The Knife: Off Record – 102

This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
Hi, Pesha. Hey, Anna.
How's it going? It's good. I am excited to be here in studio.

Can you believe it?

I mean, I can hardly believe it. We're recording our very first episode of The Knife Off Record, which we also understand is technically there's a record of it because we are recording it.
All of it. It's all here for you to hear.
Keep a record of. Yeah.
we're calling this episode format of our show Off Record because we have our interview episodes where we speak with people who have lived through a crime. And many, many times we come across stories where something really interesting has happened, something we want to explore further, but nobody wants to talk with us about it.
And we still want to talk about it. So we find out everything we can, and we're here to bring you those stories.
Yeah. I actually just talked to someone yesterday, and I found the timing appropriate since I knew we were coming in to record today.
I was like, yes, I got a hold of him. I've been trying to call him.
We got to talk to this guy. He is intimately connected to the story that we're

researching. And this type of thing happens to us all the time where you get ahold of someone, they start talking to you and you're just like, oh yes, like everything you're saying is gold.
I'm so thrilled that you're talking to me. And then they get to the end and they're like, but I don't want to do an interview.
And also don't use my name. This is off the record.
This is off the record. And you're like, okay, how am I going to tell this story and also keep this person's trust? So that's something we're always looking to do.
Recently, I called someone about a story and it was a situation where the same thing, she answered my call. She was excited to hear from me, excited to tell me about what she had been through.
I asked her if she would schedule a recorded interview. She agreed.
And just before the call ended, she said, you know, actually, I had a question. I said, what is it? And she said, what is a podcast? And what a great question, a great question.
It did stump me for a moment. So at that point, I have to take a step back and say,

okay. What a great question.
A great question. It did stump me for a moment.
And so at that point, I have to take a step back and say, okay, this person may not totally understand what they're signing up for. And I need to make sure that they know that before they do the interview.
Yeah. Sometimes those conversations end up turning into an interview.
Sometimes they don't. They just end up as being informative background conversations for a story we are researching.
And then sometimes it means we can't turn the story into an interview episode. And that's okay too.
But you and I have been, and we'll get into our intros here in a second for people who don't know us, but we've been producing podcasts for a while together now. And one of the things that we've learned is that there are stories that you and I feel passionate about, we fall in love with, we think are important stories to tell that we,

for a variety of reasons, have not been able to tell on a podcast. So we are going to bring you, listeners, those stories as well on the Knife Off Record episodes.
And we're excited to be

able to tell you some stories that we find interesting and important. Right.
And really put you guys in the room with us during conversations we're having about these stories anyway. I mean, when we can't find the right person to interview for whatever reason about a story, it usually doesn't stop us from sitting on Zoom for an extra half hour being like, but guess what I learned? And that is why I'm so excited to be doing these episodes.
Me too. These are going to be conversational episodes along with bringing listeners a true crime story.
We are going to do a variety of things. We'll talk about conversations that you and I find important or intriguing as we produce a true crime podcast.
We'll sometimes answer listener questions, but it gives us an opportunity to invite listeners into the things that you and I talk about that we are fascinated by. This episode, this is our first The Knife Off Record episode.
We are going to answer a few questions from listeners, and then we're going to get into a story that Peisha is going to tell us about a missing persons case that you are going to want to stick around for.

Yeah, and that missing persons case and the research I did on that actually helped me get a job working with you, Hannah. So why don't you tell people a little bit about yourself? So I'm Hannah Smith, and I've been working in podcasting since 2017.
Like many, many people, listened to the first season of Serial when it came out and really was just blown away. I have always liked writing and storytelling.
And I remember just feeling so amazed that you could tell a story, a true story, a crime story in this format, in this way. And I just felt like, I want to try to tell stories like that.
I want to do something like that. So I started working in podcasting.
I worked on a bunch of different shows in different genres, editing, producing, writing. And then in 2020, I got a job lead producing, hosting, and writing a true crime podcast called The Opportunist.
We covered crimes of opportunity, mostly fraud as well as some cults.

And even though I was a true crime fan before that, it was my first time working on a true crime podcast, and I fell in love with true crime all over again from this different perspective of what it's like to be on the other side of it, to make a podcast like this. I found out that I love making this type of podcast.
I love researching stories. I love speaking and interviewing people who were

there, who lived it. I knew that this is what I wanted to do.
So I kept doing it. I did it for

three years and was thrilled to do it. And if you've never heard of the show, no worries.
You're

