well, maybe even more than well. Maybe it had been a great first date.
They were, in fact, going back to his house afterward.

Speaker 10 But what Sade had not realized is that once Maxwell's front door closed that night, she would never come back outside of it alive again.

Speaker 7 There's nothing like sinking into luxury. Anibay sofas combine ultimate comfort and design at an affordable price.

Speaker 7 Anibay has designed the only fully machine washable sofa from top to bottom. The stain-resistant performance fabric slipcovers and cloud-like frame duvet can go straight into your wash.

Speaker 7 Perfect for anyone with kids, pets, or anyone who loves an easy-to-clean, spotless sofa. With a modular design and changeable slip covers, you can customize your sofa to fit any space and style.

Speaker 7 Whether you need a single chair, love seat, or a luxuriously large sectional, Annabe has you covered. Visit washablesofas.com to upgrade your home.

Speaker 7 Sofas start at just $699 and right now, get early access to Black Friday savings, up to 60% off store-wide with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Shop now at washablesofas.com.

Speaker 10 Add a little

Speaker 7 to your life. Offers are are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.

Speaker 15 This is the story of the one. As a custodial supervisor at a high school, he knows that during cold and flu season, germs spread fast.

Speaker 15 It's why he partners with Granger to stay fully stocked on the products and supplies he needs, from tissues to disinfectants to floor scrubbers.

Speaker 15 All so that he can help students, staff, and teachers stay healthy and focused. Call 1-800-GRANGER, clickgranger.com, or just stop by.
Granger for the ones who get it done.

Speaker 2 This is the story of the one. As a maintenance supervisor at a manufacturing facility, he knows keeping the line up and running is a top priority.
That's why he chooses Granger.

Speaker 2 Because when a drive belt gets damaged, Granger makes it easy to find the exact specs for the replacement product he needs.

Speaker 2 And next day delivery helps ensure he'll have everything in place and running like clockwork. Call 1-800-GRA, clickgranger.com, or just stop by.

Speaker 3 Granger for the ones who get it done.

Speaker 3 Lowe's early Black Friday deals are going fast.

Speaker 13 Don't miss up to 50% off select major appliances. Plus, up to an extra 25% off when you bundle select major appliances.

Speaker 3 And with Christmas around the corner, you're going to need more string lights, right?

Speaker 13 Save $4 on GE LED 100 count string lights. Now just $5.98.

Speaker 3 Lowe's, we help. You save.

Speaker 13 Valid through 12.3. Selection varies by location.
Select locations only while supplies last. See Lowe's.com for more details.

Speaker 10 Just a few hours in the early morning hours of April 2nd, Sade's phone GPS showed that it had left Maxwell's house. Which was not that strange, right?

Speaker 10 I mean, maybe they had gone back to his house, hung out a bit, maybe even hooked up, then maybe she decided that it was time to head home. I mean, she was 19.
She was also living on her own.

Speaker 10 It's not like she had a curfew. If she wanted to go on a date until the early morning hours, I mean, she certainly could.

Speaker 10 However, instead of her phone showing that it went back to Sade's house and then stayed there for the rest of the night, like you would imagine would happen if she really was the one with her phone and going back home, the GPS location showed that her phone went to a bunch of very different and very odd locations.

Speaker 10 And these locations weren't places that could be easily explained away. I mean, it's not like she stopped at the local Taco Bell or Del Taco for a late-night snack or something.

Speaker 10 Because at first, the GPS showed that her phone went to a place called Pleasant Valley Park.

Speaker 10 And the thing that stands out most about that park, that one in particular, is that it is right alongside the Milwaukee River. Huge red flag.

Speaker 10 Why is she going to a park next to a river in the middle of the night? Then her phone went to yet another park. This time, a park called Warnemart Park.
Now, by this time, it was around 2.45 a.m.

Speaker 10 So obviously another huge red flag. Two separate parks in the middle of the night.
It just screams that something's going on or someone is up to no good, right?

Speaker 10 Not to mention, this second park also has a body of water that's connected to it. Only this time, it's much bigger.

Speaker 10 In fact, the park itself is known for its stunning beaches that are connected to Lake Michigan, which for those of you who aren't familiar, it's not a small lake, not by any stretch of the imagination.

Speaker 10 It is massive. It literally looks like you're on the ocean, like your ocean front.
That's how vast it is. So, do I need to mention how big of a red flag this is? Probably not.

Speaker 10 Now, Sade's GPS showed that her phone was at this park for quite some time. And on top of that, surveillance cameras were also able to catch her car on camera.

Speaker 10 However, with this footage, you couldn't really see much of who was on the inside, who was driving, or if anybody was in the passenger seat, or what exactly was inside.

Speaker 10 It was grainy, it was difficult to see. But then, eventually, at 4:31 a.m., her car was seen leaving the park.
However, at this point, her phone had died.

Speaker 10 So at this point, the GPS wasn't tracking her phone and the phone's every movement at all anymore. It was almost like it just suddenly dropped off.

Speaker 10 And there was really no reason at all for her to be at all of these different parks.

Speaker 10 Whether she would have been alone, whether she would have been with a man that she had just met, it just, there was no reason for it. It just wasn't safe.

Speaker 10 And her friends and her family have all said that Shade was very big on safety. Then, just hours later, a phone call came in to 911.
They reported that a blue Honda Civic was on fire.

Speaker 10 And when officers arrived at the scene, they were immediately concerned.

Speaker 10 The car had been parked right behind this abandoned building, almost in a way that suggested that it wasn't meant to be seen right away. And luckily, I mean, nobody was inside of it.

Speaker 10 It wasn't like this tragic car accident or something. But with that, it indicated that it was purposeful.
Somebody intentionally set this car on fire.

Speaker 10 Now, lucky for the police, yet unlucky for whoever set this car on fire, there had been two women who witnessed this entire thing and who called 911 as soon as it happened.

Speaker 10 On top of that, there were also surveillance cameras in the area that also caught some pretty helpful tips.

Speaker 10 In these videos, these two women are seen watching someone who had a bigger sized tan backpack on their back.

Speaker 10 And this person is like walking over to the car and then lights the car on fire and starts walking away.

Speaker 10 One of the women starts waving their arms in the air, you know, trying to get the attention of anybody else who is nearby, while the other person is seen pointing and even heard yelling at the person walking away, saying, hey, look, he did it.

Speaker 10 He's the one. And just based on the witnesses' versions of the story, even before checking that surveillance camera footage, the investigators knew right away that this was sketchy.

Speaker 10 I mean, it doesn't take a trained professional to piece together that somebody who's lighting a car on fire, early in the morning before most people are even awake and then taking off and leaving it behind in abandoned building.

Speaker 10 I mean, that obviously screams, I'm trying to cover something up, right? Not to mention, whoever had done this really made sure that the fire would do some damage.

Speaker 10 I mean, the car was completely destroyed. Despite that, though, the investigators were able to piece together two very important pieces of evidence.

Speaker 10 Number one, The car's VIN number and license plate came back as belonging to none other than Shade Robinson, who at this point was not somebody that they were familiar with.

