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Hi CrimeJunkies. I'm your host Ashley Flowers.
And the story I have for you today shook you when I first shared it.
And I know we say this all the time, but people literally don't believe that this type of crime could happen here.
It wasn't part of the brand.
Here was supposed to be the happiest place on Earth.
That's right. Today, we're going to Orlando, Florida.
Hi CrimeJunkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers.
And I'm Britt. And happy Monday, everyone.
I'm going to ruin your day.
This is the story of the Tote family.
Know those places that still feel like they're straight out of the 1950s, you know, where nothing bad ever happens?
That's Celebration, Florida.
The manicured lawns and picture -perfect houses and condos cultivate a sense of tranquility.
It's a place where neighbors sit out on their front porch in the evening, soaking in the warm Florida sun and greeting their neighbors as they pass.
But on this day, January 13, 2020, a federal agent parked on Reserve Street isn't admiring the landscaping or enjoying the weather.
He's got his eyes trained on one house, the home of Anthony Tote.
There's three agents staked outside his house because they have a warrant for Tony's arrest because of insurance fraud.
He owns a physical therapy practice in Connecticut, and he had actually been billing his patient's companies for, like, I mean, we're talking tens of thousands of dollars for appointments that they just never actually had.
So this investigation has been going on for months, and they've actually been trying to track him down for the last two of those since he vanished from Connecticut.
Now, the agent watching the house doesn't see any movement inside.
The blinds are drawn.
It doesn't look like there are any lights on, and he's actually just about to leave when suddenly the front door opens and out walks Tony.
Now right away, the agent can tell that something's wrong because Tony does not look good.
I mean, he can hardly walk, he looks sick, and his behavior is just weird.
Like he sits down in a chair just kind of looking around, and then eventually he gets up and slowly, seemingly painfully, goes back inside.
So now that he has eyes on him, he calls for backup from officers at the Osceola County Sheriff's Office.
And actually, this isn't the first time that local officers have been to this house either because they had gotten several calls from Tony's sister asking for wellness checks, one on December 29th and then one on January 10th.
And the one in December, apparently she had asked for someone to go check on them because she had been told the whole family got like super sick with the flu.
She hadn't spoken to them in days.
She called Tony and his wife, Megan, like one of their sons.
And although she had gotten some texts like up until the 26th, the last time she actually spoke to any of them was like the 23rd or 24th.
So are they making the connection that this is the same guy they've been checking in on?
I don't think that they're making that connection, no, but I'm pretty sure that the officers are at least aware that something's been happening or that there have been wellness checks.
So I'm guessing nothing really happened at that first check, though.
No, I mean, just like now in this agent sitting there, like the blinds were closed, lights were off, no movement in the house.
And you know, in some areas or for some people that might be concerning, but celebration specifically is full of snowbirds, basically people who only live there part time.
And the totes were known to travel.
Tony, especially, like he traveled regularly between Connecticut and Florida.
So just because no one came to the door, they weren't all that worried.
But things had gotten a little more concerning just a few days ago when Tony's sister had called back and added that apparently Tony's wife, Megan, had mentioned that the world was going to be ending on the 28th, but like she didn't really know what that meant.
I'm sorry, the world's going to end and no one has been able to reach them.
Ashley, we did not grow up in basically a cult to not call this like a red flag of red flags.
I know. And I think, again, like this is what she's doing.
She's calling the police.
She's hoping someone has eyes on them.
Like what else do you do?
But like fly down there.
Not everyone has the ability to do that.
And here's the thing.
It's not even just Tony's sister who sounded the alarm bell because the totes landlord had called police because they hadn't paid their rent and they were actually getting evicted.
Like they rent the house that they live in.
And, you know, obviously when you stop paying your bills, like that's not a good thing.
So the landlord attached a note to their door basically giving them notice.
But that's the thing.
This note hadn't even been touched.
And this landlord had also seen a Facebook page called Looking for the Tote family that had been started by worried family members.
So now she's worried, especially because Tony and Megan have three kids.
So she actually called to request police check on them as well.
But again, even during this call, Fox 35 reported that they didn't see anything out of the ordinary.
OK, but now they know he's home.
I mean, they just saw him hobbling around.
Right. And they are fully prepared to serve that arrest warrant.
But they're not sure who else could be in the house.
So the sheriff's office sends some extra officers out just in case.
So once they're all there, a group of officers and agents approach the front door, knocking and announcing themselves as police.
But no one answers.
So they knock again.
Still nothing. But again, they like no, Tony is in there.
So eventually they just go ahead and try the door and they find that it's unlocked.
Cautiously, they walk inside still announcing themselves.
And that is when they smell it.
It is a smell that anyone who has been on the job knows and will never forget.
Something or someone is dead as they go further into the house.
They come to a set of stairs and when they look up, they see Tony standing at the top.
And just like the original agent said, he does not look well.
He looks sick, he's mumbling and he's trying to make his way down the stairs.
But he can again barely move.
So it takes him a while.
When he finally gets to them, the officers ask him if there's anyone else in the house.
And he says that his wife is sleeping upstairs.
And he actually at this point even turns around and calls for her.
But like, nobody hears any kind of response.
So then they ask him, OK, well, where are the kids?
And then his response is strange.
She says he doesn't know like he can't remember if they went to a sleepover last night.
It's all just really fuzzy.
So a few of the officers and an agent walk upstairs and at the top, they see a door open to a bedroom and the agent would later explain that she can't really make out the details, but it looks like someone is lying in bed.
So she pushes the door open even further and sees a mattress at the foot of the bed as well with what looks like more people in it.
But even without getting close, she can tell that these people aren't sleeping.
They are dead. According to a podcast produced by The Day called Looking for the Tote Family, which was one of our main source materials for this episode, she can see a few feet peeking out from under the sheets and blankets.
And just one look tells her that they have been there for a while.
The officers count four bodies in total.
Meghan, who is on the bed and two of their three kids, 13 year old Alec and 11 year old Tyler.
There's a dog bed next to the mattress too.
And in it, they find the family dog Breezy dead as well.
OK, but where's the third kid?
Well, that's their first question, because as the officers look around the room, no one sees four year old Zoe.
So they ask Tony where she is.
But again, Tony is like really out of it.
He says something like, Oh, isn't she in her bed sleeping?
But we know she's not.
I mean, officers are going room by room looking in beds.
They're looking in closets anywhere they can.