here now, and I'm so glad that you're here with us. If you did hear the show and were a fan, then I have to tell you that I was by no means the only person that made that show.
There were a lot of great people that made that happen. And one of those great people is sitting here with me today, Pesha Eaton.
So if you were a fan of the show, you should know her as well, because Pesha came and worked on the show from season two on. And we just immediately became friends and found out that we have a lot in common as far as the stories that we are interested in and the way that we want to tell them.
Long ago, we dreamed about doing a new show, a different show together. So I'll throw it over to you now, Pesha.
Tell us a little bit about yourself. So when I moved to Los Angeles, I wanted to work in scripted television, and I pursued that for a really long time.
And I ended up working at a production company, loved the people I worked with and the shows I was working on. But a lot of stars have to align for a TV show to get made.
And I was becoming sort of disenchanted by that. And the pandemic came along and I was one day away from flying to North Carolina for a pilot shoot.
Everything got shut down and I was just so disappointed. I was out on my deck listening to a podcast and I'm like, you know, I wonder if I could do this.
But I don't have any podcasting experience. I don't have any nonfiction storytelling experience.
I've only ever worked in scripted. So I was like, okay, how can I do this? I'm trapped in my apartment.
And I found a missing persons case in Tennessee. And I started researching it.
And as I was in the process of doing that, I applied to work with you on Opportunist, did not get the job, applied again. Well, it wasn't my fault that you didn't get the job.
I just want to say. It was someone else's.
But yeah, I was, okay, I'm going to just take this extra time to continue teaching myself how to do this kind of work. And that was the best thing that could have happened because I really fell in love with speaking with people that I would have otherwise never met and hearing their stories.
And, you know, it's amazing you think of it as this work you're doing, but it's actually incredible how many of them you end up keeping in touch with. And I also, as a true crime listener, started thinking, okay, these are the kinds of podcasts I like listening to, but why? One thing that I think you and I really connected on is that there's a wide spectrum in true crime storytelling, but why it's so meaningful to us is because at the end of the day, some of these stories are really fascinating, but why do we tell them? Well, I think that people want to know that what they went through mattered and it does matter and we can all learn from it.
And so I was just really enamored with that and by the ability to just make something from home. And that was really cool to me.
Especially probably coming from television, where there's so much that goes into making something. Yeah.
And, you know, we were able to make the show that we were working on remotely, and it was just about working really hard and trying really hard and getting better every day. And now we're here, and I just couldn't be more excited.
Yeah, me too. You're going to tell the story later about this case that you ended up doing a lot of research into and reporting on.
I'm really excited for that. Even though you should have gotten the job in the beginning, you know, it gave you time to look into this case.
It gave me time to look into the case and also really solidified that this was something I wanted to be doing. It wasn't just like a Hail Mary attempt to get a job when no one knew the future of television.
And now we're here. And I'm just so excited to be working together and at Exactly Right Media.
What a dream. What a dream.
Truly. Another thing we're excited about is hearing from you, the listener.
We would love to talk to you about past episodes and answer any questions you had about it or provide case updates if we have them. So you can write to us at thenife at exactlyrightmedia.com, and we can't wait to hear from you.
Since this is the first time we're doing this, we asked the producers and staff if they had any questions for us that would help you get to know us and learn about what we do. And I think we got some good ones.
They did have questions. The first question we're going to answer today has to do with last week's episode, our interview with Darune Henry.
The question is, how did you first come across Darune's story, and how did you go about reaching out to her? Peisha, do you want to take this one? Yeah, I actually saw Darune's story playing out in the media in real time shortly after she released the viral video. And the story just really stuck with me.
And as soon as we had a platform where I felt like we could bring her on to tell her story, I suggested that we reach out. I had just had a moment, take an Instagram off my phone and actually asked you to reach out.
And that's how we were connected to Darun. Yeah.
Always a good idea, you know, to take a break from social media. Don't we just need a break? Yes.
We take turns so that one of us can always reach out to sources. This is what friends are for.
That's right. And Darun was really gracious when he reached out and we are so glad that she came on the podcast.
Our next question is, what types of stories or motivations are you drawn to most? A crime of passion, random opportunistic crime, grade motivated crimes, or other? Great question. Great question.
I find myself drawn to stories that are less straightforward. word.
I'm less interested in like a crime of passion where someone like murdered someone else without forethought. I love to dig into a story where there are a lot of layers.
It's one of the reasons I love cult stories. I feel really passionate about telling cult stories.
I really love interviewing people who have been a part of a cult and left a cult. I just think that those stories are so complicated and there are so many layers.
There's so much psychology involved as well. You know, I find myself drawn to like really complex, difficult to understand crimes, really.
Like, why did someone do it? If the answer is not clear, then I'm like, okay, let's dig in and try to figure out why. Oftentimes, there's not like an easy answer, right? But I remember when we were on The Opportunist, we would try to find cases where the motivation was not always money, and it was so hard.
When you're just researching stories all the time and having to tell stories all the time, you start to see all these patterns. And it was also because we were making stories that were within a lens, right? There had to be crimes of opportunity.
There was a lot of fraud that we covered and cults and scams. And a lot of times people are motivated by money.
So we were always like looking for stories where the motivation was not money and was different or more unclear. And I think that with cult stories, money is oftentimes very much a factor, but there's also this factor of just like psychological control that sometimes people want to wield over other people.
So that's a long answer, but I am really interested in scams and cults particularly. What about you? Yeah, I think in researching, investigating the cults we looked into on Opportunists were fascinating.
I think the pattern in cults that intrigues me is this idea that you become someone you don't know. It's this like, you know, when someone commits a crime and you know that person, maybe you've now, they're a stranger to you.
But when you become the stranger to yourself, it's like, well, can I even trust my own brain? Yes. And that is a really wild thing for people to sort of unpack and pull themselves out of.
And it's also this slow burn kind of story where, you know, it doesn't start with like, hey, come join my cult. Yeah.
It never starts like that. Never.
Would not be good for that cult. And so that is, I think, something that really resonates with me is you never think it's going to be you.

And then it is.

And you don't even know it for a long time. is, I think, something that really resonates with me is you never think it's going to be you.

And then it is. And you don't even know it for a long time.
I'm also really interested in missing persons cases. I think what draws me into those is maybe a sense of possibility, but also like a hope that always you hope for the best, I think, in any case like that.
But this sort of how can we come together to maybe bring some answers or clarity here? I think whenever we can do good, we want to do that. And so those cases I do find really end up intriguing me.
I think that when you work in true crime, you know, you find yourself reading all of these really heavy headlines and it doesn't always make sense to tell a crime story. You know, it doesn't always make sense.
It's not just because someone will talk to us and tell it. Yeah, I totally agree.
You've really hit on something that we think about a lot when we're choosing a story. I think it's such a great point when it comes to missing persons cases because because there is that hope.
And as you'll talk about later too, just that like need for answers, that it's hard to not have those answers for loved ones who have someone go missing, right?