Speaker 10 But then on the inside of the car, there was a charred black jacket and jeans that were inside out.

Speaker 10 And that was the same outfit that Sade was wearing the night before, the night that she went on her first date. Though again, the investigators had no idea who Sade was at this point.

Speaker 10 They didn't discover the relevance of that information. Now, a lot of different things were happening simultaneously on this day, on April 2nd.

Speaker 10 We have Sade's car that was discovered quite literally burnt to a crisp. It was in a very odd location that morning with no signs of her being anywhere.

Speaker 10 We also know that on that same day, Sade was scheduled for one of her work shifts, yet never showed up.

Speaker 10 So her manager and her coworkers kept calling her, kept texting her, yet they were getting no response. And like I mentioned in the beginning of this episode, Sade was a hard worker.

Speaker 10 She was a very dependable employee. She had hardly ever called off, and if she did, she was the type of person that would have requested the day off ahead of time.

Speaker 10 One of her managers even said that if she was going to be just five minutes late, she always made sure to text them. She would always update them.

Speaker 10 So given that information, I'm not even sure if she had ever even done anything like this before, which was probably why everybody was so concerned.

Speaker 10 So the manager at the pizza shuttle continued texting Sade, just extremely worried that she hadn't come in for her shift that day, messaging her multiple times, begging for her to just, you know, even if you're not coming in, let me know that you're okay.

Speaker 10 We're just worried about you. She wasn't going to ask why she didn't come in.
She wasn't going to harass her for not giving them a heads up that she was not coming in.

Speaker 10 She just wanted to know and hear from Sade that she was okay.

Speaker 10 She even drove by Sade's apartment looking for her car in the parking lot, which I will say, in pretty much any other scenario, a manager showing up to your apartment building would probably be borderline harassment.

Speaker 10 But in this case, it just shows how quickly people noticed that Sade's absence was a big deal and they were worried for her. I think it says a lot.
Now, the manager also knew that Sade lived alone.

Speaker 10 They had come to know each other for quite some time at this point. So she kind of felt this sense of protection over Sade.

Speaker 10 Not to mention, I think that sometimes we just get those gut feelings, right? Where it just like you can tell in your gut that something's truly wrong, right?

Speaker 10 Now at the same time, Sade's family and friends were also noticing her absence. They noticed that she was essentially silent.

Speaker 10 Again, she was someone who kind of followed a very strict routine in her daily life. She didn't just like fly by the seat seat of her pants and just do whatever.
So none of this was typical behavior.

Speaker 10 If her friends or her family members ever called or ever texted her, she would answer. But now she wasn't.
And the people who knew and loved Sade the most said she was not somebody who was naive.

Speaker 10 Even though she was, yes, young, she knew how scary and how cruel the world could be, especially living in a bigger city.

Speaker 10 And like I said, she was big on safety, which is also why she always would share her location and she shared it with multiple friends. She did that so that somebody would always know where she was at.

Speaker 10 And remember all those different locations at very odd at times that I had mentioned before?

Speaker 10 Well, the reason that those were even first discovered was all because her friends had started backtracking her movements after she didn't return their phone calls or their text messages.

Speaker 10 They knew that something was wrong, so they started looking at the tracking, seeing where she had gone, where is the last time that she had any sort of movement.

Speaker 10 And then it was after they saw how odd all of these movements were that Sade's friends decided to call the police. They reported her missing at around 9 p.m.
that evening.

Speaker 10 Now, what nobody in Sade's life realized, though, was that just a few hours earlier, before Sade was ever even officially reported as missing, human remains had been found at that second park.

Speaker 10 And those remains would later be identified as belonging to Sade.

Speaker 10 But that was only the very beginning of this case. As soon as Sade was officially reported as missing, the investigators immediately got this like sinking pit in their stomach.

Speaker 10 You see, the remains that were found hours before were just that. Remains.
It wasn't a full body, it was bits and pieces.

Speaker 10 And the sad truth of it all is the only thing that had been found that day was a leg.

Speaker 12 So this is Evan Milley's. He's a 5,000 before.

Speaker 12 South guy, he's mostly a good guy. He's got in this trouble a couple of times, but good dude.
Okay, so they're driving. They walked down the escarve from Sheridan.

Speaker 12 Started walking south just for fun, you know, roughly on the beach. And they're walking that

Speaker 12 leg right there. Yeah.
Said that it was up about approximately where the end of that stick is that, you know, branches. Lots of bushes right there.
Yeah, bushes so that they saw it up.

Speaker 12 It seems like up on the hill, kind of? Yeah. Okay.
So said that he, him and his buddy, who's in my squad right now, walked out, called us.

Speaker 12 And then when we came back, it was about, I don't know, maybe seven feet,

Speaker 12 seven feet east on the rock. I moved it just for Evan's purposes.
Okay, so it was fucked away. Yeah, okay.
And I documented it while I'm rotting hand, but different angles of where it was and all.

Speaker 12 Okay, cool. All right, you gotta.

Speaker 12 What's your name again, boy? Evan. Evan?

Speaker 12 Okay, Evan. How long were you out here? About probably an hour.
An hour? Yeah.

Speaker 12 Okay.

Speaker 12 Usually come this way? Yeah. Yeah.
Before you see this.

Speaker 12 Yeah.

Speaker 12 Yeah.

Speaker 12 It's the first time you see anything like this. Yeah.
Yeah? Okay.

Speaker 12 All right.

Speaker 12 Stay tight. Don't go anywhere, okay? Yeah.

Speaker 10 Now, through finding this leg, although they didn't have the full body, they were able to identify that the remains belonged to a black woman, a black woman who was about five feet tall, which fit Shade's exact description.

Speaker 10 Then add on to the fact that her car was found earlier that day and was, you know, again, had been burst into into flames. Her clothing was charred inside of it.

Speaker 10 It just didn't really feel like there was going to be some sort of positive resolution to all of this.

Speaker 10 So not too long after those remains were recovered, it was positively identified through preliminary DNA evidence that they belonged to Shade.

Speaker 10 which I just cannot imagine how her friends and family felt in that moment. I mean, one moment she's alive.
She's thriving. She's this young 19-year-old with her whole life ahead of her.

Speaker 10 And then the next, she's just gone. And not even just gone, you don't even know where her full body is.

Speaker 17 I just got in at one o'clock on April the 3rd, and there's a loud bang at the door.

Speaker 16 I just seen my baby that Sunday on Easter. We just bit

Speaker 17 family dinner at my parents.

Speaker 17 Monday morning, she FaceTimes me on her way to work.

Speaker 17 That Monday morning is the last time

Speaker 17 mommy got to talk to her baby. I love you from where you are.
I love you.

Speaker 18 That's Shade.

Speaker 12 It's my baby.

Speaker 7 At what point did you realize that your child was missing and she wasn't coming back?

Speaker 19 I think when they came

Speaker 19 to my house, when the sheriff department came like one o'clock in the morning to get my DNA.

Speaker 19 It kind of hit home

Speaker 19 because I was in denial denial and, you know, Sheena, I would tell Sheena that it's not her.

