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I have been listening to the Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club, which actually Elena recommended to me.
She did not listen to it, but she said, girl, this title sounds so you.
And let me tell you, it did. I've been listening to it while I walk, and I am absolutely loving it.
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Hey weirdos, I'm Elena. I'm Ash. And this is Morbid.
Still. It's also an Australian morbid... No, that was not as good as you can do.
Oh no, I'm going to do more, don't worry.
Because you've been practicing. It's... I have been practicing, guys.
Like, I've been really practicing. I studied your dialect.
She sure did. Because when Elena does something... i do it she does it i really do it i researched australia this week too I love researching.
And so when I decided I was going to perfect your accent to make you proud because we love you so.
I really went to town. You guys literally should have heard her before this.
It's true. So basically, let's try this.
Ready? I'm ready. This is another Aussie episode.
Oh. Yeah. Steve Irwin, is that you? So...
Maybe. Oh my god. I'm from Australia. I can't.
I always just go British. oh my god I'm like I'm oh my god you're like no I'm trying, guys.
I'm really trying. No, you're doing a really good job.
In my personal un-Australian opinion, you're doing a great job.
In my American opinion, you're doing great.
In my super uncultured opinion. I think you're great.
Well, here's my promise to you, Australia.
Each episode we do. Each Australian episode.
Yeah, each Australian episode. Let's clarify.
I won't just be Australian in every episode.
But each Australian episode we do, I'm going to get better.
You just said Australian too without meaning to.
At your ick sense. I'm just saying. And I know this one's kind of... Because I did my research.
I know this one's a little regional, but...
I don't know where it's from, but... Someone will tell us.
It's regional. So somebody let me know if you say accent.
Or accent? Or episode? Or episode? Or episode?
Which one is it? Wow. Let me know because I'm here for you, Australia.
All right, Australia. So do you want to hear what our case is this week?
Our case is a crazy one. Should we say it at the same time?
That's always fun. Let's do it. One, two, three.
Phoebe Handschuck. It's gnarly. It's gnarly.
It's mysterious. Is there like a descriptive word in Australia that they say?
I don't know. Damn, I should have looked that up.
Well, you didn't do your reset. you know what I'll research that was alright that was good that was alright that was pretty good I told you I researched you did I also found out that Australia, just in case you didn't know... that you tend to go up at the end of sentences.
Like a question. Like a question, which is pleasant.
So I just wanted to let you know that. I also found out that you guys also drop ahs, but you don't do it as harsh.
As we do it in Boston, we say caw. And we're like, you parked the car in Harvard.
And you guys say caw. It's just nice. It's like caw.
So we're like, nah. We just love you, Australia.
You guys are just delightful. You guys are the shit.
So back to the case. Phoebe hands Jack. is a doozy.
We're going to do it in multiple parts. I know some people don't like two-parters, but I promise this is going to be...
Like one right after the other. You're not going to have to wait long for part two.
But there's just too much to cover in one.
We just did not want to miss... and there's too many details and too many things to pick through that...
Just couldn't be left out. Yeah, it's just a lot.
And I think you'll appreciate the two parts.
I think the only true crime update that I wanted to give you before we jump into the case. was last week we talked about the Connecticut mom of five. who went missing, and then it was updated into a homicide investigation instead of a missing persons.
And I mean, I don't know if we were clear, but we were thinking maybe the ex-husband possibly knew any something about it.
Well, him and his live-in girlfriend just got arrested.
Yikes. So don't know a whole lot more about that because I just found it out this morning.
But any more details, we'll let you know.
We just wanted to update you. Without further ado, let's just jump into the case.
Phoebe, hands, Jack. All right, so... Phoebe Hand's truck was delivered by an emergency C-section on May 9th of 1986.
Other than that, she was by all accounts a happy, healthy baby.
Growing up, she was described as a wild child.
I'm surprised you weren't like the same I was gonna and then I decided not to Her mom referred to Phoebe as her tiger cub.
I love that. I know. It's so cute. She was super imaginative, active.
She loved all things creative. And she was like really good at art and writing and drawing and everything.
That seemed to go through like her entire life too.
Yeah. The whole way through. She loved to be outside, and she really, really loved the ocean.
And all throughout her life, she had close friends.
She loved to socialize, and she was popular in school.
She played basketball when she was younger, and she was super good.
She was super competitive. There's actually a website that her family set up to kind of like commemorate her and also they kind of just update it.
Yeah, because this is still kind of an ongoing ordeal, which you'll see why later.
On the website, her family set up, they remember if someone fouled her, she would play like 10 times harder.
And then at the end of the game, they'd be like, wow, like why doesn't Phoebe play like that all the time?
And they said it was because someone had did her wrong.
She's like, I was pissed. Excuse me, done her wrong.
Somebody done her wrong. Phoebe also enjoyed other activities like rock climbing, hiking, and even karate and kickboxing later in life.
Damn. Yeah. She was super active. Yeah. Like crazy, crazy active.
Yeah. And that's important later that she was a very athletic and fit person.
Right. So really everything kind of like seemed to be perfect from the outside.
An athletic, creative, popular girl loved by everybody around her.
But we all know it's not as simple as that.
Phoebe had her own struggles. She suffered from depression and she started using drugs and alcohol to help her cope.
She went on antidepressants at the age of 16 and was on and off of them from that time until the time of her death.
Her parents said that they didn't exactly agree with the decision of her going on them, and they especially worried because she didn't take them consistently. and she would put herself on and off of them, which is not recommended.
Phoebe's dad, Len, actually was a psychiatrist, so he knew what he... he was talking about.
Yeah. And so he and her mom, Natalie, just like were kind of worried about it.
Yeah. And I remember reading he didn't want to take her on as a patient.
Right. Obviously because of conflict of interest.
So it makes sense that he would be kind of like weary about... having someone else prescribe his daughter that stuff.
Yeah. That must be like a weird feeling too.
Yeah. Cause you're out of control, but it's like your realm, you know?
It'd be like if you went to a different hairstylist.
Exactly. You'd be like, how dare you? So anyways, Phoebe's parents divorced when she was a teenager and she took the divorce especially hard.
She actually didn't talk to her dad for like a little while.
Like they didn't have much to do with each other.
That's sad. But eventually they built their relationship back again.
And he says he believes at the time of her death, spoiler alert, she dies.
Unfortunately. Unfortunately. She was not depressed.
He did not think she was depressed at the time of her death.
All right. I would trust him. Mm-hmm. And he just felt as though she would get like kind of morose after drinking.
But it was not anything more than that. It was like more brought on by the substances.
Yes, exactly. Phoebe was especially close with her maternal grandmother, Jeanette Campbell.
Everyone knew that her grandmother was the one she trusted and she would go to her grandmother with everything and anything.
I love that. Her grandma seemed really cool.
She did. Everything I read, I was like, yeah, Jeanette.
Yeah, exactly. So... Her grandmother took LSD at some point in her life, and she told Phoebe that there were just some things that people couldn't handle.
And she was like, I've taken it and I know like that I can't handle it.
And I know that you especially can't handle it.
She's like, you got to chill on that. Because Phoebe was very sensitive in general.
She had a lot of emotions. She was such a creative person.
It seems that she was... I don't want to say a tortured artist, but like... But like that type.
Yeah, she had that vibe. I was going to say it's like the creative people tend to be more...
More emotional, emotional and because they're more in touch with different parts of their brain and their soul.
You know what I mean? People say all the time that hairdressers are super emotional and it's actually really true.
That makes sense because it's a creative field.
Yeah. Yep. They don't say that about autopsy tickets.
Really, that's so surprising to me. Wow.