And then it makes me think of for stories that involve victims of cults or like a romance scam

or something like that. I always find great value in speaking to someone and letting them tell their

to be a or whatever, and it's just that's not been the case from what I've found talking with so many people. So I like the chance to try to communicate that to listeners and understand the complexities of these type of situations and how it could happen to anyone.
And that feels meaningful to me. Yeah, absolutely.
Okay, the next question. True crime often remains open-ended with cases unresolved or unsolved.
Do you like that aspect of it or is it frustrating? Anytime a victim or their family wants the case solved and it's not, it's frustrating. It's hard to talk to them.
And, you know, the reality is that in a lot of cases, as time goes on, resources are allocated to something that is more maybe current or solvable. You know, I find it frustrating on their behalf whenever that happens.
I know law enforcement also finds it frustrating. You know, they might not have the manpower or the resources to put as much into an unsolved case as they would like.
It's also really exciting to see the developments in technology and how that's been able to bring resolution to cold cases. And, you know, that's something that I think has been interesting to watch play out, people being convicted of crimes decades earlier and families finally getting that resolution.
Yeah, especially with, well, obviously DNA developments and then the DNA testing, and you hear about like crimes being solved because of that.

Genetic genealogy.

I mean, I guess from the standpoint of a producer, the unsolved, unresolved cases, you know,

I think everyone wants to play a part in helping solve something.

But ultimately, those stories can be harder to

tell because how do you end a story that doesn't have resolution? Yeah, but we can go back to serial season one. Everyone discovered the difficulty of it listening.
Oh, wow, there's no easy way to wrap up this true story of someone in prison. Yeah.
Okay, so last listener question for today is actually one I love talking about, which is, how do you get people to agree to speak with you? Yeah, this is a huge part of the job. How do you get someone to agree to speak with you? I think it's really tricky.
We do a lot of cold calling. You know, there's so many times where I will call someone on the phone who I don't know, who I've never spoken with before, and talk with them about the project that I'm doing and what my approach is and try to build that trust with them so that they will feel comfortable enough to give me their time and energy and talk to me about an experience they had that was probably a really bad experience.
So even them revisiting that and telling me that takes a lot of trust. So I think ultimately it's building trust and being authentic.
It does. And a lot of times when you first call someone, their question is, how did you get this number? Totally.
And then you have to tell them, well, I was just, you know, lurking around the internet. And I actually found a bunch of stuff in addition to that.
But yeah, I did just call your cell phone. And I try to sometimes send a text like, hey, this is who I am.
I'm going to give you a call. Would love to speak with you.
Oh, you do? Sometimes. I never do that.
If I feel like they might be unsettled by an unknown number and someone asking about it, sometimes I'll do that. Not always, but it depends.
If I know that someone has given a statement to a local newspaper already about what happened to them, it gives us a sense of, okay, they might be open to hearing from me. Or it's someone whose name has maybe never been published and you don't know how they're going to respond to being contacted.
I think it also plays into it how much time has passed since whatever the incident was. If it's been, you know, a year or 10 years, I think if it's something that is more recent, they might be more expecting your call.
If it's not, they might be put off by it at first. And, you know, talking about ethical storytelling and sort of what we look for when we're sourcing new stories is this why, why are we going to tell this story? And I think it's really important on that first phone call that you're able to answer that question.
Absolutely. Yeah.
Yeah. Because, you know, understandably, why would someone talk to us and retell us this traumatic story just because? And I think it's also just a good measure, a guidepost for yourself as you're looking into stories.
If you can't answer that question, maybe don't make that phone call. Yeah, that's a really good guidepost.
Because you need a compelling why for someone to care to talk to you. Because a lot of people have said, this comes at a cost for me.
I'm going to have to revisit something that was horrible. So I need to know that there's a reason I'm doing it, which is totally fair.
And oftentimes, you know, in these stories, everyone's not on the same page about how things happened. And, you know, was someone's sentence fair? Were they guilty at all? Did you play a role in it that you're not disclosing in your interview? These are things people are concerned with when they're going to be recorded.
And I get that. I've interviewed someone in the past who I thought was a victim.
And then over the course of speaking with him multiple times, it sort of became, I started to question, like, I don't think what you're telling me is true. I have court documents and, you know, I have all this research that shows what happened and it doesn't line up with what you're saying.
And now I'm wondering if you were like part of the crime in some way. So it can get a little bit tricky.
And when you call someone out of the blue, Peisha, if you have like 15 seconds before they hang up on you and think you're like a spam caller, what words are you trying to get out quickly? I usually see something along the lines of like, if I'm calling you, I'm going to say, hi, is this Hannah? My name is Peisha Eaton. I'm a producer based in Los Angeles, and I'm calling to ask you about whatever, just so that, you know, they immediately know who I'm calling for because you don't always have the right number.
And I've said my name and then I just sort of wait. And then probably they say, what is your name? Exactly.
Yeah. I get that all the time, which I get it.
Patia. Patia.
Yeah. That is my quick spiel.
And then, you know, a surprising amount of people do take that call, whether they agree to interview or not. Occasionally you get hung up on and that's just part of the job.
And when people do that, we don't call them back. We just leave them alone.
But yeah, it also varies a lot. Are you calling a victim? Are you calling law enforcement? Are you calling the perpetrator of the crime? Because those are people that we have a duty to call whether or not we think the interview is relevant to the story.
You know, a lot of times when we're calling the person who has been convicted of a crime, we know they're not going to call us up and sort of dive into their own psyche. We know they're going to say, it didn't happen like that.
You had something wrong. That's generally the case.
But you have a duty to make those phone calls anyway, if you're going to talk about a crime that's been committed. So it also depends who you're calling.
And generally, those people are less interested in speaking with you. Okay, let's move on to Producers Cut, which is a segment where we let you peek behind the curtain of what it is like for us as producers on a true crime podcast and kind of give you an insider look to the conversations that we have with each other.
You know, Peisha, the last question that we took from listeners about cold calling, it's really interesting because I think it leads right into the case that you first investigated before you had ever made a podcast or were a producer on a podcast or anything. You just took it upon yourself to investigate a case, which I think is a really interesting case.
How did you find out about it? Yeah. So this is all happening back in 2020 during the pandemic.
I'm deciding I'm really interested in working on a podcast. And so I have no podcasting experience at that point.
And after not getting the associate producer role on the Apportunis that first time around. Tragic.
Yeah, tragic. I decided I should try to make one.
And I had a lot of time at that point. My job was not taking up very much of it.
And I started looking into a missing persons case in Sparta, Tennessee. And I started doing that in August of 2020.
So I didn't exactly know where to start. I thought maybe I would look on Reddit and see if there was anything locals were saying about the case.
And I really didn't find anything except for one person on the Sparta, Tennessee Reddit had maybe commented on a true crime Reddit post about it saying, yeah, I'm from there. This happened.
We don't know where they are. I wasn't like they didn't have any sort of like explosive information, but I reached out to that person and he didn't want me to use his name.
So I'm not going to use it now, but he grew up in that town and was the same age as the kids who went missing. And those kids who went missing were Aaron Foster, female age 18, and Jeremy Bechtel, male age 17.
And they went missing on April 3rd of 2000. Tell us a little bit about the case what you knew at that time I guess.
Was that basically all that you knew? Yeah so all that had been written about the case at that point was that Aaron Foster and Jeremy Bechtel had gone missing and what was generally known about the case was that they had been last seen at a party and they had left that party in Aaron's car together. And that would be around 10 p.m.
that night. So initially, this is all I knew about the case.
And the party had taken place at a person named Bubba Cole's house. Bubba's actual name is Brian Cole.
He's actually since passed away, passed away in 2014. So I was never able to speak with Bubba.
But Bubba's house was a location that was known to local law enforcement as a place where people, you know, there was partying, there was alcohol and some drug use. And that's pretty much what was out there is that they had left this party and never been seen again.
And so the speculation in the beginning was really at this party. Well, what happened at the party? That's kind of where I started.
I tried to figure out who was there. And I started actually by calling Jeremy's parents.
Now, I learned that over the course of looking for his parents, His mother, Rhonda, had passed away. She passed away from a battle with cancer in 2018.
So I reached out to Jeremy's father, Ronnie Bechdel. And Ronnie took my call and I just said, hey, you know, this is my name and I'm working on a story about this.
Sometimes I didn't even say podcast. I would say like, I'm not sure what I want this to be.
I think I want it to be a podcast, but I'm just interested in learning more about this case and seeing if there's anything we can find out. It's been a lot of years at this point, they had been missing 20 years.
So Ronnie, you know, he's the nicest person and he was like, yeah, what do you want to know? And he told me that he was like, well, I actually spoke with Jeremy while he was at the party. I spoke to him an hour before he left the party.
And he said, can you pick me up from school tomorrow? And I said, sure. So I learned Jeremy was getting SGED, which, you know, I'm not in a professional investigator, but it tells me he had some sort of plan for the future.
You know, he was planning to attend classes that next day, coordinating a ride home with his dad. And Ronnie said when he went the next day, Jeremy didn't show up.
And he said that was unusual. So, okay, we know that's out of character for Jeremy.
And I started with that. And I was like, okay, so they had plans the next day.
They probably didn't just run off somewhere. But as I continued making calls, that theory kept presenting itself that Aaron and Jeremy had run off.
The idea was that they were in Florida, in Pensacola, Florida. It was a place that maybe one of them had a family member and they were always really, you know, intrigued by the idea of going there.