But she is not there.
So they ask him again.
But all he does is mumble something that they can't even make out.
So they have no other option.
They just keep pressing.
Where is Zoe? But he can't or won't tell them.
And they're so desperate at this point that I mean, they're literally looking in like the freezer, the fridge, anywhere they think she could be or fit into.
Because obviously, their minds are going to the worst case scenario at this point.
Although I'm sure at the same time, like there is probably part of them that's hoping to find her safe and sound.
Maybe she's staying with a relative.
Maybe she's with a friend.
Maybe she's just not in that house.
But when they go back to the bedroom with Megan, Alec and Tyler, that's when they notice another bundle of blankets laying at Megan's feet across the bed.
And when they pull back the covers, that's when they find Zoe.
I don't even want to ask, but how did they miss her the first time?
Not to get too graphic.
Basically, the bodies had obviously been in there for, like, weeks, like a good long while.
And since she is so much smaller than the rest of the family, she was more decomposed, which actually it was the same for Breezy, their dog.
So there was less of her to find.
You know what I mean?
It was easier for her to be lost in that bundle.
But now that all the members of the family have been found, the officers and agents exit the house with Tony and they call for even more backup.
As they're waiting, Tony mentions that he had taken a large dose of Benadryl in order to try and die by suicide, which probably explains why he is acting the way he is.
But they can't have that happen.
He is the only one who can tell them what the heck happened inside that house.
So he is taken directly to the hospital.
Before long, the house is swarming with officers.
There are crime scene units, officials from the medical examiner's office, federal agents, I mean, the whole deal.
And they go through the house room by room, but especially focusing on that bedroom where the bodies were found.
And I don't think I can fully comprehend how bizarre and just straight up horrifying it is, because there are a mix of items in there that point to just some twisted, sick shit.
Like there are stuffed animals.
There are other toys.
There are two knives, both with blood on them and a few packages of Benadryl.
And looking for the Tote family reports that there are even snacks like peanut M &Ms and Gatorade, like snacks that have been sitting out for days and days or even unopened, untouched, or or has Tony been eating and drinking in that room this whole time?
That's the thing. They don't know what has been going on this whole time or what he was doing this whole time.
But the snacks aren't even like the end of it.
They also find zip ties in the room too.
There's a restraint that's tied to the bed.
There's this first aid spray with bloody fingerprints on it.
And then they find two BB guns, one is just out in the open and the other is in this bag in a closet.
And then outside of the bedroom, what they find that's notable is they find two cell phones, which they think possibly are Tony's and Meghan's.
And it's not even just like right outside the bedroom.
They're actually on a table on their front porch.
And then there's a letter.
Now, it's been typed and printed out.
And when investigators read it, they are stunned.
And I think to understand the rest of this story, you need to hear the whole thing.
So, Britt, can you read the letter for us?
I mean, can I? Sure.
Do I want to TBD all of this episode?
Yeah, here we go. As 2019 comes to a close and 2020 commencing, we as a family decided this course of action of salvation for several reasons.
We are seeing the end of world prophecy coming true and choose not to have our family suffer and be subjected to foreseen, torturous, cataclysmic demise and continued agony.
We will no longer be separated.
Tony will be Willis always and forever now.
Meghan will no longer be subjected to constant daily pain, torture of living and breathing from her progressive liver and Lyme disease complications.
We believe we made the right decision for our family to gain salvation and togetherness forever.
The continued increasing depression as a result of Al Ghula's suicide anniversary, coupled with the agony of the miscarriage of Connor Michael recently and Avery eight years ago, has just fueled the overall depression our whole family suffers on a daily basis.
In conversation with the kids constantly, the focus of everlasting salvation and being together forever without pain and suffering is our ultimate goal and want.
In addition, this family lives in daily constant fear of Robert.
We are very proud of what we contributed to this world, what our children have contributed and the love we share for each other.
Our one final wish is that we are kept together.
Please distribute our ashes along with our fur baby breezy in either the ocean or at harkness so we may be with dad in eternal rest.
We have prayed and we have meditated to this decision.
Please continue to pray for our salvation and please be in peace that we are no longer suffering.
We are sorry for the anguish and sorrow this has caused you, but it was a decision we made as a family.
Now we will be together forever without pain and suffering and we will watch over and protect all of you.
We love you all. Uh, so yeah, I have so many questions like they're listing people we don't even know like Robert, why are they afraid of him?
And who is algula? There's a lot here, Ashley.
Yeah, I think the best thing to do is just to kind of break this down bit by bit because I mean, this letter is really the first clue that things might not be so straightforward.
So just starting at the top again, it says, as 2019 comes to a close and 2020 commencing, we as a family decided this course of action of salvation for several reasons.
We are seeing the end of world prophecy coming true and choose not to have our family suffer and be subjected to foreseen tortures, cataclysmic demise, and continued agony.
Okay, yeah, I caught that right away.
Any mention of a prophecy about the end of the world just screams doomsday cult to me.
Yeah, so here's the thing about that, though.
As far as investigators know, at this point, they're not part of any cult or even like formal religious organization.
But obviously, again, they're like, just finding this.
They're the very start of their investigation.
It's now at the top of their growing list of things to ask Tony when they can.
So Britt, will you read the next part?
We will no longer be separated.
Tony will be will as always and forever now.
Megan will no longer be subjected to constant daily pain, torture of living and breathing from her progressive liver and Lyme disease complications.
Okay, so I don't get that part at all, like the part about Tony because it's kind of written like Tony's already dead.
And spoiler alert, dude's still here.
And so this is one of the things about the note that doesn't make sense.
Like, we don't actually know who wrote it.
Like the point of view changes a lot.
Sometimes it seems like maybe Megan wrote it.
Sometimes it seems like maybe Tony wrote it.
Or like the collective we is used a lot.
But we don't know who actually, and I say penned, even though it's typed, who penned this letter.
So what about that other part, like Megan's health issues?
Is that real? Well, I mean, most of what we know about Megan's health comes from Tony.
I haven't seen the Lyme disease thing disputed.
But we're actually going to come back to her health later on.
So just like, keep it in the back of your head.
But let me jump to the next part.
So it says, we believe we made the right decision for our family to gain salvation and togetherness forever.
The continued increasing depression as a result of Algula's suicide anniversary coupled with the agony of the miscarriage of Connor Michael recently and every eight years ago has just fueled the overall depression.