Speaker 19 It's got to be a logical explanation for this. And I'm still probably in denial to some point.

Speaker 19 I can't help it.

Speaker 19 I just can't accept this. I just, mentally, I can't accept it.

Speaker 19 I feel like I might. lose the last piece of my sanity if I do.

Speaker 10 It's important to note that at this point in the investigation, the detectives did not believe, of course, that Shade was still alive.

Speaker 10 I mean, I know it's not too often that people would cut off body parts on their victims and then let them live, especially an entire leg, but I still wanted to just specify that just in case there was any confusion.

Speaker 10 Nobody here thought that she could possibly still be alive out there. And the truth of it was, this wasn't just an act of torture.

Speaker 10 I mean, maybe so in the grand scheme of things, but they knew that this was an attempted cover-up of a murder.

Speaker 10 Now, because Shaw Day had made it known to literally everyone that she was going on that date the night before, there was immediately a rough timeline that was put into place.

Speaker 10 Even without many details, people, of course, started to guess what could have possibly happened to her, or more specifically, who had done this to her.

Speaker 10 And I'm not sure if she had given her family all of Maxwell's details, you know, his name, his all of this, I don't know, or if the investigators were just able to quickly identify and find all of that information.

Speaker 10 But regardless, they knew right away who the last person to have seen her alive was. And they very quickly zeroed in right on the fact that he was most likely the one who had done this to her.

Speaker 10 So on April 4th, at around 1:15 p.m., the investigators were able to track down Maxwell. And sure enough, they arrested him in his car just a few blocks away from his house.

Speaker 12 I died.

Speaker 18 What's going on?

Speaker 10 Did somebody just uh redo it?

Speaker 10 Now, for those of you who might be listening to this instead of watching the video version on YouTube, I'll briefly describe what happened in that clip to you.

Speaker 10 Maxwell was being handcuffed and kind of patted down by the officers, and his overall demeanor, it was cool, calm, collected. The only question he even asked was, what's going on?

Speaker 10 And he didn't even bother asking it twice. He just kind of said it almost like to his surprise.
Maybe it's because he knew what was going on.

Speaker 10 Maybe it's because he wasn't a total idiot and he knew to keep his mouth shut. Who the heck really knows?

Speaker 10 But when they checked his vehicle at the scene, they found the exact same hoodie in the back of his car that that mystery person had been seen wearing in that security camera footage.

Speaker 10 The footage where those two witnesses saw this person, you know, torch the car on fire and then walk away. So it was now just another piece of the puzzle that was coming together.

Speaker 10 And that same day after Maxwell's arrest, the investigators were able to get a search warrant for his house. And once they were inside, they found some very interesting things.

Speaker 10 The first being several gas cans, which I think is probably pretty self-explanatory considering that he, you know, set Sade's car on fire.

Speaker 10 But the main thing that I want to talk with you about though is that there was blood found in both his bedroom and his bathroom, which you would probably assume that if Sade was dismembered and if there was blood that was found at the place that she was last seen at, that that blood would probably belong to her, right?

Speaker 10 Well, that's the interesting thing here. They tested the blood and the preliminary testing came back with some kind of odd results.
It didn't match Sade's DNA.

Speaker 10 Now, does this automatically mean that he's innocent? No, not necessarily. However, it is odd.

Speaker 10 And I'll be honest, honest, it's something that I was worried about and was worried was possibly going to throw a wrench into things during the trial.

Speaker 10 So as they're doing this investigating, they still, of course, are looking for the rest of Sade, for more evidence, for her body parts, for just more evidence and clues into this investigation.

Speaker 10 And sure enough, one day after Maxwell's arrest, so now on April 6th, 2024, a human foot was found. Now this time the remains were found in a different location.

Speaker 10 And there are two really big things about this finding.

Speaker 10 Number one is that it was found in the same general area where Sade's car had been burned, where it had been abandoned behind that building, which coincidence, I don't know, you be the judge, but I would say unlikely.

Speaker 10 Now, the second thing is that it was identified as being a positive match to the leg that was found, aka the leg that had been identified as belonging to Sade.

Speaker 10 So the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel wrote that there was also, quote, other human flesh that was found in the same area that her foot was found. Now, I don't know what that means.

Speaker 10 I don't know if that means tissue, skin, or what. I think we can kind of guess exactly what that means.
No specific body parts, just pieces of her that were scattered.

Speaker 10 And maybe the pieces had already been that way. Maybe it was the work of animals.
I don't really know, but... It is horrific to think about and to say out loud.

Speaker 10 Now, even though they were finding more evidence, it wasn't until a full week after Maxwell was arrested that he was officially charged with first-degree intentional homicide.

Speaker 10 He also was charged with mutilation of a corpse and arson. And while Maxwell sat in jail awaiting his trial, sure enough, more of Sade's remains kept turning up.

Speaker 8 You guys know that my husband is a massive coffee drinker, right? I've talked to you about it before. I've like tried to test out coffees here and there, find one that I like the taste.

Speaker 8 It's been difficult, but then we kind of have like this bonus moment because it helped both of us.

Speaker 8 We discovered Everyday Dose, and not only was it finally a coffee that I actually enjoyed and liked the taste of, but for my husband, whenever he has his coffee, it may, he doesn't love the way it makes him feel.

Speaker 8 Like he likes that it alerts him and awakes him, but he starts to feel bloated. He feels like sometimes a little too jittery.

Speaker 8 And so everyday dose has the classic coffee taste that he loves and that he has been like striving for, but it doesn't have that those nasty side effects that come with it.

Speaker 8 Plus, they have added benefits. So there's no crash, no jitters.
It also has collagen in it. It has lion's mane, proteins, things to help boost focus, your brain.

Speaker 8 It just gives you this clean, sustained energy all day long. And like I said, no crash, no jitters, just sustained energy.

Speaker 8 Now, the one that I tried and really like is Coffee Plus, which is a mild roast.

Speaker 10 It's kind of light.

Speaker 8 It's smooth. It's low acidity, which is easy on sensitive stomachs, and it's like just this mellow energy.
I think it's perfect for me just kind of like getting my toes wet in the coffee world.

Speaker 8 But my husband, he likes the Coffee Plus Bold because it's a rich blend of medium roast and it's this robust, full-bodied coffee yet smooth, and it gives this extra boost of energy.

Speaker 8 But I'm telling you, it has totally changed the game for both of us. And get 45% off your first subscription order over 30 servings of Coffee Plus or Bold Plus.

Speaker 8 You'll also receive a starter kit with over $100 in free gifts, including a rechargeable frother and a gunmetal serving spoon.

Speaker 8 You get this by going to everydaydose.com slash AE or entering AE at checkout. You'll also get free gifts all throughout the year.
That's everydaydose.com slash AE for 45% off your first order.

Speaker 8 We talk a lot about safety here on this podcast, and I just have a question for you. What does feeling safe at home really mean to you?

Speaker 8 Because for a long time, I thought that it was enough to just have a good deadbolt, maybe an alarm that would work, maybe something that would make noise, maybe even having like a sign out front that would deter people, something to like hinder people if they actually broke in.