Did Jeremy's dad, Ronnie, think that that was a possibility as well? Did he mention that or no? Yeah, we talked about it. He said no.
He said it would be very unlike Jeremy to be gone this long. I mean, at this point, 20 years, right? He didn't say, I think, that Jeremy's passed away, but he, you know, optimism had faded over the years, two decades.
And he was just so kind and willing to share with me who, you know, I'd never met him. And it really kind of motivated me to continue on with this project.
And so I continued calling people. I was like, can you tell me the names of any of his friends? And he could.
And so I started off that list and I called a woman named Rosa, who at the time was actually living in Southern California. And so I live in Los Angeles and I drove out to see her and we had lunch and Rosa had told me, yes, they had gone to this party and were never seen again.
And she was not at the party, but she was supposed to be there. And so she had all of this survivor's guilt.
Rosa is just like, she's a person you want as your friend. And I mean, she's bubbly, she's kind, she's warm, she's smart, she's funny.
And she was so close with Aaron Foster and carrying this with her all of these years. And, you know, I had listened to a lot of true crime podcasts.
I'd read a lot of true crime stories. But speaking to Rosa really showed me how long someone carries this.
You know, it doesn't go away. You don't stop wondering.
And she also was just so welcoming that I was like, okay, I'm going to continue making these phone calls. Did she tell you anything about Erin in that meeting? Like her relationship with Erin? Like who is Erin Foster? She said Erin was so much fun.
Just the nicest person. She said that she wasn't sure if Erin and Jeremy were dating at the time.
They were very close friends, but exactly what their relationship was was sort of unknown at the time. And so Rosa told me that they had all talked about running away to Florida.
That was something they talked about all the time. Including Rosa.
Including Rosa. So the three of them.
Wow. Yeah.
And so I'm like, okay, that is something to think about. So these kids have actually talked about this a lot, this idea of running away.
She said, you know, I really did think that they were in Florida for a long time, but I also couldn't imagine Aaron leaving without me. That didn't seem like something Aaron would do, but we had been talking about it.
We had talked about it really recently before they disappeared. So I just sort of assumed that that's what happened.
It's just such an interesting thing to talk about with your friends. And I'm curious if that speaks to something about living in Sparta, Tennessee as a teenager.
Did you get any clarity of like, why were they all wanting to leave and go to Florida? What was that fantasy or dream about? Yeah, I think it was youth. And you're naive at that age, I think, about a lot of things.
But Sparta is a beautiful place and it's a small town and almost all of the people I met there were so warm and welcoming. It's not as if like, who could live in Sparta? It's more just that, you know, if you're a high school kid or high school aged, you've been born and raised in this small town with the same people.

