Episode 338

<v Speaker 1>Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence, and is
<v Speaker 1>not intended for all audiences.
<v Speaker 2>Listener discretion is advised.
<v Speaker 3>A man man should never be count when it comes
<v Speaker 3>to a Female's never.
<v Speaker 2>Been a man.
<v Speaker 1>Come take a load off, put your feet up, and
<v Speaker 1>listen to some murder. What a stupid thing to say.
<v Speaker 1>This is season thirteen, episode three, and thirty eight of
<v Speaker 1>Sword and Scales show that reveals it the worst monsters
<v Speaker 1>are real. If you're a fan of true crime, I
<v Speaker 1>invite you to check out our brand new YouTube channel
<v Speaker 1>where you could subscribe and the opposite way you can
<v Speaker 1>on our website. See on our website you can subscribe
<v Speaker 1>for ten bucks for audio and then add video for
<v Speaker 1>another ten bucks. On top of that. On YouTube you
<v Speaker 1>can start with video and add audio, so you know,
<v Speaker 1>take your pick. This is just going to complicate things,
<v Speaker 1>isn't it. Oh well, fuck my life. It's just after
<v Speaker 1>midnight in twenty nineteen, during the summer solstice, the longest
<v Speaker 1>day of the year. This isn't some mumbo jumbo New
<v Speaker 1>age crap. It's when the sun is furthest from the equator,
<v Speaker 1>and it's a time when some say the veil between
<v Speaker 1>this dimension and the others is the thinnest. Okay, so
<v Speaker 1>maybe there is a little quote unquote New age wisdom.
<v Speaker 1>The most important point, though, is that it's Ohio, the
<v Speaker 1>state that's becoming quite popular around here for some reason.
<v Speaker 1>So it's June twenty first in East Cleveland. Believe it
<v Speaker 1>or not, there are posh areas in Cleveland so that
<v Speaker 1>some of you savages can pretend to be people. This
<v Speaker 1>isn't one of them. It's not a picturesque skyline by
<v Speaker 1>the lake or the downtown area lit up with nightlife.
<v Speaker 1>It's colin Wood, a working class neighborhood that feels like
<v Speaker 1>it's part of a bygone era, part of the Rust Belt.
<v Speaker 1>The houses are small and modest, but nice enough, and
<v Speaker 1>the lawns are mote. There's just enough space in the
<v Speaker 1>backyard for a barbecue. Ah Americana, a small white Cape
<v Speaker 1>cod style home bases a narrow street called Chickasaw Avenue.
<v Speaker 1>It's a mild but humid evening. No wind is blowing,
<v Speaker 1>and it's dark. Windows stay open in most homes and
<v Speaker 1>the people inside are asleep, the fans humming in the background.
<v Speaker 1>But on this street, as June twenty first turns to
<v Speaker 1>the twenty second. Something bad is happening than I.
<v Speaker 4>Want one to special shoopini police fire ems.
<v Speaker 5>Oh we just got stabbed more chickensaw as.
<v Speaker 4>I'm sorry, I said, we just got sad?
<v Speaker 6>Who just got that?
<v Speaker 1>The call almost sounded like a hoax. The child calling
<v Speaker 1>in was so calm and said she lived on chicken
<v Speaker 1>and Saw Avenue. But this was no joke.
<v Speaker 6>What's your address? Where you are?
<v Speaker 7>What? What's the address?
<v Speaker 6>The complete address?
<v Speaker 5>You don't know you're on? What street?
<v Speaker 4>Chickens about?
<v Speaker 6>Are you a yuquid?
<v Speaker 8>No?
<v Speaker 5>Cleveland, Ohio.
<v Speaker 1>You may not have caught it, but the little girl
<v Speaker 1>said she was about to pass out. She was trying
<v Speaker 1>her hardest to stay alert and get the street names right.
<v Speaker 1>In this part of Cleveland, the streets seem to have
<v Speaker 1>Native American names.
<v Speaker 6>And you're on Chickasaw Yeah. Do you know another street nearby?
<v Speaker 9>Oh?
<v Speaker 5>No, I'm living Site one Trocky, You're own turkey?
<v Speaker 6>What trophy?
<v Speaker 1>What she was trying to say was Cherokee. No to parents,
<v Speaker 1>make sure that your kids know where they live and
<v Speaker 1>how to pronounce the street names. That's a small safety
<v Speaker 1>tip that rivals all of the can goods and toilet
<v Speaker 1>paper you hoard in your Cape cod summer home. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I know my audience.
<v Speaker 6>Okay, who got stabbed? Honey?
<v Speaker 5>Like by who don't be here?
<v Speaker 6>Okay, I'm gonna get you over to EMS. Okay, yeah,
<v Speaker 6>don't hang up. How old are you?
<v Speaker 4>Okay, don't hang up?
<v Speaker 5>Okay, Okay.
<v Speaker 1>The dispatch operator told the EMS responder she had a
<v Speaker 1>ten year old who had a knife for me. It
<v Speaker 1>was hard to tell if his response was disbelief or
<v Speaker 1>mere frustration. I mean, this is Cleveland. Sadly, it's probably
<v Speaker 1>not the first time a kid called in about being stabbed.
<v Speaker 1>This place truly is a shithole.
<v Speaker 6>Okay are you still.
<v Speaker 10>Yeah?
<v Speaker 4>I'm not to back out.