Speaker 8 But then after people close to me were broken into and after I had a very real scare a couple of years ago, I realized that true security takes way more.

Speaker 8 A system that actually works to prevent the break-in, not just respond to it. It's just when somebody's trying to break in or when somebody's lurking around your house, it's a violation of your space.

Speaker 8 It's, I don't even know how to really describe it until it happens to you. It just does feel like such a violation.

Speaker 8 And that's why I trust Simply Safe, not only to protect my home, but also my office and my studio and my family. It's about security that is proactive, not just reactive.

Speaker 8 Most security systems only take action after somebody breaks in. That's obviously too late.
You're already in danger. Things have escalated too far.

Speaker 8 But Simply Safe's new active guard outdoor protection helps stop break-ins before they even happen.

Speaker 8 They have AI-powered cameras, they have live monitoring agents who will detect suspicious activity all around your property.

Speaker 8 So, for example, if somebody's lurking, agents will literally talk to them in real time. They also will like turn the spotlights on them, they can also call the police.

Speaker 8 So, they proactively are deterring crime before it even starts. And with Simply Safe, what I love is there's no contracts, there's no hidden fees.

Speaker 8 And they've also been named Best Home Security System of 2025 by CNET. Over 4 million Americans trust Simply Safe, and they're ranked ranked number one in customer service, too, by Newsweek and U.S.

Speaker 8 Today. Monitoring plans start at just $1 a day, and you also get a 60-day money-back guarantee.

Speaker 8 So visit simplysafe.com/slash Annie to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free. That's simplysafe.com/slash Annie.
There's no safe like SimplySafe.

Speaker 10 On April 7th, what is vaguely described as, quote, several more body parts were found near 31st and Walnut Street in Milwaukee.

Speaker 10 Then, about 10 days later, on April 18th, a torso and an arm were found in the beach on the south part of Milwaukee. Then, on May 11th, another arm washed up, this time in Illinois.

Speaker 10 And what's maybe the most heartbreaking thing about Sade's case is that to this day, all of her remains still have not yet been found, her head being one of them.

Speaker 10 Now, while we're on the topic of Sade's remains being found, I do want to go over what the medical examiners were able to determine, as well as the autopsy report.

Speaker 10 Like in many dismemberment cases, it was really difficult to pin down an exact cause of death.

Speaker 10 Add to the fact that a lot of her remains were found in water and badly decomposed, I mean, it made this even more challenging, right?

Speaker 10 That being said, the medical examiner wasn't able to determine a cause of death, though Sade's manner of death has always from day one been listed as a homicide.

Speaker 10 Despite that, the medical examiner still was able to provide some helpful information though.

Speaker 10 For one, she believes that Sade was stabbed multiple times, though she was not able to tell if that was pre-mortem or post-mortem, meaning she doesn't know if the cause of death was via stabbing or if this sick, twisted freak stabbed her body after the fact when he was doing the dismembering.

Speaker 10 She also believes that Sade was dismembered with some kind of knife and that the dismemberment was after she was already deceased, which thank goodness.

Speaker 10 Can you imagine if this freaking barbarian dismembered her while she was still alive? That would be just like so vile and horrific.

Speaker 10 Now, what I also want to mention too is that something really important to note in all of this is that there was absolutely no chance of any drugs or alcohol being the cause of her death.

Speaker 10 So nothing that could have been construed as accidental or an overdose or anything like that. Not, not in her talks, not at all possible, according to the medical examiner.

Speaker 10 And you might be wondering, okay, well, why are you saying that that information is so important?

Speaker 10 Well, it's because it eliminates Maxwell and his defense team from being able to come up with some bullshit sob story at his trial about her passing away in her sleep from overdosing or from being too drunk that night after they went on their date, and then him just panicking over her death and dismembering her so that he wouldn't get in trouble.

Speaker 10 it kind of eliminates the idea of accidental death being a factor. And I know it sounds crazy and like nobody would ever believe that, but we have seen it happen before.

Speaker 10 It's almost like the go-to story when somebody's defense team knows that they're screwed regardless of the situation and they just want to aim for the least amount of jail time as possible.

Speaker 10 Because keep in mind, Sade was 19 years old. She wasn't of legal age to drink, despite, of course, being seen with Maxwell at two different bars on the night of her murder.

Speaker 10 So it could have easily been a a strategy of theirs to say, well, yeah, she was wasted. She's young.
She didn't know how to handle her alcohol. She died in her sleep.
She choked on it.

Speaker 10 She had alcohol poisoning. He panicked.
So then he didn't want to get in trouble since she was underage. So he dismembered her.
And like, so now that whole thing would go out the window.

Speaker 10 They would not be able to really have a leg to stand on with that argument.

Speaker 10 And I guess somebody could argue that maybe she wasn't drinking at all that night, that she was just sitting with him at these bars and wasn't participating in the drinking.

Speaker 10 But just this year, Sade's mom actually filed a lawsuit against both of the bars. The lawsuit was for negligence due to serving Sade and her being underage.

Speaker 10 More specifically, for never carding her in general, which was later seen on surveillance footage. They never checked her ID.

Speaker 10 So again, had all of that not been specified, maybe his team would have been able to create some sort of convincing enough argument that these murder charges would have been off the table.

Speaker 10 which, if that were the case, what kind of justice would that have left, right? And no murder case is easy. It's gruesome.
It's sad. And most of the time, it's completely unexplainable.

Speaker 10 But there's just something so raw when it comes to cases with dismemberment.

Speaker 10 It's like these killers wanted to make sure that their victims were left with no identity, almost like they never even existed.

Speaker 10 And my heart just breaks for Sade and her family because seeing videos of her family actively going through this pain and this trauma, it's almost unbearable.

Speaker 10 And during this whole process, Sade's mother, Sheena, has been very active in the media, seeking justice for her daughter, demanding action and justice.

Speaker 10 And some days, of course, as to be expected, do seem better than others.

Speaker 10 Now, at one point, Sheena and her attorney publicly begged, as well as drafted a letter to Maxwell's parents, trying to convince him to come forward and tell the truth.

Speaker 10 All Sheena said was that she wanted to know where the rest of her daughter was, where the rest of her baby was, so that she can be laid to rest and so she can be given as much dignity and respect as possible.

Speaker 10 The dignity and respect that their son refused to show her.

Speaker 9 We are at the point where we want to cut to the truth, cut to the heart of the matter.

Speaker 20 His family should have the ability to influence him. If they are in any way, shape, or form, decent human beings, they should take steps.
to convince him to tell the truth.

Speaker 10 Now, unsurprisingly, it was all for nothing. Maxwell pleaded not guilty since day one, and he has been less than forthcoming with information about Sade's case.

Speaker 10 And as for his family, they've just declined to make any comments in general.

Speaker 10 And it will never cease to amaze me how these people can just stand by family members who are being accused of the most heinous and vile violent crimes and just support them and stand by them and not help another grieving mother.

Speaker 10 It's just unspeakable. Now, the reason that this case has gotten so much traction again recently is because Maxwell's trial just began pretty recently.