Shocking. They're like, they're cold as ice.
So yeah. Her grandmother was like, dude, you know, like drugs just make things worse for people like us.
Like we're very sensitive and it heightens that.
Yeah. And that makes sense. So her closest friends remember going out with her starting at the age of 13.
Oh my God. Which is. bananas that's such it's like you're a baby yeah you're a child a baby then again i think i started going out at like 14 so you were a baby.
I was a baby. I didn't go out like this though.
They got into clubs and bars using fake IDs at 13 years old.
Damn. Like what kind of fucking bouncer was working the door is what I want to know.
Obviously, at 13, you are not rolling in cash.
No. But she kind of looked older, too. Yeah.
So I guess she could probably pull it off.
Right. But like I said, you're probably not rolling in cash at that age.
Probably not. Somehow her friends remember going out with like $20 between the three of them. and still coming back, having had plenty of drinks, and Phoebe would come back with handfuls of drugs. collected from different guys that she'd met throughout the night.
Awesome. There was just like something about her that drew men like to her.
For one thing, she was super gorgeous. She was beautiful.
I posted a photo on our Instagram of her and it's like a very natural photo.
But she's not very naturally. She's like stunning.
But she also had, like, a mysterious way about her that kind of made guys want to know, like, what her deal was.
Yeah. So... Yeah. I wish I was still looking for it.
Phoebe's mom, Natalie, knew how Phoebe was when it came to men.
She seemed to become infatuated with older men, and they were always intrigued by her as well.
Her grandmother felt as though she was seeking some kind of approval or like she was looking for something.
Yeah, there was some like psychological aspect to it probably.
Right. There was also a pattern in her family similar to the romantic choices that Phoebe was making.
Yeah, this is interesting. This is very interesting.
When I read about this, I was like, oh, okay.
Yeah, because they were wondering if it's like in the DNA.
Right, which is maybe. Yeah, you never know.
Her father, Phoebe's father, Len, was 14 years older than Natalie, her mother, who had also – I'm going to talk about later –
Natalie had also been in a relationship with a teacher and Phoebe was as well.
Yeah. And it happened right around the same age.
That's interesting. And Phoebe's grandmother's partner was 11 years older than her.
So like I said, there is like a whole thing about a teacher.
Yes. One of her first and most important relationships was at the age of 16 with a teacher twice her age.
Oh, And he also lived with the family at some point.
Yeah, I read that too. But I didn't really dive too deep into it.
For some period of time. Mm-hmm. And then after that relationship, another one ensued with another older man.
All right. I mean, I try not to judge, but like a 30-year-old teacher with a 16-year-old is...
It's just not okay. It's like, yeah, I mean, as you get older, it gets different.
And when you're not a teenager anymore, you know, like when you're legal age.
Right. And when you're in a role that comes with like great responsibility, like a teacher, it's just wrong.
Yeah, when you hold authority over the minor, that turns it into something different.
Makes it a different situation. Yeah, totally.
So her relationship pattern was definitely a pattern.
She liked older guys. Um, and her relationships always started out really good, but then these issues would come up about her drinking or about her flirting with other men.
Yeah. they would end in like fire, like turmoil.
Because I think she was just like a free spirit.
Mm-hmm. So like nobody could like reign her in.
And I think a lot of times when you're like a free spirit, it's almost you come off flirty without meaning to because you're just like flirty. floating through, just having them.
Well, and she's dating older men, and I think maybe in these kind of scenarios, the older men are like... you know used to being in control of the situation and you can't control her no that's just not who she was so i think it was probably becoming issues like over and over again definitely So her boyfriend at the time of her death was Anthony Hamill, who went by Ant.
They met when Phoebe was 23 and Ant was in his early 40s.
He was a regular at Lindley Godfrey's Hair Salon, which was a very upscale, I think Lindley Godfrey's like a celebrity hairstylist.
Yeah, he's a celebrity stylist, yeah. Literal goals.
And Phoebe worked to the desk there as a receptionist.
So Ant was an attractive, wealthy, award-winning events promoter.
Some of his clients included Michael Jackson, ACDC and Nicole Kidman.
And that's just naming like a few of the biggest names.
No big deal. Casual. No big deal. He also was the son of a retired Supreme Court judge named George Hample. and the stepson of a county court judge named Felicity Hample, which I love the name Felicity.
Anyways. And two judges as parents. Yeah.
Keep that in mind. Yeah, just hang on to that.
So Phoebe moved into Ant's luxury apartment.
Pretty much like five months after they were dating.
Like it was pretty quickly. Yeah. But we've all made that mistake.
Who hasn't done that? Raise your hand. Although she did pay him rent to live in the house or the apartment.
Excuse me. Yeah. He had like conditions.
Yeah. Yeah. Phoebe and Ant were an interesting couple.
In a lot of ways, they were very different from each other, but they obviously were similar enough to start a relationship.
Yeah. But Phoebe loved a space filled with art and clutter, somewhere to paint and journal and like express herself creatively.
I'm into that. Whereas Art wanted his apartment to look like untouched.
Oh, yeah. Very like modern, like white, clean. yeah everything has a place i remember reading about like the cleaner that they had the cleaning lady and she said that he specifically told her to make it look like no one lives here yeah I mean, I respect everybody's choices of how they want their home to look, but I prefer a home that looks lived in.
That's what I prefer. I can see why you would maybe want to have one.
My husband likes them more. He would be super happy if I removed all clutter from our house.
No, I just could never. But he puts up with my clutter.
Yeah. He even encourages it. It's happy clutter.
Find you someone who does that. So... Phoebe's mom said there was really no trace or presence of Phoebe in the apartment other than the photographs that she was in with Ant that were like...
That's troubling. Yeah. Cause especially like if you're going to get married someday and have a house together and like, and i mean it was her fucking house too she paid rent she was paying rent yeah so like you should be able to have a piece of you in there it should be your space together Exactly, like your house or your dwelling of some sort when you're with a partner should reflect both of you.
Yeah, both sides. So Phoebe also confided in her therapist that aunt made her feel stupid and put her down a lot.
Her mom recalls a fight that they had one time where Phoebe had promised aunt who was like away traveling somewhere that she wouldn't drink while he was gone. but she broke her promise.
During the fight, Aunt Aang really yelled at Phoebe over Skype that he didn't know who was sleeping in his bed.
What? Yeah. Chill, dude. Well, it's just like calm down.
Like it's my bed too. Like calm down. I'm just kidding.
Like, it's my bed, too. Like, I can have a sleepover.
No, I'm just kidding. So before Phoebe died and while she was living with Ant, she became involved with another older man who was her art teacher.
There were some emails between the two of them.
She emailed him demanding he have an affair with her.
I mean, who hasn't done that? Yeah. Who among us?
There's been times where I'm like, yo, just have an affair with me.
I'm demanding it at this point. I wonder how that email goes.
I would love to see that. Like how do you demand someone?
Like have an affair with me. That's all I can picture.
It's impressive. I mean, live your best life.
I'm impressed. But it didn't really work out well because he accused her of stalking him and she was kicked out of art school.
You know. Win some, you lose some. Yeah, exactly.
Phoebe and Ant actually broke up a few times over the course of their relationship, which I think their whole relationship was like, 18 months so like a year and a half is that what that is yeah i think it was or it was it was definitely not like a long drawn out like years and years you know but it was longish And things between them were rocky in the weeks leading up to her death, which is troublesome.
Phoebe confided in friends and family that aunt had a controlling side and she felt like she didn't always have a voice in their relationship.