Our whole family suffers on a daily basis.
Again, who's Algula?
Okay, so Al is Megan's dad.
He died by suicide back in 2002.
So I mean, right here in this paragraph, there are clearly some pretty devastating losses that they've had.
So they've had these miscarriages, they've had her dad who died by suicide.
So you can understand that there was this, you know, cloud.
Like a sorrow, yeah.
Yeah. Will you read the next part?
Yeah. In conversation with the kids constantly, the focus of everlasting salvation and being together forever without pain and suffering is our ultimate goal in one.
In addition, this family lives in daily constant fear of Robert.
Okay. First of all, no, your children didn't like make this family decision with you.
That's bullshit. But yeah, that's the part of all of this that like, just like grinds me even when you talk about like the family depression.
Like, yes, I'm sure grandpa's suicide affected the kids.
And I'm sure your miscarriage, if they were even aware of it, could have potentially affected the kids.
But they are not suffering so much because of those that they made this collective family decision, which they are not even capable of making.
Right. But go on, sorry.
Yeah, total bullshit.
But I have to come back with, who's Robert?
Right. Okay, so now Robert is Tony's dad.
And again, as they're reading this letter, investigators don't know anything about him.
So they are just as confused as you or I picking it up for the first time.
Just like Megan's health, we're going to get back to him though.
So let's keep going.
Okay. Do you want me to just read the last part?
Yeah, please. We are very proud of what we contributed to this world, what our children have contributed and the love we share for each other.
Our one final wish is that we are kept together.
Please distribute our ashes along with our fur baby breezy in either the ocean or at harkness so that we may be with dad in eternal rest.
We have prayed and we have meditated to this decision.
Please continue to pray for our salvation and please be in peace that we are no longer suffering.
We are sorry for the anguish and sorrow this has caused you, but it was a decision we made as a family.
Now we will be together forever without pain and suffering and we will watch over each other and protect all of you.
We love you all. I mean, great we broke it down, but I feel like there's still so much to process in this letter and I just have more and more questions.
I think the glaring thing out of all of this though is Tony is definitely supposed to be dead, right?
It seems like that.
Yeah. I mean, like this seems like a suicide note on behalf of the whole family, yet there's still a man standing, right?
So you're right. This note leaves a lot of questions for investigators to try and answer both for themselves and for the family of the totes who literally as they were taking everything in this scene in before they could even talk to Tony, the family were calling police in Connecticut to report the totes
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Officials in Connecticut had no idea what was being unearthed in Florida.
So when Tony's family called the local sheriff's office to request another welfare check, they had a bomb dropped on them.
Even though police in Connecticut are in the know, no one talks to the family just yet.
Because by this point, you know, investigators are at the hospital with Tony trying to understand just what the hell happened in that house.
Adrian Cutway reported for Quick Orlando that he doesn't have any life -threatening injuries, but he does have some wounds that need to be taken care of.
For instance, he's got some injuries to his hands.
There's like a bruise on his chest, something on his neck, but again, nothing life -threatening.
So while they're there at the hospital, they get his statement.
Twice, actually. And here's what he says.
He explains that both he and Meghan started on this spiritual journey a while ago.
And as part of this journey, they watched videos on the afterlife.
And one thing led to another, he said, which ended with them realizing that if they all wanted to be together after they died, they would have to die together.
I'm sorry. One thing led to another?
How the hell does someone go from starting a spiritual journey to femilicide?
Girl, your guess is as good as mine.
Also, like, again, I'm maybe not the person to ask, but like, I don't know of any doctrine that says like, whoever you die with, you stay with for eternity.
So like, this is some on the fringes stuff.
Or they're just like projecting onto something weird.
Maybe. But anyways, he says that they started formulating this plan back in either early June or July, and by December, they had it ready.
Now, he doesn't say exactly which day all of this went down, but one night in late December, sometime before Christmas, he says he stabbed both of the boys in the abdomen and then suffocated them.
And then he suffocated Zoe, but he can't remember if he stabbed her too.
And then he suffocated Breezy, the dog, so that she could also go with them.
What? Were the kids awake?
Like, did they know what was happening?
So he says that all of this happened in the middle of the night while they were asleep.
But I mean, logically, if they were, if they were stabbed, then they would have woken up.
There could have maybe been a struggle.
So I don't, again, we'll get into all the details.
There's a lot of questions around whether his story is true or not, but that's the story he gives about the kids.
And he says that the following day, it was Megan's turn.
Is a following day, Ashley?
Okay. Listen, let me get through this part.
I'm sorry. Listen, you're gonna be like this the whole time.
Like, everyone will.
The following day, apparently she stabbed herself twice in the abdomen, but that didn't kill her.
So then she took some Tylenol PM, and eventually Tony suffocated her too.
And he says after they were all dead, he waited for rigor mortis to fade, which would have been about 36 hours.
And then he brought them all into the bedroom and arranged them so that they could be quote unquote comfortable.
And maybe that was part of their belief.
Like, they had to be in the same room to be together in the next life?
Make up whatever you want.
Like, it doesn't make sense.
Then he says finally it's his turn.
So he said he spent the next few weeks trying and failing to kill himself before police showed up at his door.
Okay. I find it a bit odd how he successfully sent five other souls.
Yes, I'm counting the dog to the afterlife as planned, no issues, but he couldn't seem to send himself.
I mean, did he have stab wounds in his stomach?
Nope. Shocker. I'm sorry if this sounds cold or callous or whatever, but in my opinion, if he really believed the end of the world was coming and they needed to get to the other side as a family.
So they all had to die together.
I just am having a hard time believing that he would have, quote unquote, failed so many times for weeks and weeks, you know?
And like weeks and weeks that he's in this house with them.
Like I absolutely agree.
When you think about it, this man killed his kids.
Like I hate, this is why I hate episodes like this, the Chris Watts.
I can take a lot, but like the idea of a parent who, it's the one person a kid feels like should be protecting them.
This dude killed his kids, and he doesn't even seem to have much if any remorse about it, because he's saying like, oh, they're in a better place, but like, you're still here.
Like it does not track.
So does he ever explain anything about that end of world prophecy from the note?
I don't know. Not all of his hospital confession is publicly available, but it doesn't seem like he mentions anything about like premonitions of the world.
From what I can tell anyway, over the next few days, investigators talk to the totes family.
They talk to their friends, neighbors, pretty much anyone they can to try and figure out why this happened.