Speaker 10 They started opening statements on May 28th, so literally not very long ago. And this trial is one that had a lot of people just waiting, just on bated breath, just looking for the next answer.

Speaker 10 And that was long before it even began. Sade's family believes with 100% certainty that Maxwell was the one who killed her.
And there's a lot of really great evidence to back up their beliefs too.

Speaker 10 However, they also believe that during this whole process, Maxwell, as well as some of his unspecified family members, have covered up or even gotten rid of as much evidence as possible.

Speaker 10 Sade's family even actually sued Maxwell, which this was a wrongful death lawsuit, and we've seen a lot of things like this before.

Speaker 10 But in this particular lawsuit, Sade's family claims that Sade was killed inside Maxwell's home.

Speaker 10 They also claim that Maxwell's family immediately got involved in the situation by going over to his home, throwing as much potential evidence away as possible, and then immediately jumping into selling his home after his arrest so that they could conceal and hide evidence.

Speaker 10 Obviously, some pretty big claims, right? Feels like almost like the laundry family and the Albert family had a baby from the Karen Reed case, right? It's like you're covering up for your kid.

Speaker 10 That's where you've got the laundry family. Check trying to help them evade.

Speaker 10 repercussions, check, quickly selling the house after the fact to try and conceal evidence, not the laundries, but the Alberts. Check.
I mean, I get it. Some big claims, but also some big red flags.

Speaker 10 And could there be any real validity to it? I mean, maybe Maxwell's home was put on the market after his arrest, and it was actually successfully sold for just under 200 grand back in May.

Speaker 10 Now, was this an attempt to conceal evidence? Or was it a desperate move so that he could pay legal expenses?

Speaker 10 Or does his family know that he is never coming back to this house, so they might as well sell it, put it in the estate, or do something with that? Who really knows, right?

Speaker 10 But as of when I'm recording this episode, that lawsuit is still ongoing. Now, all of that to say, Sade's family has been very concerned.

Speaker 10 Not that they had the wrong guy or they missed the guy who did this to their daughter, but rather that there might not have been enough evidence to convince a jury of his guilt.

Speaker 10 So like I said, his trial began not too long ago. I've been keeping an eye on things.

Speaker 10 I've been waiting to update all of you with everything that's been going down at trial, as well as the final verdict. And here we are.
Now let's start with the basics. His jury.

Speaker 10 Now, unlucky for him, Maxwell's jury was one that might have seen Sade's case in a much different light had they been made up of different genders. But unlucky for him, it was made up of mainly women.

Speaker 10 That was the majority of it, which I know, I know. As a juror, you're supposed to leave all bias out the door and at home.
But let's also be real for a second.

Speaker 10 Other women perceive these sorts of events differently. They see their own faces.
They see their daughter's faces. They see different people that they know and love in victims like Sade,

Speaker 10 especially when it is an overly barbaric crime like dismemberment.

Speaker 10 And one thing that stuck out to me in particular with the prosecution's opening statements was that they did not make any claim about why Maxwell murdered Sade that night.

Speaker 10 Of course, no reason would ever be excusable, but in a lot of cases, we at least see a guess as to a motive. And with this case, there was just nothing.

Speaker 10 I mean, typically, there's at least some sort of rough foundation foundation to it because that's what the prosecution will use to bolster their argument. It just creates context.

Speaker 10 And as humans, we like to know why people do the things we do. It helps convince us of them being guilty of doing it.
We want to know the motive behind it.

Speaker 14 In total, what the evidence in this case is going to show is that Maxwell murdered Sade Robinson the night of April 1st into April 2nd.

Speaker 14 He then brutally and callously cut her apart, disposed of her body parts,

Speaker 1 and burned her car.

Speaker 14 Maxwell Anderson was the last person to text with Sade Robinson. He was the last person to be in public with Shade Robinson.
He was the last person to have Sade Robinson's car.

Speaker 14 He was the last person to be with Sade Robinson. And the evidence will show that he is responsible for Sade's death.

Speaker 10 Now let's be real. We can all take guesses as to what his motive could have been.
Her murder did occur after a date. She was a young girl.
He He was an older guy. I mean, he was much older than her.

Speaker 10 She was 19 and he was what, 33. So, I mean, pretty significantly older.
So it's possible that maybe when they went back to Maxwell's house, he tried to come on to her and she said no.

Speaker 10 She turned him down. And maybe that angered him.
Maybe he snapped.

Speaker 10 Or conversely, maybe he was just a complete psychopath and he was looking to kill that night, looking to take someone on a date and then kill them after the fact. We don't know.

Speaker 10 And his team is obviously claiming that he didn't do it. So they wouldn't be the the ones about to give a motive.
And in fact, the defense's whole argument is that pretty much he had no motive.

Speaker 10 Therefore, because of that, he's innocent. Which I'll just be honest, I've definitely seen better arguments, but I also was not on the jury.
But take a listen.

Speaker 21 Max being the last person to go on a date with Sade.

Speaker 21 And that's frankly why law enforcement zeroed in on Max.

Speaker 21 You are going to hear that the amount of law enforcement resources that were spent on this case by the Sheriff's Department, the Milwaukee Police Department, the FBI, the amount of resources that were spent on this case, I think is probably unparalleled in Milwaukee history.

Speaker 21 The amount of money and time and effort that was put into collecting video evidence, to searching Maxwell's home, to examine, to interviewing coworkers, interviewing people that might know him, an immense investigation.

Speaker 21 And the state knows that there are serious holes in their case. They know it.
They know that there's reasonable doubt, and that's why they're coming at you with this phrase, like common sense.

Speaker 21 So let's talk about that.

Speaker 21 There is absolutely no reason for Max to commit a crime like this.

Speaker 21 What you're going to hear in this trial is that Max and Sade went, lined up a date together like any couple of youngsters do, and they lined up a date at Twisted Fishermen.

Speaker 21 This is a place that Max used to work. You'll hear that they went there, they had dinner, and it was an ordinary evening.

Speaker 21 From Twisted Fisherman, as the state just told you, they went to Duke's. This is another place where Max is known.

Speaker 21 There was no secret place that Max took Sade that night, nowhere that anybody wouldn't have known him or recognized him. These are former places he worked and coworkers that he interacted with.

Speaker 21 And what I didn't hear was the theory of

Speaker 21 why Max did this,

Speaker 21 how Max did this, but I think what I heard in opening just now is that Max must have done this at his home. That seems to be the theory.
Max brought Sade back to his home and killed her.

Speaker 10 Why?

Speaker 21 It's a normal date. You'll see them let camera footage leaving Duke's.
You'll see them, Sade driving back to his place. You'll see them going there.

Speaker 21 In this timeline you were just given, I don't know how many witnesses they're going to call throughout this trial to put in this video or that video, but one thing you'll see throughout this is that we don't dispute any of that timeline, that they went out together and went back to Max's house, but that doesn't mean he killed her.

Speaker 21 How did he do it and why did he do it? Why would he ever do something like that?

Speaker 10 So I guess my response to that is, does there always have to be a motive?

Speaker 10 And if we want to go even deeper than that, you could ask, does Maxwell's rougher background with convictions of domestic violence and disorderly conduct and drunk driving give us all the motive that we need to know?