Yeah. So I'm going to pass the mic to Elena, who's going to tell you what happened in the weeks before Phoebe's death. or the days so a lot of my um my information i got from a really good book about this case called into the darkness the mysterious death of phoebe hands jack and it's by robin bowles who is a crime writer oh i should also say that a lot of my information came from one her family's website and to the podcast there's like a huge podcast where they go like wildly in depth and it's called phoebe's fall and it's Great.
Really, really good. Really interesting.
So go listen to that as well if this interests you.
So Phoebe tried four different times to break up with Ant in the weeks before she died.
Her family and friends also noticed that she was starting to behave a little more erratic and unpredictable.
She was always erratic, always unpredictable, but they were like something was just off.
It just seemed different. So apparently at some point, Phoebe's mother, she was what, 23 at this point?
Yeah. Phoebe's mother had told her that she wanted to send her on a fancy trip for like overseas for her 21st birthday.
Phoebe hadn't taken her up on it yet. On October 5th, 2010, she sent an email to her mother and asked if that trip was still on the table. because she said she may need to take her up on it, and she may need to do it quickly and without a lot of notice. which that's strange obviously something's going on yeah to me that seems like i need to get away from this like after i break up with him i should leave the country i just kind of want to peace out right On October 20th, she left the apartment that she shared with Ant, and by all accounts, she intended that to be the end of their relationship.
That was going to be it. She decided she was going to go visit with her grandmother, Jeanette, in Malakuta, where her grandmother lived.
Mm-hmm. When she got to her grandmother, she told her she was planning to leave aunt.
She was going to resign from her job, which...
Ant actually made her quit when she moved in with him.
One of his conditions was to make her quit her job as a receptionist because he said it was below them.
That's dickish. And then he got her a job at this like ad agency called Savvy.
I don't know exactly what she was doing there, but to him it was like a more respectable job than a receptionist at a celebrity hair salon.
He sounds like a dick. So she was planning to resign from her job.
She was going to leave Ant. And she was like, I'm going to get a job in Malakuta.
I'm going to try to get sober. I want to start things anew.
So she said she also wanted to volunteer in India and she wanted all the stress and anxiety that was in her life to just disappear so she could focus on other people. and helping people.
Of course, Jeanette was super supportive because she was a rad ass grandmother.
Love her. Um, and she also told her you know what that's great I want you to do all those things but I want you to do them properly so she said running away is a bad idea you need to go back and You need to resign from your job the right way.
You need to break up with Ant in person.
And you need to start this new exciting chapter.
Right. Because you'll feel better about it in the long run.
Exactly. So she spent about three days in Malakuta and then she contacted a family friend named Keith Allen.
Or this was during the three days, excuse me.
She contacted a family friend named... keith allen to see if she could get a job at the golf club that he managed uh just for a little bit right she just wanted to get her over yeah he said of course you can just let me know So now she had a job set up.
Before she left, she also went to an AA meeting in Malakota, because she was like, I'm really serious about this.
I want to get this over. and a woman from the meeting gave her a ride back to her grandmother's house.
This woman said in a statement to police later... that she spoke a lot in the car about her issues in her relationship.
She said that her and Anne had a rocky relationship.
She wasn't happy. She also said her phone, this lady also said that Phoebe's phone rang a ton during the meeting and on the car ride home.
And she told her it was aunt and that she really wished he would just leave her alone.
Wow. And to call somebody that many times in like one sitting, like, All through the meeting, all through the ride home.
And she was like, I really wish this guy would just like a meeting is must be at least an hour long.
I'm assuming. I think so. And then all the way home.
It's like she's not answering, buddy. Right.
This witness apparently died before she could give this stuff to police during the death investigation.
Oh. So this was not entered in with the inquest into her death.
Interesting. Yeah, exactly. Just like actually died?
Yeah, she actually died. Non-suspiciously?
No, like she actually didn't fake die. I mean, like, did somebody set her up?
I don't know. I mean, she was attending an AA meeting, so maybe she unfortunately... succumb to her addictions but I don't know this person wasn't named obviously because she was coming from an AA meeting But in the next two days, apparently Ant was able to convince Phoebe to give it another go.
Oh, God. It's never a good decision. No, it's not.
If it's broke, you can't fix it. If he has to, like, convince you... No.
And convince you and convince you to get back, just don't do it.
It's like... Remember the reason why you did it in the first place.
Yeah, exactly. On October 24th, she said she was giving it another go She told her grandmother, and her grandma was like, okay.
Live your best life, girl. Like, I'm going to support you because I love you.
So Phoebe promised her grandmother that she would calm down her drinking.
So she went from I want to be sober to I'll chill it out a little bit.
Right. And everything seemed to go back to normal.
On November 17th, she and Ant went to a dinner at a friend's home named Linda Cohen.
Linda was like very close with Phoebe. There was a lot of times that I read where she contacted her and like some of her like. darker moments with aunt apparently she and aunt got into a fight at at the dinner oh no because phoebe was like checking her phone or like texting someone and he got mad, and he ended up leaving without her and going home, like leaving her at Linda's.
That's a dick move. So she and Linda stayed up all night talking.
Linda consoled her, was talking to her about aunt. the things she wanted to do, all the things she was basically telling her grandmother she wanted to do, just start anew, really get stuff together, and just go to India.
And obviously that's what she really wanted.
Yeah, because she was bringing it up. And she also told her, because I think she had met Linda later, so she was telling Linda...
You know I experimented with drugs when I was younger like she was letting her know you know this is what my life has been.
And she even told her that she'd tried everything at that point except for heroin.
Jesus. Yeah. So Linda was like, whoa. She also told her that she preferred cocaine and weed more than alcohol because they didn't make her feel like shit the next day.
Because she said, alcohol always makes me depressed the next day.
Which is kind of like what her dad said.
Exactly. So I think she recognizes it. She knows what kind of... I remember reading her parents and all her friends said...
From the time she began drinking until her death, this girl could have maybe two drinks.
Right, I heard that a lot. And if she did, after two drinks, they were like, she could not even stand on her feet.
She could not hold her alcohol at all. She was also pretty tiny.
She was. She was tiny. Even though she was athletic, she just couldn't hold the alcohol.
They were like, some people are not meant for it.
Yeah, she was a wobbly mess after like two drinks.
And obviously it had worse effects on her.
She always was depressed the next day. She wasn't a good drunk.
It just wasn't something she should have done.
So Phoebe then told Linda that she wanted to go back to her grandmother's.
And she and she was like, you know what?
I want to go back to my plan. I'm going to leave it, resign from my job, all that good stuff.
Girl, do it. I know. I hate that. Because I get excited and then I'm like, I know what happens.
That's the worst part. It's like I know the outcome and I'm like, but I'm still reading the book being like, no, girl, turn around.
Because she had so much promise, man. She really did.
So the next morning, Linda said Phoebe...
It surprised her because she said she started drinking right away in the morning.
Yeah. Oh, no. And she was like, oh, that's upsetting.
Especially since you just said what her plan was.
Exactly. She was like, and that you were like, I like Coke and weed better because alcohol makes me depressed.
And then she starts the day drinking. So she was like, oh, no.
So she drove her back to the Balenciaga apartments where she lived with aunt and she helped her pack up her stuff because she was still like, I'm doing this.
November 19th was the next day. Phoebe saw Linda again, and Linda had her stay that night with her, too, before she was going to leave for Malakuta again to go.
Start a new life. While there, she called her mom, Natalie, and asked if she could rent her cottage in Malakuta if she moved back.
Mm-hmm. So she was trying to set this all up.
She was like, ready. Linda said when Phoebe woke up the next morning, November 20th, she seemed totally with it, coherent, clear-headed.
She even wrote some poetry and drew some drawings and gave them to Linda.