Now, everyone they talk to say that they hadn't noticed any red flags up until like very recently, except with the exception of Tony's sister, because she's the one who said that Megan had been talking about this end of the world doomsday stuff.
But this was all news to everyone else.
Yeah, which is to me a little weird, right?
Because we're not hearing that they like isolated themselves from everyone.
It seems like, you know, they were still around there.
I mean, even if they're not super social, well, and it doesn't like they weren't even processizing.
Like they weren't like trying to get other people to join them.
There was what a fancy word.
Oh, my God. Preaching the good news.
Yeah, they weren't like trying to like convince everyone else that they were right.
This was like their personal convictions and that was it and they didn't even share it.
Right, like you think the world is ending and like you don't even like mention it to your family.
I just I find that part hard to believe that you have you have such a strong conviction like this.
If everyone's plan really was to like take their own life and the life of their kids, of course, you're not going to tell people that.
But surely you would be like warning people of like the end of times, you would think.
But that's not what was happening.
The communication with everyone is pretty normal, even leading up to their deaths.
Like in looking for the tote family, Megan's aunt and uncle say that they had gotten some texts from her around Christmas, where she said that the whole family was going to go on a trip to St.
Augustine. They you know, we just might not have her phones much if at all, which was so normal.
Totally fine. Zero red flags.
But then just before they were supposed to go on that trip, they got some more messages saying that the whole family had gotten really sick with the flu.
So they had to postpone.
Now, I'm not sure how many days after that they heard from the family again, but sometime after Christmas, Tony had texted them saying that Megan had misplaced her cell phone.
And he also mentioned that they were going to go off the grid for a while.
And then after that, that's when they didn't hear anything else.
Okay, but how much of all that communication was actually just Tony?
Because according to him, everyone else was killed sometime before Christmas.
Bingo. And this is the part that's really unclear because we know that all of the messages sent after Christmas were 100 percent Tony.
So saying that Megan lost her phone, they're going to be off the grid, like that's him seemingly covering his tracks.
But before then, it's a bit of a mystery.
So like in my mind, even the one person that Megan supposedly told about this doomsday stuff, which was Tony's sister, was it even Megan?
That's the question.
So is that because they haven't really pinpointed when the family died or because even if they were alive, Tony was still like the main communicator?
I think it's because they still don't know exactly when they die, which is kind of a central question in this.
And so what they do is they try and build out a timeline using people outside of Tony, who is very much our unreliable narrator.
And they do this by talking to his family, by talking to neighbors.
Now they learned that there was a Christmas concert in mid -December that the whole family went to, which is the last time that they were seen alive.
But other people who attended remember noticing that they did kind of stick out, like everyone else is wearing like super festive Christmas sweaters.
But the totes were dressed more plainly in quote unquote regular clothes, which honestly is neither here nor there.
Like to me, sure, maybe they knew they weren't going to be around for Christmas, but they also could have just missed the memo to go all out and dress festive.
Yeah, I don't know how like normal, like I would totally be all black to this thing.
And like, that's that's it for me.
So I am with you there.
But actually, speaking of their neighbors, police also try and get a sense of who this family was.
Again, did anyone notice any red flags, even if they weren't red flags at the time, maybe in hindsight, but what they hear is overwhelmingly positive.
One neighbor says that the kids were extremely polite, they were well behaved, they would take their trash out or hold the door open if they needed help.
And even though the kids were homeschooled, they went to an actual school twice a week.
And so they were involved in extracurricular activities.
Megan went to yoga, transported her kids everywhere.
The next door neighbors were interviewed for that podcast I mentioned.
And they have a son that was good friends with Alec and Tyler.
And they said that they played together a lot.
And all in all, they seemed like such a normal family, a little reserved, sure, especially Tony.
But to be fair, Tony didn't spend the majority of his time in Florida.
So he was in Connecticut during the week.
I told you he traveled all the time.
And that's because he still worked up in Connecticut during the weekday.
And then he would come down to Florida on the weekends to be with his family.
So it was kind of normal to them that he wasn't even as involved as she was.
He didn't really have the connections that Megan and the kids had down in Florida.
So informative, but kind of unhelpful to get them to how we ended up here.
So they turn to the physical evidence.
All four autopsies are conducted on January 14th.
And still, they don't really provide any more answers.
The ME finds that all four died of diphenhydramine toxicity, aka a Benadryl overdose, as well as, quote, homicidal violence of unspecified means.
Now, what we're able to see from what was released is that both boys were stabbed once in the abdomen and Megan was stabbed twice in the abdomen.
The only one who may not have been stabbed was Zoe, but the ME notes that she was so decomposed that they couldn't really tell.
Maybe I just missed it.
But did Tony mention drugging them with the Benadryl in his statement?
Yeah, so that part didn't make it into his first story that he told police.
But honestly, that story pretty much is out the window the more that they learn from the ME because BTW, all of the stab wounds that the ME finds, the ME says those were made post -mortem, like not while they were still alive, which is what Tony said.
Okay, that doesn't make any sense.
Of everything he could have lied about, like, literally, he could have lied about who stabbed them.
But no, he lied about when they were stabbed?
Yeah, it's super weird, right?
Well, and why would he stab them after they'd already died?
I think that's also a good question.
Also something I don't have an answer for.
Now, they even did an autopsy on Breezy, the dog.
But much like Zoe, there just wasn't much that the vet could do to determine her cause of death, although there was a small hole that potentially could have been a stab wound.
Hard to say. So again, it's more just an FYI, like it didn't really provide any answers.
So with this information that they get on the 14th, investigators decide to interview Tony again on January 15th.
Because obviously, there are now even more questions.
And this time, he gives a bit more detail than in his hospital interviews.
When it comes to why he killed his family, he explains that Meghan first became interested in the afterlife in April of 2019.
Pause. Rewind. He said they started planning the murders in July or even June.
It only took them three months to decide they should kill their whole family.
Well, according to Tony's version of events, yes.
Do we believe Tony's version of events?
I would say no. Right.
So in this interview, he elaborates on why they started researching the afterlife in the first place.
So he claims that it was all tied to Meghan's health.
She started looking for alternative ways to feel better because he says that she was in a lot of pain, both physically and emotionally.
She was, at least according to him, chronically ill.
She was in more pain every day.
And then their miscarriages over the years took a heavy emotional toll, he says, on both of them.