Speaker 10 Does he just have a checkered past so it makes him capable of anything? I think you could argue both sides of that.

Speaker 10 I mean, not everybody has a great past, but that also doesn't mean that they are a murderer or that they would dismember somebody.

Speaker 10 And it might not be a definitive reason for why he did what he did that night, but his convictions and, you know, the domestic violence one at the very least do show that he's not totally incapable of violent things.

Speaker 10 I mean, at least in my opinion. So I don't know, just kind of thinking out loud.
So Maxwell's trial was very heavy on surveillance footage.

Speaker 10 And honestly, it was the main chunk of the evidence that the prosecution was able to even present against him. So, let's go over some of the clips that were shown during that first week of trial.

Speaker 10 The first few clips that were shown had been pieced together from multiple different surveillance cameras, and they were in the area of Sade's car being dropped off and then later burned.

Speaker 10 In one clip, you can see someone driving the car towards that alleyway behind that abandoned building. But whoever is driving that car is unidentifiable.

Speaker 10 It's, of course, course believed by the prosecution that it's Maxwell who is driving the car.

Speaker 10 The next clip shows those two women who I mentioned earlier, and you can tell by their mannerisms and their expressions that they had just seen the car being caught on fire, or rather being set on fire.

Speaker 10 Then you see someone, presumably a white man who is believed to be Maxwell, crossing the street and walking away from the scene, just trying to be very nonchalant, though these two women had already caught on to what was happening and they were still there within eyeshot.

Speaker 10 Also shown were pictures and videos of body cam footage of Sade's car, along with an explanation of how that fire was started.

Speaker 10 And I mentioned earlier how that fire completely totaled the car, just like burnt it to a crisp, right?

Speaker 10 And I think that until you get a good look at this footage and the photos, you might not quite realize just how badly the car was burnt.

Speaker 10 So I encourage you, if you're listening to the audio version of this, to go pop over to YouTube after this and take a look at this footage looking at the passenger compartment so the front seats the back seats

Speaker 18 we had

Speaker 18 heavy mass loss to contents as well as the seating both for the backrests and there's more survivability to the seat cushion but the backrests for the two front bucket seats and the backrests for the rear seat were were uniformly consumed and so it was

Speaker 18 very clear that the fire had originated inside the passenger compartment. All right, and for the record, while you were talking, I put up exhibit 62, which has already been admitted.

Speaker 18 That would be an image of the interior compartment, correct?

Speaker 18 Correct. What can you tell us about the windows?

Speaker 18 When I examined the windows, I had a lot of window remnants deep inside the window wells, indicative of the windows being at least partially open during the fire event. Let's talk about excavation.

Speaker 18 What happened? What did you notice through that?

Speaker 18 So, like I said before, when we determined origin, and that being the passenger compartment, we started excavating, looking for

Speaker 18 what are our fuel loads. The back seat, I remember seeing a fleece blanket, which I believe we see here in this photograph.
There were remnants of cardboard, remnants of paper material.

Speaker 18 I do recall, I believe, a purse in the back seat. There was also remnants of a BIC lighter, I recall seeing in the back seat.

Speaker 18 And as we excavated further now into the front of the passenger compartment,

Speaker 18 I reached the area of the floorboard on the front passenger side. So front passenger bucket seat right at foot level.

Speaker 18 During excavation, I located what appeared to be remnants of a stuffed animal, green in color, at least majority of it green that had survived.

Speaker 18 And as soon as I turned it over, I was overwhelmed by an odor consistent with the possible presence of a petroleum distillate. It smelled like

Speaker 18 sometimes we can't tell what it is, but it could be gasoline, it could be leader fluid, it could be any kind of petroleum distillate.

Speaker 18 But whatever this stuffed animal was appeared to have been saturated with it because it had weight to it, and it was an overwhelming odor that I experienced.

Speaker 10 Then more footage from week one showed different clips of Maxwell and Sade on their date. And it's not necessarily what is seen in this footage that's important.

Speaker 10 I mean, all in all, it kind of looks to be a pretty normal first date. They're just sitting at the bar area, they're talking to some of the workers, they're looking at the menu, no biggie.

Speaker 10 It was more so the date and time that was important because it showed that they were in fact out on a date and that Maxwell was in fact the last person to be seen with Shaw Day while she was still alive.

Speaker 10 Stuff that we of course already knew, but now it was concrete proof and it was important for the jury to see this.

Speaker 10 Now, one thing that was a huge point of contention between the prosecution and the defense during this entire trial has been that DNA evidence. So let's go over that a little bit.

Speaker 10 The things that were tested, what came back negative, what came back positive, all of it.

Speaker 10 I mentioned earlier how there had been some blood that was found in the bedroom and the bathroom at Maxwell's house. However, all of the testing came back and it did not match Sade's DNA.

Speaker 10 So it's kind of concerning where that blood came from. But regardless, it wasn't hers.

Speaker 10 Now, during one of the searches, investigators found multiple different items that could have been used as a weapon or even an item that could have been used to dismember a person.

Speaker 10 For example, there was an axe, there were 51 knives, a firearm, and also seven knife sharpeners.

Speaker 10 Each one of those was of course tested and the investigators really honed in on the knives in particular since it's believed that the murder weapon was probably some sort of knife.

Speaker 10 But the tests all came back and there was no blood or no traces of blood found on any of them.

Speaker 10 Then, when it comes to DNA evidence that was found outside of Maxwell's house, that also was kind of a bust.

Speaker 10 Because you see, just one week after Sade's leg was found at that beach, at that park, three bloody latex gloves were also found.

Speaker 8 Now, I have talked with you guys about Helix many, many times because I think I got my first Helix mattress, gosh, back in, I think 2020, maybe 2021.

Speaker 8 And I still live, I have not only this mattress in our bedroom that my husband and I share, I have it in our guest room. I'm so obsessed with it.

Speaker 8 I think I've told you too that my mom one time was babysitting the kids and spent the night and slept in our bed. And she was like, what's with your mattress? What is this? Why is it so comfortable?

Speaker 8 So I ended up getting her Helix as a gift as well. And it is the most comfortable mattress I've ever tried.
And I've tried them all. I've tried sleep number.
I've tried the box mattresses.

Speaker 8 I've tried, I don't think I can say the name, but I'll just say the friendly ghost, if you get what I'm saying. I've tried them all.
And Helix is the goat.

Speaker 8 Honestly, I'm telling you, like firsthand, it's been years now and I will never turn back.

Speaker 8 Now, what I love about Helix too is you take a quiz when you go on their site and it matches you to the exact mattress you need based on firmness and softness.

Speaker 8 I have the Helix Sunset Lux and it's perfect. It feels like a freaking moon cloud.
It's so soft. It's so fluffy.
It's so comfortable. I like love getting in my bed at the end of the day.

Speaker 8 And honestly, I love staying in my bed when I wake up because it's that comfortable. My sleep has improved.
I just feel so comfy. I've noticed my sleep stats and scores changing too.