She was like... She was always in these creative moods where she would just create.
All of a sudden. I love that. And just the... She was always doing poetry, painting, drawing, you know, like writing in her journal.
Apparently she... carried a journal everywhere she went and would just write random things.
She was always writing. So at the time Linda said, I took this as like, she's in a really good place.
She's great. And she's like, now I look back on it and I'm like, well, she, Calling for help?
I don't know what this was. Right. So she said she was ready to go to Malakuta, but then Ant called.
And asked her if she could meet with him and talk.
No I'm busy. She agreed. And after their meeting, she moved back into the Balenciaga apartments with him.
I know. It's just so, I'm just like, oh, because we've all been there with that one person.
And we can always convince you to come back.
And it's never different. And it's like, we've all been there.
We can all relate. It's so unfortunate. November 23rd at 10 a.m., Phoebe called her dad and told her aunt had thrown her out.
And she needed him to pick her up. How many days after that?
This was four days after. Wow. So they're on a rocky road.
Yeah, they're not having a great stretch.
Wouldn't call this like a banner week for them.
Well, and also it's like, aunt, like, do you really like, yeah, you're throwing her out.
So you're convincing her to stay. And then you're throwing her out.
Right. Like make up your mind. Like do just pick one.
Come on. Don't do that to somebody. That's shitty.
So she called her dad and she's like, I need you to come get me.
So he, you know, being a good dad... He immediately canceled all of his appointments for the day and rushed there.
Yeah. He said when he got there, she was standing outside with a ton of her things waiting for him.
He brought her back to his apartment in South Bank where he lived with Tom, her brother.
Mm-hmm. Because she has a brother Tom and a brother Nikolai.
They're both younger. She was super close to Tom.
In fact, they said like they were like best friends, which makes me sad because I'm sure Tom was like devastated.
Phoebe stayed there for three nights. On the third night, which was November 25th, Phoebe met Ant for dinner.
Why? Yes. He begged her to come back, and she agreed again.
This is a very frustrating lead up here.
Mm-hmm. She met with Linda the next day for lunch again and chatted about the whole ordeal, but Linda said she seemed in good spirits again.
She wasn't like... You know, she didn't seem depressed to me.
She didn't seem erratic. She seemed very clear-headed.
Told me the whole thing, and she said... that she was very excited about a trip to Paris that the two of them were going to take, Ant and herself.
Okay. So she was like looking forward to, okay, we're going to get things back on track.
We're going to go to Paris and we're going to have this great romantic adventure.
So Phoebe had her weekly breakfast with her dad at 8 a.m. the following Monday at French Fantasies in South Yara.
Apparently, this was something they did weekly, obviously.
And it was kind of a way to not only spend time with his daughter, but to also keep an eye on her.
Her two legs kind of keep tabs. She told him she and Ant were going to a U2 concert Wednesday.
She was super excited about it. She also told her dad that she and aunt wanted to take him to dinner for his birthday that Thursday night.
Okay. Her dad's birthday. Right. They wanted to take him to her favorite restaurant, which I forget the name of, but it comes up later.
After breakfast that day, later around 2.45 p.m., she rode her bike to Lindley Godfrey Salon, where she had previously worked and met Ant.
And she had coffee with Lindley. She went back to Valencia after that.
And she normally had to bring her bike into the apartment because there wasn't a space for her outside.
But that day, Eric Giamario, the apartment manager, who's also important to this story. told her there was a permanent space open for her now.
One had opened up. And she had really been waiting for that because she didn't like bringing her bike all the way up there.
So he was like he figured she was going to be psyched but he said she like barely even noticed him speaking to her and was acting kind of strange and not her cheerful self. so he said just something was off about her he was like I don't know like he didn't know her super well but he was like I knew her enough to know that she's typically very happy Now, the records from Aunt's key fob, which is what you had to use to get in and out of the apartments.
Mm-hmm. You had to use them for everything, like in the garage.
You could not get in that place without your personal key fob.
Okay. It showed that he returned home November 29th at 350 p.m.
A bit later, he and Phoebe went to dinner with their friends, the Rockmans.
Apparently promised him to chill on the drinking that night.
And she promised she would only have a maximum of two wines.
But that did not happen. And according to Ant, she began being a little too personal.
With Mrs. Rockman and telling her about like her depression and like just getting a little too deep.
Uh-huh. Which we, you know, everybody does when they've had a few classes in line.
I've been there. So it's like, yeah. Like, you want to hear my life story?
Let me tell you all. Let's order one more wine and I will tell you about my life.
And just like that's when you start like just like spitting in your palms and being like we are soul sisters.
Literally. Like that was probably happening.
Mm hmm. Of course, Ant wasn't finding this charming or funny.
No, he was probably embarrassed because he was super into his fucking self-image. exactly so he tried to make her stop but she kept going so he got pissed and took her home early The town of Agde in France is famous for sun, sand, sea and sex.
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They got back at around 7.51 p.m. They were not out that long.
He said she kept drinking in her rage. When she got home, she just kept like rage drinking.
Because she was like, fuck you. She was like, fuck you, man.
And she called Linda, her friend Linda, at 8.30 p.m. and told her about the fight.
She wanted to stay with Linda and Linda was like, you can totally stay with me because I'm a great friend.
She really was a good friend. But she was like, the only problem is I can't have another all-nighter with you again because I have to wake up for a meeting next morning.
So she was like, I'm sorry. Which is understandable.
So Phoebe was like, okay, I kind of want to like stay up and party.
So she was like, all right, I'll call somebody else.
So she called a couple of other friends to vent, and then she eventually landed on a friend named Brend Hession.
Mm-hmm. He agreed to meet her for drinks at 11.30 p.m.
I believe she dated his older brother at one point.
I think she did. Right after the teacher.
Yeah. I knew there was some connection there.
Yeah. He agreed to meet her for drinks at 1130 p.m., which I was like, whoa, I can't hang.
That's not that alarming. I can't hang. 11.30 PM.
I'm like, woo, time for bed. 11.30 is like when I got to the bar on Sunday.
Dear God. Yeah. They met at the European Beer Cafe, and she was super happy, super upbeat.
He said that she arrived and was like totally herself.
He also said that her phone rang constantly and it was Ant.
Shocking. So she had, just for the record, because this is important too.
She had two phones that she used. She had a new iPhone, which was an aunt's name.
Mm hmm. And she had an older Nokia, which was hers, like originally.
And she kept that just for numbers. She didn't feel like transferring all the numbers.
Which, like, I feel her on such a spiritual level.
So creative. Like, that's a creative vibe.
Yeah, just with these, like, silly, like, little, like, you know.
Yeah, just little cool things that she has going on.
So, little quirks, that's what I was trying to think of.
Cool things. You know that word. You know cool things.
You know cool things she's got going on.
The quirks that she has. Is idiosyncrasy also the right word for that kind of?
Yeah, it sounds good. Is that rude? No, I don't think so.
I like it though. At midnight that night, Bran had to go home because he had an early day, and she wanted to stay out and party more.
Mm-hmm. So he was like, by all means. She also probably just like didn't want to go back to ants.
Yeah. And she was literally like. And like wanted to stay up.
Yeah, and according to him, he said when he left her, she was like skipping down the street.
Like she was just having a blast. So he was like, all right, like do you, girl.
I love that. Yeah. So she ended up, after a little more time, she went to her mom's place in Clifton Hill a little bit later, because she had a place in Clifton Hill also.
Uh-huh. Russell, her mom's partner, was there.
He made her tea and he called her mother to tell her that she was there, safe but drunk.
And they actually stayed up talking until about 3 a.m.