But this is also where he says that Meghan started having quote unquote visions, many of which showed an impending apocalypse.
He says that she would see their family being separated and subjected to all sorts of terrible atrocities.
And they knew that they couldn't let that happen.
And in order to avoid it and still all be together, they had to die together.
And apparently this notion of being together was really appealing to them.
Because with Tony living part time in Connecticut, part time in Florida, they didn't have much time together as a family.
And like the note alluded to, he reiterates that the kids were basically in on the plan, which again, we call like major bullsh** on.
He claims that when they decided this was something that they were going to do, he says him and Meghan sat the kids down and asked them questions like, if mommy died, how would you feel?
If daddy died, how would you feel?
And he claims that the kids were basically like, well, we don't want to live without you, we would rather die too.
Which even if this happened, huge if, of course, a little kid is going to say that doesn't mean they're asking to be murdered by their father.
I mean, I know this is some gross levels of manipulation here.
I know, I know. Now, according to the podcast, Tony then goes on to describe how he researched different ways of killing the kids so that they would die in the fastest, most painless way possible.
And then they settled on Benadryl to put them to sleep and then stabbing them while they were out.
So he says they make this pudding pie.
They added a ton of Benadryl to it, hoping that all three kids would just overdose and die while they slept, but then they didn't.
So the next night he says that he and Meghan set their alarm for 1130 p .m.
I don't know why 1130 specifically, but he's adamant that that was the time.
And then he says that they did it together.
He gives a lot of detail, none of which I think matters.
So I'm not going to go into it for this story.
Plus, I think it's pointless because his story is full of moral lies because he talks about, again, the stabbing being done first when we know that that's not true.
So anyways, he gives this horrific play by play about how it's him and Meghan.
They kill two of their kids together and then he kills the third alone.
The only thing you need to know is that the how does resemble his first story involving stabbing and suffocation.
Then after the kids are dead, he says Breezy was killed because again, they wanted her with them as well.
And then Meghan wanted to go next.
But what's the timeline here?
Is this the next day or now he's saying it all happened at the same time.
So this is what I was saying.
I think he's sticking with the original timeline, but if this is all starting at 1130 p .m., I think by the time she dies, it is technically the next day.
It's like after midnight or whatever.
Right. So according to him, she drank some wine, some Tylenol PM to calm her nerves and then stabbed herself.
And he said that she was targeting her inferior vena cava, which is basically like this big blood vessel.
So she would bleed out quickly, but she didn't hit it the first time.
So 45 minutes goes by.
She's still alive. He says she drinks a lot of Benadryl and then stabs herself again.
But again, she didn't die.
And he goes into so much detail about what she did and where she was, how she just couldn't die.
And then at some point he says that she asked him to suffocate her, which he said he didn't know if he could do it.
But her response was something to the extent of if you love me, you can do this.
So he had her take more Benadryl and then he suffocated her with a pillow while they were laying there in bed.
But here's the thing about how he says they all died.
So not only did the autopsies show that all of the stab wounds were again post mortem, which is not in line with any of the stories he told, but it also showed that there was no evidence of suffocation in any of the autopsies.
How is his version of events so different from what the physical evidence is clearly saying?
Because he's lying.
Anyway, Tony says that after Megan died, he laid in bed with her for a while before eventually moving the kids to the primary bedroom so that they could all be together.
He says he puts rosaries in their hands.
And then once they're all arranged, that's when he tried to die by suicide.
But I mean, we know how that went.
He says he tries numerous methods, all of which didn't work or he chickened out of.
I think the latter is probably the closest to the truth, if even true at all.
And, you know, as he's talking about this, like, he he makes note to mention that he's not big on guns.
So he like didn't just go out and buy a gun, which could have been an easy way if he really was that desperate.
But apparently he read online that you can kill yourself with a pellet gun.
So he went out and purchased two pellet guns.
Obviously, that didn't work either.
And he even considered, I guess, buying a real gun, but he didn't because there was a three day waitlist.
Okay, again, not to sound like I'm rooting for him to die.
But, dude, you were in that house with their bodies for weeks.
Yeah. Like, what's three days?
How does this make any sense?
It doesn't. And here's the other thing.
So by the way, he didn't stay in that house the whole time.
Apparently, at some point, he actually went to a store, I know to get more Benadryl.
Another day he drove to Sarasota for some unknown reason.
And then he lost his phone at a Starbucks.
What? Yeah, dude, it's getting Starbucks.
And then he they have this con so they're renting the house, they have this condo.
And we know he makes another trip over to their condo to find this necklace that he says Zoe wanted.
And this is all part of, again, this elaborate story he has.
He says that when they all decided to die by suicide, each of them decided to have a special item when they died.
And this necklace that he was going to get from the condo was Zoe's special item.
Well, and like, yes, he's making all these trips, but he would have had to leave to get the pellet guns at some point, too.
I mean, I don't think DoorDash delivers those.
Right. So you're not just like at home in some state of psychosis.
You're getting Starbucks.
Right. At this point, are investigators just, you know, letting him talk, getting as much out of him as possible or are they calling him out on his BS?
Well, so I know that they confront him with the autopsy report towards the end, like after he's done confessing, but it doesn't do anything.
He's still adamant that the kids and Megan were stabbed before they die.
Okay, dude. So whether they know what to make of the conflicting information or not, they are still trying to get as much as possible out of him.
Now, he confirms that everything sent from their phones after Christmas was, in fact, him, although he can't remember, he says, the exact day that they all died.
So he can't say if anything before Christmas was him, too.
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Now, in talking to him, investigators obviously ask about his finances, because they're trying to figure out if there could be any other motive here.
And like, hi, this whole thing started with him being in some hot water with the feds, so they're wondering if financial issues could have played any part in what happened.
But Tony says, no. He acknowledges that their finances weren't good, but he claims that they didn't influence his decisions at all.
Listen, I know we're not professionals, but money is usually brought up in a lot of the cases we've seen like this.
So to me, it seems like it's got to play at least some sort of contributing factor here in my opinion.
It's hard to ignore, again, especially when we're not talking about like a couple little things that were like getting him in hot water.
Right, the feds were looking at him.
Yeah. So with his confession in hand, Tony is charged with the first -degree homicides of his family as well as a count of animal cruelty.
And since he confessed, it seems like it'll be a pretty straightforward case, right?
But this case is anything but straightforward.