Speaker 8 And like I said, anyone who has ever slept over, my sister, my mom, the friends who have just sat on my bed, they all love it. And I always tell them, it's Helix.
It's Helix.

Speaker 8 It is a freaking moon cloud.

Speaker 8 So I'm telling you guys, whether you have snoring issues, back pain, hip pain, trouble sleeping through the night, sleeping too hot, and whatever it is, you need to try Helix.

Speaker 8 Go to helixsleep.com slash serialously for 27% off site-wide. That's helixleep.com/slash serialistly for 27% off site-wide.
HelixSleep.com/slash serialistly.

Speaker 8 But this is an exclusive deal for only you listeners of Serialisly with Annie Elise. So, again, helixleep.com/slash serialistly for 27% off.

Speaker 10 So these bloody latex gloves were found, and this was an exciting find at first. Bloody gloves near where her remains were found? I mean, it had to be connected.

Speaker 10 And if they were lucky, Maxwell's fingerprints would be all over them. But the gloves were tested and they all came back negative all across the board.
No DNA from Sade.

Speaker 10 No DNA from Maxwell, and nothing found on either inside or outside of the gloves belonging to either one of them. Which, let me be really clear on something.

Speaker 10 I'm not bringing up the lack of DNA because I think that Maxwell is innocent. I believe that there is too much that is left unexplained if he is innocent of any of these wrongdoings.

Speaker 10 Not to mention, there's still plenty of other evidence, specifically the GPS locations that her phone went to that night, which happened to coincide with the same areas where her remains were later found.

Speaker 10 Also, the surveillance camera clips that the investigators were able to pull together. There's still a lot of evidence.

Speaker 10 And I 100% believe that with each pit stop that was made that night, it was to get rid of her remains, as well as get rid of any other damning evidence that was attached to him.

Speaker 10 The murder weapon, anything with her blood on it, his bloody clothing, all of it. And I only want to bring all of this up because it was all pretty concerning stuff during the trial.

Speaker 10 And we've talked about this extensively in the Karen Reed case, but the burden is on the prosecution. They have to prove to the jury beyond a reasonable doubt that Maxwell is guilty.

Speaker 10 And again, not that I think that he's innocent, but the fear was that would the evidence that was being presented be enough?

Speaker 10 If there's DNA that's found, but it doesn't match him, is that compelling or not? There were too many question marks and it made people very nervous.

Speaker 10 I also think that all of this ties back to that lawsuit that her mother, Sheena, filed against Maxwell's family.

Speaker 10 Could they have gone inside his house at some point and destroyed any evidence or cleaned up anything that was left behind? Possibly. And it's really 50-50, right? Maybe they did, maybe they didn't.

Speaker 10 But the issue still stood. Was it enough for a murder conviction? But then, just when people were concerned, bombshells dropped.

Speaker 10 Because as concerning as all of that was, there was DNA that was tied to Sade.

Speaker 10 Outside of Maxwell's house, in his neighbor's garbage can, the investigators had found a gray sweatshirt that belonged to Maxwell.

Speaker 10 And this sweatshirt was actually the same one that he was seen wearing in that surveillance video that morning that Sade disappeared.

Speaker 10 And not only is this a big deal because it shows that he was clearly trying to get rid of it in his neighbor's garbage can at that, which I know we're referencing a lot of cases here, but like feels very Brian Koberger-esque where he was disposing of stuff in his neighbor's trash cans in Pennsylvania, but even more so than just being a red flag.

Speaker 10 That sweatshirt had Sade's DNA on it. And on top of that, Sade's DNA was also found on a red plaid jacket that Maxwell had that was just lying there on his couch when the investigators found it.

Speaker 10 And perhaps the most convincing piece of evidence that the prosecution has used during this trial was witness testimony that came from an alleged friend of Maxwell's. Now, they haven't been named.

Speaker 10 They've stayed anonymous. They've only been referred to in court documents as a confidential informant.

Speaker 10 But this informant had originally met with the investigators in April of last year after some of Sade's remains had already been found.

Speaker 10 And what this person had to say, it really shocked the investigators.

Speaker 10 They claimed that Maxwell had told them in confidence that not only was he planning a murder, but he was planning to murder a specific woman that he had recently met.

Speaker 10 And this informant was pretty specific with the details that they gave. They claimed that it was March 5th, 2024, and that they were over at Maxwell's house.

Speaker 10 And at this point, he confided in them with all of this information. He told the informant that he had met Sade pretty recently.
And then from there, after meeting her, he just came up with this plan.

Speaker 10 And again, not to reference a case, feels very much like Aiden Fucci, right? Like with the Tristan Bailey case, he gave himself this deadline, told his friends that he was going to kill someone.

Speaker 10 He didn't name Tristan, but it's like he met her and then he just came up with this plan. Maxwell and Sade, not Tristan and Aiden.

Speaker 10 And there was no real reason as to why, just simply because he wanted to. The thrill of it all, a thrill kill.
And Maxwell apparently did not stop there.

Speaker 10 He also told this informant that he had the entire thing planned already. He would invite her over and he would keep inviting her over until she said yes.

Speaker 10 Then once she was at his house, he would pull out his gun and he would threaten her with that gun saying, you need to obey all of my commands. You need to walk down into my basement.

Speaker 10 And in his basement is where he would be prepared and keep all of his power tools and saws.

Speaker 10 Now, the scariest thing about this entire interaction was that Maxwell wasn't just explaining how he was going to do it, but he was showing him the equipment that he had already set up.

Speaker 10 There were allegedly already plastic tarps too covering the floor, covering nearly every square inch of the area, almost like his own Dexter den.

Speaker 10 It was covering the ceiling, the floor, the walls, even inside the sink that was down there, like a full-on torture chamber.

Speaker 10 And apparently, while the two of them were down in the basement, Maxwell was also explaining to this informant that once Sade was in the basement, he was going to shoot her, dismember her, and then dispose of her remains all throughout the city.

Speaker 10 Which I mean, how much more spot on could this story get, right? And the vivid mental image of what Sade's last moments likely were is unbelievably upsetting.

Speaker 10 The fear that she must have felt going into that basement and and then seeing those tarps laid out everywhere, knowing exactly what was about to happen, that's something that I cannot even begin to wrap my head around.

Speaker 10 Also, her poor parents having to hear all of this information and having it sink in that this is their baby that they were talking about.

Speaker 10 This is their baby who had to, you know, have this fear and walk into this murder den. It's unspeakable and it's not something that I would ever wish on anyone.

Speaker 10 My heart just has broken for them time and time again while researching this case and uncovering all of these details.

Speaker 10 So I really hope that they're taking care of themselves in the aftermath of all of this.

Speaker 10 Now, what is maybe the scariest part of all of this information is that the investigators do not believe that Sade was his first victim.

Speaker 10 And that kind of gives this perfectly good explanation as to why there was blood in his home, in his bedroom, in his bathroom that did not match back to Sade.

Speaker 10 Was he a serial killer? Did he have past victims?

Speaker 10 Now, the defense's only real argument against all of this information was that because the informant was confidential, they have more room to lie and exaggerate on things, which I'm not really sure how you could even exaggerate the things that they shared, but I don't know, whatever, I guess.