Oh, Russell. Yeah, like she had a lot of people in her life that are like nice.
Just like, I'll sit up and talk with you.
The next day was Tuesday, November 30th, and she told both Russell and her grandmother through text... that she was going to her job for her shift because she was like, I don't want to get canned.
Right. She didn't end up going. She went back to the Balenci apartments.
She got there around 9.08 a.m. and aunt was already at work.
Sometime midday, that day, she called her psychiatrist and asked if she could see her.
Okay. But her psychiatrist didn't have any appointments open that day and she didn't even have any phone appointments.
So she actually told her to call a hospital in the area and was like, if you need to talk to somebody, like if you feel like important.
Call them. apparently phoebe did call them but was not whatever answer she got or whatever what happened she wasn't happy with because she called the psychiatrist back And she was like, I really don't have time.
I can't. Like, we'll have to make another day.
Oh, no. So later that afternoon, she used her Nokia to call Bren again.
And she told him that if he didn't call her back, she would throw her cell phone away and leave the world.
Okay. That's a lot to put on someone. Well, apparently, according to Bren...
He got the message around 6 and said he wasn't even worried because she was always pulling shit like that.
Right. Like he was like, this is not. Yeah.
He was like, she was kind of dramatic. So he was like, I'm not.
I wasn't worried about it. Oh, yeah. So he did.
He called her back, but the phone was off.
And he was like, I honestly was not worried that she had done anything because he was like, I just didn't.
I knew who she was. Yeah. So this same day goes kind of in a crazy direction, too.
There was a guy she had met when she was in an adult education program when she first started dating Ant.
She was doing an adult education program for a while.
And I think she was doing, like, art history...
And something else. I can't remember exactly.
Sure. She was taking some awesome classes.
Oh, writing. Professional writing. Okay.
She ended up stopping those classes... after like a few months, but she was doing them.
When she was going to this adult education program, she bonded with this guy in her class.
They really related to each other, especially with drug and alcohol use.
Both of them were kind of in the same boat.
After 2009, which was when they were going to classes together...
He was trying to get his shit together. When everything started happening with Phoebe and Ant in 2010...
He hadn't spoken to Phoebe since that time.
Right, so like a year or so. So it had been a while.
But he told police that in the time that he knew Phoebe...
He had met Ant a few times, and he actually really liked him.
He said, according to... He said, as far as I could see, which...
It's just me, a casual observer. Which is like not super intimate.
Yeah. He said he seemed like a genuine person and he seemed to make Phoebe happy.
Which, again, he had a very small porthole into her life.
Now, on November 30th. This guy, who is not named in any of the sources I saw, got a Facebook message from Phoebe saying she wanted to meet up.
So this was the same day, you know, the day after she went out with Bren and all that good stuff.
The same day that she called Bren, right?
Yeah. So she said she had some issues and she needed to talk to somebody.
And she said she felt bad about burdening her family with them anymore.
And she said not because my family doesn't want to listen but because I feel bad that I keep going to them.
Yeah. So they met near the Balenciaga apartments for coffee at around 4 p.m.
He later testified in court that their conversation was amazing.
He said, one of the best conversations I've ever had.
Wow. Said it was just a great conversation.
She seemed totally coherent, totally clear.
He was not worried. She told him she was going to volunteer in India.
Put that out there again. And she was feeling like her life with Ant was making her feel insulated from the real world.
Right. So she wanted to get out there. She wanted to see more.
They talked relationships. I think he was having trouble in his relationship at the time, too.
And she said that she felt embarrassed that she worked such a low job and that aunt deserved better.
Oh, I don't like that. I feel like he was putting this kind of stuff in.
Yeah, he was. Well, because he made her quit her job as a receptionist.
So obviously. But even the one he gave her, she was already still feeling like, I feel like a little.
Less than. Yeah. So later, after they talked and all that good stuff, she persuaded him to drive her to Port Melbourne.
To get drugs from a dealer. Oh. She got two ecstasy tablets.
Then they went back to this guy's house because this guy is also an artist.
The drug dealer. No, the friend from our class.
This guy's also an artist. So he was like, let me just show you like my art pieces and we'll like talk about art.
Cool. It'll be cool. He said that she definitely took at least one of those pills before they got there, and she ended up trying to kiss him.
He claims he told her no and that she got violent.
Okay. He said he had to actually restrain her to calm her down.
He said she just flipped a switch. Right.
And he just attributed it to drugs. Yeah.
So at 6.03 p.m., Ant was getting home to the apartment and Phoebe obviously wasn't there.
Mm-hmm. He texted Bren, who she had contacted earlier, at 6.25 p.m. and asked where she was, but Bren ignored the message.
Because he was like, can I not be involved in this?
Yeah, he was like one. And I guess Brent also like hadn't really talked to Ant that much.
So he was like, why is this guy texting me?
Like, I don't know you. Phoebe got in the car with that guy from school that she tried to kiss, unfortunately.
And he said her mood swings were insane.
Like, happy one second then sad yelling then silent like she was just having a moment she was rolling quite hard rolling face She made him let her out of the car in West Melbourne near Festival Hall at exactly 9.30 p.m.
She got to Ant's apartment somehow. Okay.
At 1229 a.m. There's no records of these three hours in between.
She got out of the car. This guy's like, I let her out of the car.
That's the last time I saw her was 9.30.
Between then and 12.29 a.m.? ? Nobody knows what she did.
Would it have taken her a long, long time to walk to... I'm not positive, but...
Somehow she got back and I mean, obviously she went on like a bender that night, I think.
Okay. because Phoebe was still asleep when Ant left for work the next morning around 9 a.m.
He said he took her iPhone with him. Which is douchey.
I think he said he was getting it repaired.
I don't even know. This actually becomes this move here that he says he took her phone that morning becomes a thing later in the investigation because.
Her iPhone was used to send a pretty weird text message that was from Phoebe.
At about 10.30 a.m. that same day. So he's saying I left at 9 a.m.
I took the phone. Right. But somehow... A text message went from that phone from Phoebe, right, to a bunch of people at 1030.
Lynn, her dad, and a bunch of other members of her family got a weird text saying, That said, hi, family.
I am in bed and about to sleep. And when I wake, I will transform into the most incredible human being you've ever seen.
Not. I will go to the hospital. It's safer there.
And I hear the special tonight is tomato soup.
Delicious, nutritious. I love you all very much, but not enough to send an individual text.
Sorry about that, but time is sleep and I must be on my way. merrily merrily merrily life is but a dream exo i don't like that So to me, first, that's concerning.
But it also seems like she's being like, I want to...
Get sober? Yeah, like I want to go to the hospital.
Like that's what that seems to me. Like in a very maybe creative way.
Yeah. A very like tortured artist way. Exactly.
So that message went out to Len, her dad.
It went to aunt. Okay. It went to her boss.
It went to her mother Natalie, her brothers Tom and Nikolai, her grandmother Jeanette, and Natalie's partner Russell.
Okay. Natalie, her mother, was very concerned about this text message.
So she called Jeanette, the grandmother in Malakuta.
And she was like, can you check on Phoebe?
Like, can you call her or do something? Jeanette also was very concerned about this message.
So she called Ant on his cell phone at 10.35 a.m.
And she was like, is Phoebe all right? Right.
He was like, yeah, I didn't even see the message.
Like I didn't even notice it. Inconvenient.
Yeah, exactly. And he was like, oh, I left Phoebe sleeping this morning.
She was sleeping peacefully. But he didn't say, like, I have her phone.
No. Weird. And he said, you know what? I'll swing by at some point during the workday and I'll check on her.
So Jeanette sent Natalie, her mom, a text saying, don't worry, aunt said she's fine and that he's going to check on her.