You have this curiosity about other places.

And I think that this rumor that they had run off to Florida was pretty widely accepted by their peers in the beginning because you're almost rooting for them.

You're like, oh, they went, they left.

They did something different.

That's so awesome.

They're on an adventure.

Something that stuck out to me about this is that when Aaron and Jeremy went missing, so they're last seen April 3rd, there's not this sort of April 4th, April 5th call to action in the community. There's not this moment of Aaron and Jeremy are missing.
We need to find them. It was a much slower process than that.
They were sort of accepted to maybe have run away, but then the parents' concern was pretty evident. And then they're sort of calling friends and trying to see what's happening.
But there was not this like immediate sense of, okay, we need to have people working on this case. And so that was a really hard thing for me to understand looking back.
But after having worked on the case, you realize, you know, this is a small town. They don't have a ton of resources to be working with.
And it was at a time before people having cell phones. You know, in Sparta, they talked about some of the kids had pagers.
Wow. In 2000.
In 2000. And the police department, the sheriff's office at that point, I believe, had one computer.
Wow. Yeah.
So it wasn't like they were not working on it. I think it was just a very different time in sort of the expectation of what happens when a kid doesn't come home from a party.
There's also, if these are kids who maybe have done that once before, Erin had run away before for, I don't even know how long it lasted. I think she drove to Nashville or something.
I don't quite remember, but you kind of accepted in the beginning. And so Rosa remembers getting a call from Aaron's mother saying, have you seen her? And she doesn't remember when that was.
She thinks it was within maybe a week of Aaron and Jeremy going missing. and she said when she got that call was the first time she thought maybe something is wrong.
And I think that really points sort of to where things start to go south in this investigation. And it's not one person's fault.
I think it was many factors. But Rosa says, no, she hasn't seen Aaron.
She hasn't seen her since I think it was the day before the party because Rosa didn't go to the party. But, you know, we know that that they were there because Ronnie Bechtel, Jeremy's dad, spoke with him.
At the party. He was at the party.
Did he know that he was with Aaron? He knew he was with Aaron. Okay.
And so I ended up speaking with an investigator by the name of Chris Isom,

who had moved on from the sheriff's office,

but told me what he could tell me about the case.

And I eventually learned another few names of people who were at the party. And one of those names was Becky.
Becky did not agree to a recorded conversation, but she did agree to speak with me. And she said, yeah, they were there.
And you're going to hear a lot about Bubba Cole's house and how it was this place where people were drinking and using drugs. But actually, we were just hanging out.
Maybe there was some alcohol. Shouldn't have been doing that and driving for sure.
But this was not this sort of like dark, maybe shady scene that I had been hearing about. It was just a place people were hanging out and, you know, being teenagers.
And so she said, yeah, they did. They left around 10 and we didn't see him again.
And so I'm like, okay, so I know they left at 10, but I know they were there at nine. And I said, where were they going? And she didn't really know.
She thought maybe they were going to pick up Aaron's brother in town somewhere. So Aaron had a little brother, has a little brother.
And I had called Aaron's family members over the course of this process and they were unwilling to speak with me. And that's okay.
I totally get it. It goes back to that moment of, yeah, this is like what could be more painful than not knowing where your daughter is.
And you don't know me and I have no prior work to show for myself. So I, of course, accepted that.
But something that I found really tricky to sort of work through during this project was that Rhonda Bechtel was her married name. Rhonda Ledbetter once she and Ronnie divorced, so Jeremy's mother.
She was frequently pressing law enforcement for answers, frequently reaching out to Aaron's family to sort of join forces.