And according to more of Adrian Cutway's reporting, Tony throws another curveball when he pleads, not guilty.
Not guilty by reason of insanity or just straight up not guilty and stop.
Not guilty and stop.
He didn't commit the murders, according to him now.
Cool. But he confessed in a note to the police twice.
You're not wrong. The thing you need to know about Tony, though, is that he thinks he can control the narrative of what happened that night.
And I think that at some point, he realized that he is going to spend the rest of his life in prison if he doesn't change his story.
Did that just not occur to him before?
I don't know. I don't know if he thought maybe like because he was selling this attempted suicide thing that he would look like a victim.
None of this makes sense, Britt.
So over the course of a few calls to his sister from jail, he basically does a complete 180 from his original statements.
So now he is saying that Megan was the one who killed the kids and he had no part in it.
There it is. Yeah. How many times have we seen this like disgusting defense by men who killed their families?
And then all of a sudden it's like the dead wife who cannot defend herself.
Like tale is old as time.
So his new story is that he doesn't remember what happened at all.
All he knows is that he went over to their condo to look for the necklace that Zoe wanted.
It's like a Mickey necklace.
And he says that he fell asleep there.
And then he doesn't know.
He doesn't know what he told investigators.
He doesn't know anything about his family's death.
Knows nothing. But that confession of his was pretty detailed.
I should say confessions of his were detailed.
And what's wild is that he just keeps conveniently remembering things when he needs to.
Like even though he doesn't remember anything, he knows that it was Megan who killed the kids.
And his description of her changes drastically from what it was before.
Because now he's saying that he basically did what she told him to do.
He claims she was controlling over bearing.
She prevented him from asking for help when it came to things like their financial crisis or his health.
So they are in financial crisis.
Yeah. Yes, of course.
So again, we have all this fraud stuff happening.
And in addition to that, maybe as the fraud's a result of this, but they were living way above their means.
And his physical therapy practice just wasn't making enough to keep them afloat.
So he at first had taken out loans, but then he couldn't pay back the loans.
And it just created this mound of debt that he could not get on top of.
Wait, in this new version, was he still planning on killing his family?
Like why is he looking for the necklace at the condo when he fell asleep?
Okay, yeah. So that's a little confusing, right?
Because in one of their early calls, cause again, we're getting all this from like calls he's having.
He pretty much insinuates that he was still on this plan and he's looking for the necklace because that was Zoe's special item that she wanted to die with.
Right. But in later calls, he changes his tune.
He says that it was all Megan.
The necklace was just something that Zoe wanted, but not because her plan was to die with it, just because she wanted it.
So again, this guy just says whatever is convenient for him at the time, I think is the takeaway.
But there is something else his sister mentions on one of those calls that I think is important.
And that is Robert, their dad, the one that the note said they were scared of.
So basically his sister tells Tony that Robert is using the influx of media attention on their family to claim that he is innocent.
Of course, a dad's going to say his son is innocent.
Oh, no, no, no. Robert is saying that Robert is innocent, not Tony.
Who is saying Robert's guilty and and of what?
Exactly. All right, buckle up, girlfriend, because we have to go back to March of 1980 when Tony was just four years old.
So his family at the time, which consisted of him, his dad, Robert, his mom, Loretta and his sister, they all lived in Pennsylvania.
And one night while his dad was out, a man broke into their house and shot Loretta in the face.
Somehow, thankfully, she survived.
But according to an article for Fox 35, in the subsequent investigation, it was discovered that Robert had been the mastermind behind the whole thing.
Oh, my God. Not only was he having an affair with a 17 year old, he was also engaged to another woman completely, all while he was married to Loretta.
Yeah, this dude is bad news.
And so basically, in order to be with the woman he was engaged to, he hired one of his former students to kill his wife.
But just like Tony is doing now, Robert denied it.
And for a long time, Loretta believed him like she stood by her husband.
She claimed he would never have done that.
But he was still convicted anyway, and he served about 10 years for attempted homicide, for criminal solicitation and criminal conspiracy.
Now, eventually Loretta did come to believe that he had been behind the whole thing.
So she divorced him and took her two kids to Connecticut.
But was toddler Tony home when the attack happened?
Well, here's the thing.
Not only was he home, he may have seen the intruder, although that isn't like totally confirmed.
So yeah, he's in the house for sure, which is why I mean, you can see this led to a strained relationship growing up.
And even now, Robert doesn't have a solid relationship with either of his kids.
But now that the Tote family is back in the headlines, Robert does an interview where he basically says he, Robert, is innocent, which kind of pisses off Tony's sister.
Well, yeah, I'm not even in this family and it's pissing me off.
But is that why the letter said they were scared of him?
I don't understand.
Maybe, maybe. So the family hadn't had much contact with Robert.
So I'm not sure why the note even mentioned him.
But apparently, Tony had gotten over his fear at some point, because in June, while he's sitting in prison waiting for trial, he writes his dad this 27 page letter detailing his side of things.
27 pages seems like a lot of pages for someone who didn't remember anything.
Well, he sure remembers now.
And listen, we absolutely cannot go through the whole thing.
But I have picked out some of the highlights, which Britt, I'm gonna have you read.
Okay, this first part says, I write to you in response to the letters I received from you to correct all inaccuracies created and generated by the creative writing machine press to sell papers and the sheriff's department who went to score a big win after screwing up a prior murder case that the governor of Florida had
to intervene and move it out of this district to respond to absurd allegations in your last letter and to offer you forgiveness.
What is even happening?
The rantings of a madman.
I don't know. I think the other murder that he's talking about is the murder of a woman named Nicole Montalvo, whose case was taken away from one state attorney and given to another.
But that is like literally my best guess.
I could be wrong. Okay.
And just to be clear, this doesn't have anything to do with either of their cases, right?
He's just saying the sheriff's department needs a win because of a screw up somewhere else, right?
Yep. Okay, continuing on.
First of all, I am 10 ,000 % innocent of all these preposterous charges, both on the state case and on the proposed Medicaid fraud case.
The statements taken from me were interesting to say the least.
I'm writing to you in confidence.
Please do not share with anyone but your wife as I need not to be shown off as a trophy again.
Nor do I need to contend with the results of the telephone game when it is time to testify in a couple months.
Please do not break my confidence.
So spoiler alert, we have the letter.
So I just say, well, we're reading this.
Yeah, he didn't want it to get published, but it was entered into evidence and then released in records request.