So everybody was like, alright, cool. Well, I'm sure they were like somewhat used to this kind of weird, I don't think this level of Weirdness, but they were like, okay, it's Phoebe.
Yeah, like maybe Phoebe's just, you know... And honestly, they were probably thinking like...
She probably went on a bender. Yeah, like maybe she's just being weird.
She might even still be drunk. We don't know.
Right, exactly. So they're just kind of checking.
Almost does seem like a drunk text. Sort of.
But it was very coherent, weirdly. Right, like everything was spelled correctly.
And it had like... a chain of events it seems like a drunk like thought thought yeah exactly there were other strange things about the events of that day after aunt talked to the Later, he called her back and he said, hey, I went to the apartment.
Phoebe was still sleeping off a bender. And he said, I'll make sure she calls you when she wakes up so you can hear from her.
In his second police statement, he said that during when he went to visit Phoebe in the middle of the day, that Phoebe told him she'd taken two sleeping pills.
And these were called still knocks and they were actually prescribed to aunt to help him sleep on the plane to Paris.
Okay. So he got concerned and he said he took the pill bottle with him. back to the to work because and he didn't say why like he didn't say i was concerned she was going to overdose her yeah i think he was more concerned that she would actually accidentally overdose like maybe she would wake up and take more but not mean to i don't think it was yeah she was suicidal But there doesn't seem to be any record of this visit.
And by record... You mean the fobs. That key fob.
Which is weird because every other night there's a record.
And there has to be. You can't get into this place without using your key fob.
So Phoebe's grandfather, Lorne Campbell, was a former homicide detective.
And he was like a really well-respected homicide detective.
People said he was very thorough. He was very fair.
He was meticulous. Like they trust him. Mm hmm.
So her grandfather, like later when everything went down, was the one who really focused on this lack of key fob information for this visit that he claimed he made.
Because it does not make any sense. Yeah, and he went through the key fob records for December 1st when he said he was there.
And he got them from Eric Giamario, the manager of the apartment.
And... Eric said to the coroner during the whole inquest that happens later, he said, Valencia residents, whether they're coming or going, were recorded everywhere. every single time by these key fobs and they were individually numbered and you had to use it to get in the You had to use it to get in the elevator, the car garage. the front door, your door, literally every single part.
So he said, this just doesn't make sense.
There's no record. And the records seem to show that day that Ant left the building at 9 a.m. when he went to work and he came back at 7.33 p.m.
Nothing in the middle of the day. So what's that about?
Yeah. So that day at 2.17 PM, there was another person that did go in the place. sally teller she worked for as a cleaner this is the cleaning lady that said he liked it to look like no one lived there She said she came for her regular Wednesday, clean, that she did every week.
Did she see... phoebe yes and she said she had her own key fob and apartment key okay so that's how she got in and that's recorded She said when she actually let herself in, she was surprised that Phoebe was in the apartment because she was usually not there when she came.
Mm-hmm. She said she cleaned the other end of the apartment away from the bedroom.
And then she like quietly knocked on the bedroom door.
She said Phoebe came out. Mm-hmm. She was wearing a T-shirt and shorts.
And she said, Sally says she didn't smell any alcohol.
She didn't seem like she was out of it. She actually said she was like, are you sick?
Do you need me to do anything for you? Like, why are you here?
And Phoebe just was like, no, it's okay.
And she said she gave her this like dazzling smile.
Which, if you look at any picture of Phoebe, she does have a dazzling smile.
So she said she just gave her this big smile and was like, no, I'm totally fine.
Like, thank you. and she said she didn't look sick and she said she definitely didn't look depressed to me and she goes and the only reason i'm saying that It's because she said she herself suffered from depression in the past.
And she said when she was in her... her deep depression, she goes, I never could have produced a smile like that.
Right. And she's like, that's just me like speaking from experience.
Right. And she also told police later that she always liked Phoebe, and she said she actually didn't like the way Aunt treated her.
She said their relationship seemed like... a parent-child relationship where he would scold her.
Because he was so much older than her. Yeah, and she said she never liked how he was with her.
She really liked Phoebe. She was always nice to me, always respectful, and just a nice person.
Right. So after she cleaned the bedroom, Phoebe went back to bed with an eye mask on, according to Sally.
And she finished cleaning the apartment.
She left around 5 p.m. Ant came back at 7.33 p.m. when the key fob records him coming back.
Mm-hmm. He said that, no, this is according to him.
He said that he and Phoebe stayed in that night.
He ran her a bath. He gave her a massage.
Oh, wow, what a sweet. Sweet fellow. He cooked dinner.
And then he also said he showed her the tickets to Paris so that she would feel excited that they were already...
Here's the tickets. We're really doing this.
So around 8 p.m. that night, Phoebe called her father, Lynn.
They talked for about 11 minutes, and she told her father that she was still feeling hungover from her bender. but she said Ant's looking after me like we're fine everything's cool so maybe he did run her over yeah who knows She also said to him, quote, I really need to stop doing this.
So he said... to him, accompanied with that text message that she sent.
He was like, to me it seemed like she just didn't want to do this, like, bender stuff anymore.
Like, I need to get my shit together. Like, I can't do this.
Right. So this was the last time that Len spoke to his daughter.
Now this brings us to the night of December 2nd, 2010.
This is the night that Phoebe Hanschuk died.
Now again, Ant left Phoebe in bed that morning around 8.30 a.m. because he was going to work.
I think he said he went to the gym first.
At around 9.45 a.m., we know that she sent an email and used the computer a couple times.
Not a lot is known about what she was doing, like, after that.
But we do know there was a fire alarm in the Valencia apartment building at 1143 a.m.
Mm-hmm. There's also CCTV footage of Phoebe and her dog evacuating with everyone.
Mm hmm. There is a point where she's outside and she stumbles against a wall a bit.
But... It could just be that the dog is pulling her.
You know what I mean? Because anybody who has a dog who has a small... big, medium, whatever, they can knock you over no matter what.
So I don't think it was necessarily that she was drunk or anything.
Right. When she walked back in, she's walking fine, too.
So then she goes back in. She's walking fine.
11.50 a.m., she got back in the building.
That's when they let everybody in. The last picture of her taken alive is at 11.50 a.m.
No one knows what happened between that time and 6 p.m.
Sometime in there, she went into... The building's garbage chute.
Which is fucking horrific. Yes. That's the crux of this whole thing.
And I will get very much into it. But just warning, this is like graphic.
How she died is pretty gross. So Ant drove into the apartment building around 6.05 p.m.
He used his key fob to open the gate. It's all recorded.
He later said he didn't know if the front door to the apartment was locked or not.
He couldn't remember. Which is like, whatever.
He said when he got in there, Phoebe wasn't there.
Okay. At 6.05. She was not in the apartment.
When he looked on the kitchen counter, he said that her keys and her purse were there.
And he thought that was weird. Because he was like, again, you can leave...
But you can't come back in without keys.
So why are your keys here? Where are you?
And also your purse is there where you can't go far.
So there were also several post-it notes around the kitchen that had like weird scribbles and they were on the kitchen counter.
Uh-huh. Uh, and he said this kind of stuff, like she would do this stuff when she was drunk.
Apparently she would like scribble on post-it notes.
Just, like, scribble like it didn't say anything?
I think it was supposed to say something, but it was hard for him to, like, understand.
Yeah. So he said he went into their bedroom and he found what he later referred to as a, quote, shrine on the bed.
The shrine was a photo of he and Phoebe, a photo of her cat. and a bunch of random notes.
And he said the notes that she writes when she's smashed and they don't make a lot of sense.