And her perception, based off of what her friends and family told me, was that Erin's family was not operating the same way. They really didn't want to talk to her about it.
And I don't know why that is to this day because they didn't speak with me. And again, I just, that's what I was told from those who were really close to Rhonda.
But Rhonda never believed Jeremy ran away. Rhonda always believed something happened.
Gotcha. And was there some kind of suspicion put on perhaps Aaron's parents because of this? Like unwillingness to discuss it or talk or collaborate? Yeah, I wouldn't call it suspicion.
I think it was more of just a, you know, it's an intimidating thing to ask someone about something that's so painful when they don't want to talk about it. And, you know, they certainly spoke with law enforcement about it.
It's not like they were uncooperative in those terms, but their response was very different than Jeremy's family when I called them. Got it.
And I get it. But it was hard.
They were people who I really wanted to speak with and couldn't. And so it took many, many months.
And eventually Aaron's brother and I exchanged a few text messages. And he told me in those text messages, he said around 10 o'clock, Aaron came and picked me up from the pool hall in town and took me home.
And Jeremy was in the car with her. I'm like, okay.
So they left the party. They went to the pool hall.
Then they go to Aaron's house. And this was the first I had ever placed them anywhere outside of Bubba's house after 10 p.m.
Now, mind you, at this point, I hadn't seen the police report. And I had spoken with numerous members of law enforcement about it.
And one of them went to Florida literally looking for them twice. Wow.
They fully were exploring that theory. So, yeah, that was kind of where their head was at.
So you hadn't seen the police report at this time. But if I'm remembering what you said, this is different from like the information that was in the news article that you had read because that information had said they were last seen at the party, right? Right.
And so they were not last seen at the party. At that point, I know they're last seen at Aaron's house.
Okay. They're last seen at Aaron's house by her little brother who she's dropping off there.
And Jeremy's in the car with her. So I asked him, I said, did they go inside? You know, did they turn around and leave? He's like, I don't know.
I got out of the car and I went inside. And that was what I knew.
So Becky, who had been at the party, had told me their plan was to come back. Their plan was to come back to the party.
So then I'm sitting there thinking, well, maybe they were last seen at the party because maybe they went back and left again. And I'm trying to piece that together.
And it's so many years ago and people just really didn't know, did I watch them leave the first time or was I watching them leave a second time? But the person who did know at 10 p.m. they were at his parents' house was her brother.
And so it just kind of started back from that point. And the Florida theory to me, it felt very unlikely.
I'm not a professional investigator by any means, but it's hard to leave with no money. And Jeremy had a paycheck waiting for him at Burger King, where he was working at the time.
His parents both agreed it would be very unlikely for him to not pick up his paycheck.

So if they're not in Florida and they were last seen at Aaron's house,

did something happen at Aaron's house?

What's going on?

I actually went to Sparta. I flew there in October of 2020.

And I met up with the guy that I met on Reddit, who's just the nicest person I know.

I flew to a small town in Tennessee to meet up with someone who I met on Reddit. Okay, great.
He was the nicest person ever, drove me all around. And I asked him, I said, can you take me from Bubba Cole's house to Aaron's house? Where the party was back to Aaron's house where they were last seen.
Yes. And we did.
And he's like, I think these are the roads you would take if you lived here. And they're back roads.
How far was it? It was miles. It was like a, I think a 20 minute drive.
I don't remember exactly. It's not like it was three houses down or something.
No. Okay.
No. And, you know, it's dark.
Sparta is not a big city. There's not as much light pollution.
So it's pitch black at the time we're driving. And this sort of eerie moment happens where I'm in the car with him and a buck comes right on into the road and he comes to the screeching halt.
And I mean, I swear to you, this is the strangest thing. But at that point, because his headlights were on this buck that was looking right at us just for a split second, I noticed the water and we're right by the Calf Killer River.
So the road is running alongside the Calf Killer River. And I'm like, oh, the Calf Killer River, like he's telling me about it.
And I recalled a moment that law enforcement told me they searched the river. They said, you know, we drugged that river from end to end.
And I'm not discounting it, but I'm like, wow, this is a really dark road and it's winding and if they were drinking, I don't know. But the law enforcement said that they looked in the river, right? They told me they looked in the river.
Okay. And this is where things get murky is that the case was handed off to different investigators at different times.
They had maybe a different process for record keeping than they would today. Limited ability to use a computer, handwriting things.
It's not as easy to transfer information from one place to another. So I don't know if maybe someone talked about looking in the river and didn't, or if they did and didn't find anything.
But what ends up happening is I go back to law enforcement after all of my research, because I want them to go on the record and talk to me. So I'm like, well, here's what I found.
And I said, I don't think they were last seen at the party. I think they were last seen at Aaron's house.
At this point, I'm working on the opportunist. I'm very busy.
And I'm trying really hard to make the most of that job. And I'm dedicating way less to this project.
But I'm still keeping tabs on it. And all of a sudden, I get a call from that first guy I met on Reddit.
And he's like, you'll never believe it. They're pulling up a car from the Calfkiller River.
And it's a 1998 Pontiac Grand Am, which is the car Aaron was driving. Wow.
And I'm like, oh my gosh. And so I called the sheriff and he's like, yeah, I'm here right now.
They're pulling up the car. We haven't looked inside, but they are pulling up the car.
And they were always very sort of kept me at arm's length. They never told me anything they shouldn't have told me.
They were careful about that. But he did tell me, He knew how hard I had been working on it.