So here we are. Okay.
The next section says my wife and my children were and still are everything to me.
I love my wife still very deeply.
And it will be the hardest thing to sit there and tell everyone that it was her that did this when I was not home.
And then she committed suicide in front of me.
So he's sticking with his story that all of this was her fault.
Yeah, but he also goes into a lot more detail about her health and how he says it impacted the family.
So in this version, he basically describes her as practically immobile.
He says that she could barely walk and they did numerous physical therapy sessions every day to help her.
He says she lost a ton of weight due to the illness.
And he makes a point to say that her drop in weight, are you ready for this?
Probably not resulted in quote, the loss of all female features gross.
And the way he speaks about her doesn't get any better.
He claims that they moved down to Florida because the warm weather was good for Megan's health and that they moved from the condo into the house because they needed more space.
But even here, he paints Megan as controlling everything from where they live to their finances.
She controlled it all.
So according to him, this whole Medicaid fraud thing, that was all her too.
And he just did whatever she wanted because he quote, honored and obeyed her.
So he's just blaming all his problems on her and basically how loyal he was to her and how much he loved her.
Yeah, because he's a great husband who honored and obeyed her.
The problem was her.
And when he tells a story, he said he was happy to do it.
Because even when he was commuting back and forth every week, working some wild hours just to make ends meet, he knew he was caring for his family.
So he also goes on into pages and pages of detail about what happened the night his family died.
Even though he had just told his sister, he didn't remember anything again.
Yeah, but now he does.
So here is his most recent version of events.
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He writes that on that day, Meghan woke up without pain for the first time in a long time.
And so they wanted to make the most of it.
So they hung out as a family and later that day, Meghan asked if he could go get Zoey's Mickey Mouse necklace from the condo.
He agreed, saying he had to do some maintenance over there anyways, so whatever.
And Meghan also made a comment about wanting everyone to go to bed early that night since they were getting over the flu.
So fast forward, he's at the condo.
He ended up falling asleep in the car and then woke up the next morning in a panic because he said he had missed his and Meghan's 4 30 a .m.
physical therapy session, which I didn't even know was a thing.
Yeah. So he's like goes home fully, quote, prepared to receive a scolding as I would on occasion if I forgot to do something.
But this would have been harsher, end quote.
But he says that that's not what he found.
Britt, can you read the next part?
Yeah, I entered the house to find the melted dessert and remnants on plates on the table.
It was some sort of fruit pudding pie in a graham cracker crust.
It looked very good, as all of my wife's desserts were, but smelled horrible.
Turns out it was a Benadryl pudding pie.
So after that, he kind of rambles on a bit saying that he eventually found Megan at the top of the stairs.
And when he saw her, instead of getting scolded for being late, she was relieved that they didn't get him.
So she then goes on to tell him about a vision that she had gotten the day before while meditating about the end of the world, that it was coming and in order to escape, they had to release their souls.
So he blames this on her, quote unquote, spiritual belief, saying that they had moved further from organized religion.
And while he didn't necessarily believe it again, he supported her and just followed her lead.
Okay, this next section is a long one.
Long story short, she gave them the Benadryl slash Tylenol PM pie, separated them, woke up at 1130, stabbed and then suffocated each one.
At the news of this, I ran to the bathroom and puked.
I was weak. She continued to tell me what happened and then wanted to pray slash meditate together.
I needed to see my kids.
When I went in, I was horrified.
It was peaceful, no signs of struggle, as she said, but I couldn't believe her that there wasn't a struggle.
I got a warm washcloth and wiped each of their faces, held them cried and worked to make them look more comfortable by closing their mouths, eyes and loosening their nasal passages.
It was normal for me to wash their faces when they weren't well.
Throughout that whole time, Meg kept checking on me very calmly asking if I was okay while drinking something.
Turns out the Benadryl she'd been stockpiling for a while.
I would respond to her know you murdered our children.
And she would respond.
Relax and believe in what I saw.
I released their souls.
Okay, if he's in his right mind during all this, why isn't he calling the police?
Because he says Megan hid their phones.
Okay, fine. Go to a neighbor.
Borrow a phone. Also, by the way, the phones are like on the front porch.
So like, right, not that well.
But to your point, you can drive to Starbucks.
You can't drive to a phone.
And so, but you'd specifically ask what you know, the neighbor thing whatever he he has a specific answer for this too.
He was like, Oh, you know, we live in an area with a lot of snowbirds.
So you know, maybe no one was home.
Okay, this is winter.
It's December. It's no bird time.
No birds are supposed to be in Florida.
For sure. Well, and also, like you can't go to the nearest gas station try to fly.
That's what I'm saying.
I mean, there are people you can go to for help.
Plus, what he's even reverting to the whole suffocation thing when the autopsy had already shown.
That's not what happened.
I this guy, I don't understand.
Like, I think he's just so backed into a corner, that he can't make sense of I just there's a there's a truth in there somewhere, right?
Like, we know you did it.
What's the truth? Right, right.
Okay, so the next thing he goes into, he talks about Megan's death.
If you want to just read that real quick.
Mm hmm. Upon going back into the bedroom, I heard a horrific sound of something rubbing a latex balloon.
She had stabbed herself the first time.
I ran to her bedside and she said, please don't leave me alone to die, as I didn't leave the kids to die alone.
When I pulled this knife, it will go quick.
I can feel it happening now.
Before I could react, the knife was pulled and thrown on the bed someplace.
There was blood, a lot of blood.
I begged her to let me call.
I would take all responsibility as I felt it was all my fault.
After a while, nothing happened.
She had more of her drink and asked me to leave her for a few minutes as I was stressing her out with all my pleading of asking her to go for help, where phones were, etc.
So after this, he goes on to say that Megan ended up drinking a family size bottle of Benadryl and then stabbed herself again.
But like his other version of events, she still didn't die.
So that's when she asked him to suffocate her with a pillow, but he says he couldn't do it, to which, according to him, she said, quote, I finally found something you suck at.
Wow. That sounds pretty narcissistic.
Yeah. So that's actually something that stuck out to me when I was suffering through all 27 pages of this letter.
There's a ton of little quips like that, or he like brags about his medical knowledge.
Like he just finds these moments to boost his own ego a bit.
Which is gross, but can we pause for a second?
Isn't Megan supposed to be super sick?
Like practically immobile, you said.
That's what he said.