That's how he described them. He said there were candles burning and Phoebe's hair straightener was on the floor plugged into the wall.
Okay. The shrine later gets called into question whether it existed.
Personally, I don't think it existed. Nobody else who went into that apartment said they saw a shrine of any kind.
Just saying. Again, I wasn't there. I don't know.
But to me, it doesn't look like I was there.
At 6.51 p.m., which was about 40 minutes after he arrived home.
Mm-hmm. Phoebe's dad called her on her iPhone.
Now, this is where Len and Ant differ on their stories, too, which makes it a little strange. suspicious.
According to Len, Phoebe's father, he has all the numbers shown on his phone bill, and he's going off of that, like what happened next.
So according to Lynn's phone bill records that he's going off of, he called Phoebe's phone and answered it.
And... That's what happened. Mm-hmm. Ant said he didn't hear the phone, but he called him from his own phone at 6.52 p.m. because he thought maybe Phoebe was with Len.
Okay. So now they have two different stories, but her dad has a phone bill record to back it up.
Exactly. So there's so many things like this that you're just like, oh, wait a second.
Mm-hmm. I just want to put it out there one more time.
Both of his parents are judges. I just want to put that out there.
I'm not saying anything. I'm just putting his family background out there.
So however they ended up speaking on his phone, Phoebe's phone, whatever the hell.
Len said he's been trying to call Phoebe, and he was like, we were supposed to all go to dinner tonight.
Because remember, for his birthday, at the Golden Triangle.
I guess that was like Phoebe's favorite restaurant.
And he was like, we were supposed to go tonight to celebrate my birthday.
So I was calling to say when we should meet, like what time.
Aunt said she's not here. Her bag and keys are here, so she can't be too far.
So Len was like a little worried. He was like, what do you mean?
You know, like she's not there. Like we made this plan.
I don't know. Now you're telling me her keys and purse are there.
So he was like, maybe you should report her missing.
Like, I'm worried. That's not normal. And family things weren't something that she missed. like no it's not that she was like this crazy alcoholic that didn't show up for family things exactly she was always involved in her family stuff And he was like, the fact that her purse and keys are there and she's not concerns me.
So he was like, why don't you report her missing?
And Ant was like, no. And then he was like, they won't listen to me until like 48 hours have passed and like she'll come back.
That's not true. And Lynn was like, eh, I don't know.
So her dad called her brother Tom, the one that she was very close to, and he was like, will you call some friends who might like know where she is.
So he also rang Natalie, Phoebe's mother.
And she hadn't heard from Phoebe either, and she had texted her earlier in the day.
Mm-hmm. So Natalie called a couple of Phoebe's friends, including Brenn.
The one that shows up every now and then.
Bren said he hadn't seen Phoebe since that Monday night when they had gone out for that drink together.
He was like, I heard from her, you know, the following day but that was it I didn't talk to her so he but he did relay to them like she seemed like she was kind of on a bender like just putting it out there Meanwhile, Len was like, OK, I'm going to just sit here and wait for now.
Like, I'm not going to go crazy. I'm just going to try to calm myself down.
So he even said he was like, I changed for dinner.
Like I got ready because he was like, you know what?
She's going to show back up. That makes my heart fucking hurt, dude.
I know. Now, at the apartment, the Valencia apartment, this is weird to me.
Ant called the Golden Triangle, the restaurant.
Yeah, this part is fucking weird. And he got takeout for one.
Like what? Yeah, that's just weird. I don't know how that... I don't know why that's so weird, but it's weird.
Well, because it's like... The three of you were going to be going out to this place, which is her favorite place.
She's not there and she's missing right now.
You don't know where she is. And you're going to get takeout.
And you order takeout from this place. For one.
For one. So you're not expecting her to come back.
Yeah. That to me says, like, I murdered her.
She's not here. So just after 8 p.m., he was going to buzz the delivery guy up to... They were on the 12th floor of their apartment.
Mm-hmm. And the delivery guy said, man, what's going on here?
And he was like, what do you mean what's going on?
Like, I'm getting some takeout. And he said, the front of the building is swarming with cops.
There's police cars, ambulance. I had to prop my bike up on the street.
Hope your dinner isn't cold. So it was like, what?
So now I'm going to switch to the hotel staff and those who responded first, their perspective of this.
This afternoon. Into the night. So... Same day.
We're talking about December 2nd, the day that Phoebe Hansjuck went missing and ended up dying.
At around 4 p.m., that's when the concierge of the hotel, Beth Osilup, arrived at the apartments.
Eric, the manager that we've talked about a few times, he stayed on with her for about an hour and he was just kind of like catching her up on the day.
Right. So he also said that the garbage compactor had just been majorly serviced.
And he said he wanted to go look in and make sure everything was working properly before he left, but he didn't have time. because he said um it was 5 p.m and he said he had to take his son to a music lesson and he really had to run out and go so he was like Can you go check on it for me?
So at 6.05 p.m., the fire alarm went off again.
Which was odd that this happened twice. Twice, exactly.
But it turns out that they were both like false alarms.
Okay. What had happened was there was workers working on a higher floor and the smoke from their tools kept making the alarm go off.
But it was just like a weird day. And she said she just like already felt like he weird.
Yeah. Uh, Beth also said she never liked going in the trash compactor room because she said it smelled and it was awful.
Right. So she was not looking forward to this.
So she went down the hall. She unlocked the door to the compactor room.
She tried to open it, but she said something was in the way.
It was like she was pushing against something.
So she gave it a really big push with her shoulder.
And when you do that, there's an automatic sensor that floods the room with light.
Mm-hmm. And so she said it was bright in there and she said she saw that a bin had tipped over off the conveyor and that there was just rubbish everywhere.
She then saw something else that was between the door and the wall.
Mm hmm. She said immediately it looked like a mannequin.
But she said then she looked closer and it was bleeding.
And she said it was very clearly a dark haired woman lying on her back.
Oh, God. So she said she immediately backed away and closed the door.
And she said she stood outside of the door for like two to three minutes.
And she said she was just trying to get her shit together.
And she was like, but I have to look again.
I need to know what's going on, obviously.
And she was like, maybe I'm just seeing it wrong.
And this is... So she opened the door again and she said she saw just blood everywhere all around the room.
And she said it was very clearly a human being on them.
And she said there was blood all over the walls.
There was congealing blood trails that were leading towards the body from the compactor.
And the rest of the floor was covered in trash.
Oh God. She also said that the back of the door had blood on it.
So like smeared blood. She said she screamed and literally ran out of the office.
She immediately called Eric. And he said that she was completely incoherent and just like inconsolable.
And the only thing he caught was dead blood rubbish room like over and over again.
So he said to call, he was like, call triple O, which is their 911.
Right. And he was like, I'm coming right away.
So there is CCTV footage of poor Beth like running up and down the hall, like wringing her hands, crying, like freaking out like she lost it.
And within minutes, police cars came. Eric Giamario and Tony Basil, the manager of the company that operated the apartments... right after the police, somewhere between 7.15 and 7.30 p.m., An ambulance also was obviously called.
Right. At 7.20 p.m. And they arrived seven minutes later.
Okay. So they were like right on it. Stabbed.
Christy Cook was one of the paramedics. She said she ran right to the compactor room where she could clearly see a body on the floor.
Mm-hmm. The police officer that was guarding the door stopped her and told her she wasn't permitted to enter because this was a crime scene.
And she was like, what? Hi, I'm an ambulance.
I'm a paramedic. So she said this literally went against everything she was ever taught.
She was like, no, I'm supposed to go in there and save that person or try to.