Yeah, so Erin and Jeremy's remains were found in the car. The sort of suspected what happened in the case is that she probably lost control of the vehicle while driving.
And there were no guardrails at that time in certain areas. And the car went into the water.
Wow. So they found the remains and it was basically no foul play.
No foul play suspected. The headlights were on.
The key was in the ignition. I believe the radio was on.
I think the windows were, I don't remember if the windows were up or down, but nothing led them to anything other than this was just an accident. So as of 2022, the last thing I've seen published about it, and I think still to this day, it's an unsolved case, but there's no foul play suspected.
Okay. Wow.
And what was people's reactions that you had talked to and looked into this, and how did they feel about having this finally answered? Well, people were really confused about my role in the carving found, which is really limited actually. You know, I placed Erin and Jeremy at her parents' house, but that actually had turned out to be something that was in the police report the whole time.
So I wasn't the only person to know that. I think it was sort of this game of telephone of they were last seen leaving the party, but they had said they would come back to the party.
Did they go back to the party and leave again? You know, it's confusing. And I think law enforcement did the best they could.
And I have to give them credit because they were much more interested in finding Aaron and Jeremy than they were any perception of like them having ever missed something. They didn't care about that.
They wanted them to be found. And that's not always the case when you're reaching out to law enforcement.
They were so kind to me and were so professional and answered all of my questions. So I did not find Aaron and Jeremy by any means.
The person who found them is actually a YouTuber and he has a channel called Exploring with Nug. And he is a diver who looks for people who are missing in cars near bodies of water.
So he found the case on his own. He contacted the sheriff's office and the sheriff's office then said, actually, maybe look closer to Aaron's house in the Calf Killer River.
Wow. Okay.
So that's just what he does is he dives into bodies of water looking for cars and missing people or people that might be... Yeah.
There's a whole host of people doing this now on YouTube and finding people who have been missing for decades. Wow.
Because there's just no trace of them. My gosh.
Yeah. And so he went out to Sparta and he took his boat into the river and used sonar and then dove down and matched the license plate to Aaron's car.
And it looks like it's parked at the bottom of the river, which we can watch the video. Yeah.
How I found out is when they were pulling the car up, people were calling me because they thought I had something to do with that, which I didn't. And then it was so strange to watch this case that no one had heard of or been working on in the media, at least in the New York Times the next day or the next few days.
It happened so quickly. And then it was this like, it was international news.
Probably more national news, but it was published everywhere. And it was just amazing to see.
So their remains were found and they were buried, I think, in 2022. It's a tragedy.
It's a huge loss. And Rhonda, Jeremy's mother, she didn't get any answers before she passed.
We'll put a link to that video of them pulling up the car in the show notes. I never had any contact with this person who operates this YouTube channel.
He did this all on his own. But I'm just amazed and grateful he was able to find them.
Yeah, seriously. I'm so glad that it was answered for the people who had been wondering what happened to them for 20 years.
That's such a long time. Yeah.
By the time they were discovered, it was almost 21 years. And, you know, I met so many great people in Sparta.
I met this guy, Jordan, and this other guy, Chet, who were so close with Jeremy. Jeremy was an aspiring rapper.
They had this music group. I think it was called the Little Town Lokstas.
I'm not really, I don't exactly remember, but just the most like kind people. And I went out to Jordan's house and it was this really kind of somber moment because he had built this like beautiful picturesque white country farmhouse on this stunning piece of land in Sparta.
His daughter's there, his dogs, his wife, you know, he's a grown man at this point. And we're talking about Jeremy, who was 17.
And it's just sort of in everyone's memory, just always 17. And I think it hit me in that moment how much time had passed.
And it just solidified my interest in doing this kind of work because even though I didn't solve the case, someone feeling heard goes a long way. Ining.
I think it's really helpful. I think you get more authentic storytelling and it also just really connects you to people.
And these people's friend had been missing over 20 years. And I think it mattered to them that someone cared to look into it.
Absolutely. And it's also, I think with like missing persons cases and unsolved cases, sometimes just having attention back on it.
You never know what piece led to what piece. You reminding law enforcement, again, I really think that they were last seen at Aaron's parents' house, you know, could have, you know, been fresh in his mind when this other guy calls.
Like, it's just, I think people, I mean, not everybody, of course, but I know that there's people that really appreciate having that attention on a case because they're looking for answers. And it's great when they can actually get them.
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I spoke with Sheriff Steve Page in Sparta, and he was like, just so kind and wanting anyone who was interested to look into it.
He was obviously not the sheriff when this all took place and, you know, really understood the challenges that his department was facing back then. And just like he took my call, he took this YouTuber's call and accepted help and they were found.
And that's awesome. Yeah.
I'm so glad that you were able to tell us about this on this podcast because you had worked on this for so long and it had been a case that was so close to you and important to you. You know, it was solved and you had moved on with your life and didn't end up putting any episodes out about it.
But you've heard some of them. I have, and they're really good.
Thank you. Yeah, so I'm glad that you were able to talk about it on the show.
Yeah, it was an incredible learning experience for me, and ultimately, I think it made me a better producer. We're going to wrap up today's episode by telling you what we're listening to or reading right now.