Speaker 10 So the state and the defense both rested their case on Thursday, June 5th. And by Friday, a verdict was reached.

Speaker 22 I will now read them into the record.

Speaker 22 As to count one, the verdict reads: We, the jury, find the defendant, Maxwell Anderson guilty of first-degree intentional homicide as charged in count one of the information. As to count two,

Speaker 22 we the jury find the defendant Maxwell Anderson guilty of mutilating a corpse as charged in count two of the information.

Speaker 22 As to count three, we the jury find the defendant Maxwell Anderson guilty of arson of property other than a building as charged in count three of the information. As to count four,

Speaker 22 we the jury find the defendant Maxwell Anderson guilty of hiding a corpse as charged in count four of the information.

Speaker 10 Guilty on all charges, and his sentencing is set for August.

Speaker 10 Immediately following the guilty verdict, Sade's mother, Shana, spoke, and I really wanted to include this for you because she mentions a lot of different things. Take a listen.

Speaker 16 She will be forever remembered as an angel,

Speaker 16 a light worker who's touched so many souls, so many lives in the Milwaukee community.

Speaker 16 She is our hero.

Speaker 16 She is forever leaving

Speaker 16 an imprint.

Speaker 16 She walked in her own path, her own light.

Speaker 16 She solved her own case.

Speaker 16 My baby solved her own case. That's how I raised my kids.
We don't give up. We are fighters.

Speaker 16 I demanded justice. I stand tall.
I stand affirmative.

Speaker 16 Shade will continue to walk with me daily and right beside me.

Speaker 16 Please continue to support us by

Speaker 16 walking in how you move every day. Like, live by your principles,

Speaker 16 live in your true spirit. That's how Sade is remembered from every job, from every stranger, from every person she touched.

Speaker 16 Her energy is just, it will be forever

Speaker 16 with us.

Speaker 16 Please continue to support the foundation, shade'svoicefoundation.com. Myself and Adriana and all of the Sade's Voice angels and

Speaker 16 light workers that have been standing beside me, the whole team. We will definitely be

Speaker 16 advocating for all of the other missing, murdered.

Speaker 16 all of the other individuals in the community.

Speaker 16 I appreciate everybody in the community that's been standing beside us by us. I know that there's a lot of other crime victim families in the community that have been outreaching me, and I have to,

Speaker 16 you know, I have to take it one step at a time. I have to get my babies justice first before I can be able to help maneuver and

Speaker 16 support any other crime victim families. But that's definitely going to be our mission.
That's how I'm going to carry on Sade's.

Speaker 16 You know, her voice,

Speaker 16 definitely.

Speaker 16 I'll be working with Representative Elis Dubbs. Thank you so much for being here.

Speaker 16 We're pushing for the Missing and Murder Task Force. It's mandatory.

Speaker 16 State definitely needs it for our BIPOC women, for all women.

Speaker 16 And just allow us time to just kind of

Speaker 16 grieve. I haven't really had a day to grieve since April of last year.
Me and Adriana have been non-stop all day, every day.

Speaker 16 we, my mom, my family, all of us, we, we don't give up.

Speaker 10 Like Sheena said, Sade's family can now grieve. They no longer have to worry about all of the what-ifs.
Is there enough evidence? Will the jury find this compelling?

Speaker 10 They can finally sleep at night knowing that their daughter's killer is behind bars and that he very likely will be behind bars until the day that he dies.

Speaker 10 Now, for more information on the foundation that was set up by Sheena and Sade's other family members, as well as the work that they are continuing to strive to do, you can head to Sade's VoiceFoundation.com.

Speaker 10 But I'm curious to know from you guys, what do you think the motive was? Do you think that this was truly just a budding serial killer and that this was a thrill kill? That it could have been anybody.

Speaker 10 He just, his method to lure his prey in was by taking them on a date and then back to his house. And then that's where he was going to do this.
Do you think that he has other victims?

Speaker 10 The blood in the bathroom and the bedroom didn't match Sade.

Speaker 10 It seemed like he was very prepared with his tarps and his basement. Are there more victims out there?

Speaker 10 And look, I know location-wise, it's not exactly spot-on, but we've been talking recently about the New England serial killer.

Speaker 10 And if there is a potential serial killer, and if not a serial killer, why are all these remains being found over there on the East Coast? Like, is there any correlation?

Speaker 10 I know it's more in the middle and not all the way on the East Coast, but I don't know. It makes you wonder.

Speaker 10 My personal opinion is I I don't think that this was his first victim, not only because of the blood, but also because of the precision of it all.

Speaker 10 Who sets up a torture chamber dungeon like Dexter on their first victim like that? Maybe, maybe, but something is telling me that maybe there was somebody else. But tell me what you guys think.

Speaker 10 I'm glad that Sade's family finally has some resolution in all of this and some answers so that they can begin to have peace.

Speaker 10 But as I said throughout the episode, too, all of Shade's remains still have not been found, her head being one of them.

Speaker 10 So will Maxwell now do the right thing and let her family know where the rest of her body is so they can grieve her properly and put her to rest? Maybe, probably not.

Speaker 10 He sounds like a piece of shit, if you ask me, but we can only hope. So thank you guys so much for tuning in today and listening to another episode.

Speaker 10 I know that this was a tough one, but so many of you have been requesting it. And I'm curious to know your thoughts on what you think the motive was here.

Speaker 10 All right, I'll be back with you with an all-new deep dive very, very soon.

Speaker 10 And I also, of course, will be with you on Thursday with Headline Highlights, where we talk about everything happening this week in True Crime.

Speaker 10 All right, thanks for tuning in, and until the next one, be nice, don't kill people, be careful on any first dates, and just be a good person. All right, bye.

Speaker 2 This is the story of the one. As a maintenance supervisor at a manufacturing facility, he knows keeping the line up and running is a top priority.
That's why he chooses Granger.

Speaker 2 Because when a drive belt gets damaged, Granger makes it easy to find the exact specs for the replacement product he needs.

Speaker 2 And next day delivery helps ensure he'll have everything in place and running like clockwork. Call 1-800-GRANGER, clickgranger.com, or just stop by.

Speaker 3 Granger for the ones who get it done.

Speaker 23 If you love to travel, Capital One has a rewards credit card that's perfect for you. With the Capital One Venture X card, you earn unlimited double miles on everything you buy.

Speaker 10 Plus, you get premium benefits at a collection of luxury hotels when you book on Capital One Travel.

Speaker 23 And with Venture X, you get access to over 1,000 airport lounges worldwide. Open up a world of travel possibilities with the Capital One Venture X card.

Speaker 5 What's in your wallet? Terms apply.

Speaker 8 Lounge access is subject to change.

Speaker 3 See CapitalOne.com for details.

Speaker 7 Big news: Wayfair's Black Friday sale is here. Right now, score up to 80% off everything home.

Speaker 10 These are our best deals of the year.

Speaker 9 Shop Wayfair's Black Friday sale now at Wayfair.com.

Speaker 9 Wayfair, Every Style, Every Home.