Right. So she was like, what? And she said, from what she observed from the doorway that moment, she said it was a female. was lying on her back with cuts to her right thigh and hip and with her right foot in an unnatural position.
She said she thought immediately that it was a fractured ankle, obviously.
And she said the body showed, quote, showed generalized cyanosis, which is a bluish tinge. and no spontaneous respirations and appeared deceased but she said this is me from outside the room right So she wasn't happy about being prevented from going in the room because she and she said even the months after this, she said she lost a ton of sleep.
It like ruined her. Because she was like, what if I could have helped her?
Yeah. You just don't know. Now, no medically trained person ever attended Phoebe after she was discovered.
Not once. Which is very strange. No. No one laid hands on her to see if she was still warm.
They didn't see if she was actually dead.
The first people to go in the room were actually crime scene specialists who came hours later.
They were the first person to even go in the room.
Right. So nobody even went near her to see.
And they said later that going by all those blood trails that were around the room, it wasn't like just splatter.
It was like trails of blood. Like she didn't die.
Right. They said it was likely that Phoebe had survived the fall and had crawled around the room and had tried to get out that door and had probably died of blood loss.
Did the door lock from the inside? Like you couldn't get out of the room?
That I'm not sure about. Maybe we'll be able to get into that next week when we go further into it.
But I think mostly it seemed like she couldn't... Because what we'll find out is...
Her ankle was like severed. It was hanging on by muscle.
So she probably wasn't able to get herself up.
And she had also been banged through a compactor at the bottom of the chute.
Which again, we're going to get into that more.
So she probably just wasn't able to even get herself together to get out of that room.
She was just trying to. Now, one of the leading homicide investigators in the country, I believe his name is Roland Legge, was crucified. quoted in the Phoebe's Fall podcast as saying, quote, well, from the moment you join the police force, the most important thing is preservation of life. the protection and preservation of life is the number one priority and he said it was ridiculous that no one checked for vitals ever And the thing is, they all now agree that she was most certainly alive when she got to the bottom of the chute.
Yeah, she had to have been. possibly could have been saved if someone just bothered to check and see if she had any vital signs.
I hate that. Again, it's not like Maybe she would have.
Most likely she wouldn't have been saved, but they didn't even try.
We're going to stop part one here. And part two is going to be us discussing exactly how the garbage chute works. how her grandfather, the retired homicide detective... is going to great lengths to prove that she did not put herself in that shoot.
Because from the immediate looks of it, people were like, okay, it's a suicide.
Which again, I have like the autopsy and everything that we're going to go through in part two. but that seemed to be what they all decided was the official cause of death, and her family and friends...
And police officers agree, like retired police officers are like, no, this doesn't make sense.
So we're going to go into all of that. We're going to go into the physics of why it doesn't make sense that she put herself in there. and we'll get more into the unfortunate injuries that she suffered.
Because what ended up happening was somehow she went from the 12th floor in the garbage chute, went 12 floors down. and went through a compactor at the bottom of this garbage chute before being spat out into this compactor room.
So she went through like a really awful, awful death.
Jesus. So. hope you guys stick around for part two when we're going to discuss all of the different theories of what happened and this is still like an ongoing thing we're going to try and get to the truth we're gonna we're gonna figure this out guys from a totally different continent we're gonna figure this we are And Phoebe's mom will be happy because she said, it is the truth we are missing here.
We are being told that our daughter, granddaughter, and sister... put herself into this thing because she was a damaged, disturbed girl, and that is just not true.
I don't know what happened. I just feel sure that she didn't put herself down that chute, either accidentally or on purpose.
I agree, man. Natalie, I'm just and we're not going to like, you know, we're not going to condemn anybody here.
No. Obviously, we do not have, you know, we're not there.
Because we don't have the legal team to back us up if we do.
And we just don't want to get sued by anybody.
So, you know, everything's going to be peppered with allegedly.
It's just if it's going to be like a little shoot back to the Germany Rams.
Oh, yeah. And the Kurt Cobain one. We cover our butts.
Hold on to our butts. We're going to tell you what we think, but we're going to throw some allegedly's in there.
So hang on for part two. It's going to come out in the beginning of next week, so it won't be long.
But I think we're going to transition right from that into thanking some of our Patronuses.
Let's do it. Let's do it. So first up, we would like to thank Catherine, I think it's Nake. k-n-a-k-e as long as it's not katherine knight i will accept it There you go.
Thank you, Catherine Nake. Wow. And it's an Aussie reference. ozzy and ozzy on the episode that was british ozzy i think you say ozzy Aussie.
Aussie. Aussie. I'm asking you a question.
Thank you, Catherine. Thanks. The next one is they actually requested that we say this for their name because they were like, I don't want to get people excited. so I'd like to thank the other Amy Poehler the other Amy Poehler I'm glad that you donated and not the Amy Amy Poehler.
I'm more excited that you donated. You're the other best.
You're the number one Amy Poehler. Numero uno.
Let's be real. Thanks, the other Amy Poehler.
Thank you, Amy Poehler. So the next person we'd like to thank is... Thank you, Donnie Girl.
Thanks, Donnie Girl. this that reminds me of like brawny paper towels yeah it does it reminds me of that as well or donnie or dawn soap yes that's what it is reminds me of um animals covered in oil.
What a wonderful thing to think about. What a wonderful world.
So thanks, Donnie girl. Thank you. The next person we would like to thank is actually we would just like to say to this person.
Mm-hmm. Happy late anniversary, Marsha.
From your husband, Dave. Happy late anniversary, Marsha.
He said you love our podcast, which makes me very happy, so thank you.
Dave, that was kind. Yeah, and he was like, she'll be really excited if you say that.
Let's all find a Dave. Happy late anniversary, Marsha and Dave.
Happy late anniversary and here's to many more.
Here's to many more. Thanks, guys. Thanks, guys.
Next person we want to thank is... Thank you, Christina Manns.
Whose manns is this? Whose... mans is this it's christina's man it is thanks christina thank you find your mans find them Now the next person we want to thank is Veronica Wolf.
That would have been a better name for the show, Veronica Mars.
It would. Thanks, Veronica. you're a wolf we love you oh thank you thank you Next person we're gonna thank is Alyssa Horn.
We're gonna blow our horn trumpet because you're the best.
Toot your horn, girl. That's what I should have said. thank you Alyssa thank you what's a horn trumpet and the last Patronus that we are thanking on this episode is Ever.
We're never thanking anyone else. This is it.
Thank you, Ambrosia Shelton. What? That just one more time.
Ambrosia Shelton. Yes. Right. Thank you, Ambrosia Shelton.
That was like smooth caramel. Butter. I love your name.
It just felt good. Ambrosia. I like that.
Yes. I like it. Thank you, Ambrosia, for existing.
For real. Thank you to everybody. Thank you to all our Patronuses.
Thank you so much. And if you're listening and you want to hear your name but you haven't donated to the Patreon yet. you can head on over to patreon.com slash morbid podcast and donate if you're feeling so inclined.
If you're feeling inclined. If you're not feeling that inclined, you can keep up with us on Instagram by following us at Morbid Podcast.
And then if you don't have an Instagram, maybe you have a Twitter and you want to follow us and tweet at us.
A morbid podcast. And maybe you're real kicking it old school and you just want to email us. morbidpodcast.gmail.com.
And if you don't have any social media whatsoever, but at least you have a computer, you can head over to our website at...
Morbidpodcast.com. And check us out. Do it.
We hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep listening.
It. Weird. Bye. I don't want to do one about this case.
Yeah, this one's sad. Yeah. So stay tuned for part two, guys.
Bye. Love you, Mina. Bye. Bye. Thank you.
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