It could be a book, a podcast, or a show, just something that has captured our attention. Great.
So the thing that I want to talk about is this book that I actually read last year. I think it came out in 2024.
I actually listened to it. It's a good book to listen to.
And it's called Sociopath, a Memoir by Patrick Gagney. I think that's how you say her name.
And it was an easy listen, super fascinating, easy to get through. I have thought about this book so many times since I read it.
I love to read, but a lot of times times I read a book, I'll think about it a little bit. This book I've thought about so often.
And part of it is the work that we do in true crime, but I cannot recommend it enough. It is written by a sociopath.
So Patrick, she's a clinical psychologist with a PhD and also a diagnosed sociopath.

The memoir is just her life story.

It helped me understand sociopaths or what it would mean to be a sociopath so much more.

I still don't understand it.

It's very difficult to really understand what that would be like because it's such a different experience than what I experience.

But sociopath is a word that's thrown around so often, right, in true crime. So-and-so is a sociopath.
So-and-so is a sociopath. We've had conversations around this of like, how do we use this word? Maybe let's not try to use it unless someone has actually been diagnosed, because we actually don't know if they are or they aren't.
I want there to be so much more research done about sociopaths, and I suspect there will be, but there really hasn't been a ton. So Patrick talks in this book about her upbringing.
She grew up in a loving, healthy family who was well-resourced. She was, you know, went to really good schools, did really well in schools, really smart, and had parents who, like, listened to her and really tried to help her.
Like, she had a really good upbringing. You know, I think sometimes there's misconceptions of someone's a sociopath because they had this horrible thing happen to them or whatnot.
Like it's this result of trauma. Right.
And her whole sort of, the thing that she poses in the book is that it's not. It is more like a neurodivergency.
And she walks through being a young kid and watching her mom try to teach her and her sister life lessons and teach them empathy. And she remembers from a young age feeling like she really did not get it.
She didn't understand. She could observe people around her understanding this.
And from a young age was very clear that she was different. And so started to feel really isolated and like no one understood her.
And when she was honest about her, you know, feelings or thoughts, she often got the response from her parent, teacher, classmates, that there was something wrong with the way that she was thinking and feeling and interacting with the world. So she talks about that feeling of being perceived as problematic, even from a very young age, sort of played with and intensified some of the behavioral problems that she then went on to display for much of her life.
I mean, she talks about wanting to cause other people pain as a release from these feelings that she's having or lack of feelings or like distance. It's interesting though, like this desire to sort of cause someone pain if you can't feel for them.
I know. It's so hard to wrap my mind around, which is why I love this book because some of the concepts, they're so abstract.
Okay, sociopaths don't feel empathy. They don't feel learned emotions.
A lot of our emotions are learned emotions like empathy. She still feels happy, sad, you know, emotions that you're born with.
But like, what does that actually look like in a life? How does that play out? And so she, through the book, takes the reader on a journey where she's talking about this struggle, where she wants to be a good person. She wants to be a contributing member of society.
She wants to get married and have children and all of these things. But it's so difficult for her because she sees the world and experiences the world so completely differently from the people around her.
I think it's such a fascinating read. Since I've read it, I think about it so often when consuming other true crime podcasts or books or documentaries.
I'm always like, is that person a sociopath? And then it kind of, it gives you this different lens. It doesn't justify anything that someone is doing, especially when they're committing crimes or hurting other people.
But I'll wrap it up by saying, you know, Patrick says in the book that she wrote this book for other sociopaths because from her perspective, and she became a PhD and studied this because she was looking for answers to understand herself, and there were none. The answer was like, well, sociopaths should be in prison.
And she's like, so that's the only option for my life? I don't believe that. And so she wrote this sort of like for other sociopaths to offer them ideas about how you could exist in a different kind of way.
And if you think about it, if we all thought about it or approached it as this is a neurodivergency, how would we as a society try to help integrate those people into society in a healthy way, as opposed to just not understanding them, isolating them? Maybe we would have fewer serial killers, you know? I don't know. It's interesting

to think about. Yeah.
And also, like you said, so mind-bending because she has this emotional pull to help other sociopaths. Yeah.
It's like a purpose for her. And it's really interesting the way she talks about emotions and feeling.
And it's so hard to sort of understand that because she is married now,

but like she doesn't feel love in the same way that non-sociopaths feel love. But that doesn't mean she doesn't care about her husband.
Wow. Isn't that wild to think about? Her husband must just be such an emotionally grounded person.
Yeah. I mean, no, that's great.
I'm going to check that out. Peisha, what have you been listening to or reading?

I've been watching.

Or watching.

I've been watching.

What have you been watching?

I have been re-watching, actually, a show called Accused, Guilty or Innocent.

That is an A&E show that I watched on a streaming platform.

It's a really incredible show because of the unique perspective, which is that they're taking you through a criminal trial from the perspective of the defendant. And that defendant, you know, is saying that they are innocent in some way, shape or form.
Maybe it's that it was a vehicular accident that caused death, but they're fighting for their freedom is what they're doing. And it really sheds light on something you don't really see in a lot of headlines.
You know, for example, if someone dies in a car accident, there's understandably not a lot of sympathy in that article to the driver who is thought to have caused the accident. but you really see these people for so much more like, you know, what are they going to have to leave behind if they go to jail for what

happened and do they really deserve that?

And are they really to have to leave behind if they go to jail

for what happened? And do they really deserve that? And are they really a danger to society? And you're really asking all of these questions as you're watching it, like, wow, everyone wants justice when something terrible happens, but what is also the cost of that? And what does justice bring to the victim's family? And what additional destruction does someone going to jail cause? You know, someone could be facing their family being displaced because they no longer have that income, or someone could be watching their son who thought they were doing the right thing now spending his adult life in jail. It's a hard show to watch in moments, but it is a really well done, I think, docuseries.
So it's people who have been accused of a crime. What kind of crimes are they? Heavy crimes.
You know, murder is one that you'll see in a few episodes. There's a mother on the first season who is accused of purposefully causing harm to her son having Munchausen's by proxy.
And when you're hearing her defense, you know, they're saying things like, well, there's a doctor at this Texas hospital who is a specialist in Munchausen's. And so what does that mean for the amount of people who are being diagnosed with it there? And why is it geographically a higher percentage in this area? Well, because they're specialists.
And you really start thinking about that. One thing I wish we had with the show is follow-up episodes.
I was particularly interested in her episode because I want to know, like, after her trial happens, what is the result for her child? Does he become healthier? You know, I haven't seen any follow-up to it, but it's an interesting show and I think a perspective you don't often get. I love that.
That sounds really good. I also love shows that take you through a case or a trial in detail.
I think that's so interesting.

Yeah, it's like it happens slow, but it happens fast because you're watching the clock on your own freedom.

But it can sometimes be years. Your life is sort of in the balance.
And yeah, go watch it.

I will. What a great recommendation.

Well, that concludes our first episode of The Knife Off Record. Thanks for listening.
We'll be back next week. If you have a story for us, we would love to hear it.
Our email is thenife at exactlyrightmedia.com, or you can follow us on Instagram at The Knife Podcast or bluesky at The Knife Podcast. This has been an Exactly Right production, hosted and produced by me, Hannah Smith,

and me, Pasha Eaton.

Our producers are Tom Breifogle and Alexa Samorosi.

This episode was mixed by Tom Breifogle.

Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain.

Our theme music is by Birds in the Airport.

Artwork by Vanessa Lilac.

Executive produced by Karen Kilgariff,