But yeah, how is she able to stab herself, get up, walk around, stab herself again, all while apparently chugging Benadryl?
I mean, honestly, how would she supposedly be able to kill all the kids if she was so weak?
Because he's either lying about how sick she was or about how the kids died, probably both.
With this dude, probably both.
Yeah. And I have such a hard time believing that she was as sick as he says, because remember when police are talking to like the neighbors and stuff, they're like, yeah, we saw her.
She's at yoga. They're a totally normal family.
There's nothing awful.
It's not adding up.
Oh my God. And just to be clear, he's still sticking to this stabbing thing, even though the Emmy has said that it happened after.
I guess. Did first responders happen to see like a lot of blood at the scene?
Because the only thing I can come up with that would like begin to make sense to sticking with the story is to explain like a really bloody scene.
But if you're going to change your story to change it, match the facts.
I don't know. I don't understand any of it.
That's the thing is so I actually looked for this because again, I agree with you.
Like if you're going to, this is your what?
Your fourth, fifth, 12th version of this story.
Like usually when you see this happening, it's because like they're getting more information and they're trying to like course correct.
They're like, oh, that's not, that wasn't right.
Let me change it to this.
It's not happening here.
And so I did try to find out what the scene looked like, but I couldn't find anything describing exactly how much blood there was or wasn't at the scene.
I know there were some bloody fingerprints.
I know there's some blood on some knives and maybe some blood that was collected for testing, but I can't tell you if this is a bloody scene or if they're just like very small amounts of this stuff.
Right. And while we're on this topic, was there any forensic evidence that backs up, I mean any of his story or gives us a clearer picture of anything?
Reporting on the actual forensic evidence is really few and far between.
But Montevert Cordillera reported for the Orlando Sentinel that Tony's fingerprints were found on boxes of Benadryl, which you'd expect, but they didn't actually compare Megan's prints to any of the ones that they found.
What? Why? I have no idea.
I don't know if they didn't know that that that was going to be their defense.
Like, I don't know.
I'm very confused. Like, there was other stuff done too.
So there was male DNA found on the knife.
Maybe male DNA found under Zoe's nails, but I don't even know if that was ever a hundred percent match to Tony.
So, okay, what you're telling me is both the prosecution and the defense are basically going to go to trial with just Tony's numerous conflicting confessions?
Well, maybe not because as the trial looms closer, Tony's defense actually petitions to get some things thrown out of evidence, including his first confession at the hospital.
Okay, that's specific.
Why? So it turns out that before police started questioning him, they didn't Mirandize him properly.
And so, my God, I know, but his mental state at the time was, I guess, in question.
So the judge does end up siding with them.
And that confession is partially excluded, but I don't know that it matters because there are still two other confessions because he had that other one at the hospital and then one at the station, which are still fair game.
Now, a Click Orlando article by Brenda Argueta states that there are a few other things that the defense throws out to.
The biggest one being that the prosecution can't bring up the insurance fraud case.
Which I kind of get.
They're separate cases, but are they thinking they're not at all connected?
I am not sure, but I don't know.
Again, if it was partially a reason, I don't think there's enough of a connection.
The prosecution actually doesn't seem to care.
They don't object to this.
They seem to think that they can prove their case without it.
Now, the other thing that they can't bring up are his suicidal thoughts.
Or, and this is really interesting, the fact that in German, Tote means dead.
Oh, creepy little side note there.
I know, it's a weird coincidence, right?
So this is what's in, this is what's out, whatever.
Tony's trial is delayed several times for multiple reasons.
But on April 11th of 2022, it finally starts.
The prosecution takes the jury through the evidence that they do have, primarily relying on Tony's original confessions before he changed his story.
But after just three days, the prosecution rests their case.
Uh, that seems quick.
But the defense is even shorter.
They only take one day to go through their stuff.
And the first witness, the only witness they call is Tony.
And Tony's story is similar to the letter he wrote to his dad.
Megan was really sick and she became really spiritual, which led her to believe in the afterlife.
But in order to get there and be together, they had to die together as a family.
Now, even on the stand, he still doesn't remember what day the kids died.
He gives a range of somewhere between the 14th and the 18th.
And he also talks about that suicide note that was left, which he says Megan wrote.
When asked why he didn't go get help, he explains that he yelled out a window, like freaking Paul Revere or some s***, but like no one came.
Yeah. And that he thought he would die if he left her, so he just stayed and tried to help her pass away.
Okay, but for weeks?
Yeah. But he did have time to get Starbucks.
I can't leave the Starbucks thing out of it.
It's just like, it's so extra.
I don't know if this guy hears himself, but he goes on to say that his original confessions were just him trying to cover for her and that he wasn't an active participant in his kids deaths.
And of course, as you can imagine, the prosecution rips into him and basically debunks everything he says.
But what really stands out about this cross -examination isn't the facts of this case.
It's Tony's tone and the way he speaks to the prosecutor.
It's honestly uncomfortable to listen to because he is so condescending.
You can tell he's trying to control this whole narrative and he thinks that he can convince her that his version of events is the right one.
But of course, she doesn't budge and that makes him mad.
And there are even these moments where he like snaps at her, which is probably a tactic, right?
Oh my God, a hundred percent.
She is showing the jury his true colors, which pays off.
According to Brenda Argueta and Lauren Cervantes reporting for Click Orlando, they eventually find him guilty on all charges, but Tony can't just let it rest.
Once the verdict is read, he addresses the court saying he maintains his innocence.
He goes on and on. His lawyer even tries to get him to sit back down twice before he finally finishes.
Ultimately, Tony is sentenced to life as well as an additional year for Breezy's death.
And unsurprisingly, he files an appeal, but I couldn't find where that appeal stands as of right now.
Well, Ashley, you are right.
This case completely ruined my day.
I know that there are no winners in this case.
And there are still unanswered questions about what happened and what led up to it.
Again, like I hate these cases, but I get so deeply like invested in them because there is so little known about family annihilators.
To me, it is an area that really needs to be studied because surely there are signs we can look for.
And I think there are red flags that popped up all over Tony's story, right?
But like people weren't seeing them enough to help.
What are the signs that we could be looking for to prevent this from happening to another family?
You can find all the source material for this episode on our website, crimejunkypodcast .com.
And you can follow us on Instagram at crimejunkypodcast.
We'll be back next week with another episode.
Crime Junkie is an audio check production.
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