<v Speaker 6>Okay, Okay, she doesn't.
<v Speaker 4>She says she's on a.
<v Speaker 11>Street claws.
<v Speaker 4>The corner whip.
<v Speaker 12>She is not.
<v Speaker 7>She just says she's on a street cause sugar, she
<v Speaker 7>met her and her cousin got that.
<v Speaker 2>Say.
<v Speaker 11>Was her cousin older than her?
<v Speaker 1>By this time, the polite little girl who was stabbed
<v Speaker 1>and trying not to pass out was getting frustrated. You
<v Speaker 1>can hear her in the background, desperately pleading for help.
<v Speaker 1>She was probably wondering when the questions would stop and
<v Speaker 1>an ambulance would arrive. The victims were two ten year
<v Speaker 1>old cousins who managed to escape outside. They were making
<v Speaker 1>their way to a neighbor's house, but all the time
<v Speaker 1>struggling just to stay alive. Thank god, some kind people
<v Speaker 1>in the next street over were still up and looking
<v Speaker 1>out their window when they heard crying.
<v Speaker 7>Number one, that's just the st.
<v Speaker 13>It's a brother theater.
<v Speaker 6>What's what's your address?
<v Speaker 14>Address?
<v Speaker 12>One night?
<v Speaker 5>Once you cheared and she really bad, she's coming in
<v Speaker 5>my house.
<v Speaker 11>Sole, but.
<v Speaker 7>Cut the door.
<v Speaker 1>Imagine that you're minding your own business, and suddenly you
<v Speaker 1>hear little kids crying outside. You're like, what's that? You
<v Speaker 1>get up to see two blood soaked girls staggering towards
<v Speaker 1>your house? These days? Would you even let them in?
<v Speaker 1>I mean, be honest, that's some the shining bullshit right there.
<v Speaker 1>Some of you would probably slam the door shut, no doubt.
<v Speaker 5>She knocked on my door and say that she's still
<v Speaker 5>the bleeding to death over the clothes full of blood?
<v Speaker 6>Who's bleeding in that?
<v Speaker 7>The two little girls?
<v Speaker 6>Okay?
<v Speaker 5>And then you grow can girly talk?
<v Speaker 11>Yes?
<v Speaker 4>Okay, So let I ask you to my question. Answer
<v Speaker 4>that I can tell you what to do these questions.
<v Speaker 6>They're gonna help me help them?
<v Speaker 4>Okay.
<v Speaker 5>How old are okay? You look like they're about moving.
<v Speaker 7>Twelve threele than.
<v Speaker 10>Twelve years old.
<v Speaker 4>I'm as a move. And are they in wait?
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, they're covered in blood?
<v Speaker 4>Okay, and litten careful. I want to tell you how
<v Speaker 4>to stop the bleeding. Let'ten careful to make sure we
<v Speaker 4>do it correct?
<v Speaker 1>Okay, sounds like a plan, right, But what do you
<v Speaker 1>do if you can't tell where the blood's coming from?
<v Speaker 4>So I need you to get a good mood.
<v Speaker 5>All over?
<v Speaker 4>Okay, it's all over? Okay. Is a burger's done there
<v Speaker 4>by the one.
<v Speaker 6>I stabbed him?
<v Speaker 15>No?
<v Speaker 5>No, no, I'll paying.
<v Speaker 4>And is there any serious bleeding yet?
<v Speaker 5>That's curious bleeding?
<v Speaker 4>Okay? Are they completely in there? Are they going out
<v Speaker 4>of it unconscious?
<v Speaker 7>Yes?
<v Speaker 4>The sea of curd yes, okay, I'm giving this information
<v Speaker 4>to the dispatch. Stand in line. Don't hang up? Okay,
<v Speaker 4>And you said there is more than one won't correct?
<v Speaker 11>Yes, we're still over.
<v Speaker 5>They got good and they're living in my house in
<v Speaker 5>my four year and they're bleeding.
<v Speaker 6>Okay.
<v Speaker 4>Health is on the way.
<v Speaker 1>It always seems to take forever for an ambulance to arrive,
<v Speaker 1>and the questions from nine one one operators are never ending.
<v Speaker 1>The truth is that the response time varies obviously depending
<v Speaker 1>on where you live, but in urban areas the average
<v Speaker 1>time is only about five to eight minutes, but those
<v Speaker 1>few minutes can feel like forever.
<v Speaker 5>All right, shut the door, you see Okay?
<v Speaker 6>Rights you okay, you're living? Were talking.
<v Speaker 4>My one is going to take them to give years.
<v Speaker 4>They're coming right now, the fire apartment and the paramedics
<v Speaker 4>get there on the way.
<v Speaker 1>The excitement was almost too much for this lady. She
<v Speaker 1>started having her own issues.
<v Speaker 5>I got asthma.
<v Speaker 16>My bleeding is beauty.
<v Speaker 4>Okay, do you have a haler?
<v Speaker 6>She can take?
<v Speaker 1>Despite her own problems, this woman wasn't going to let
<v Speaker 1>two little girls slip into unconsciousness. I mean, if I
<v Speaker 1>needed somebody to bring me back, I'd want this lady.
<v Speaker 7>She goes hard, hi way a bright.
<v Speaker 1>As the woman in the house is on the phone
<v Speaker 1>with nine one one, her boyfriend comes back. He sees
<v Speaker 1>the kids bleeding and crying.
<v Speaker 6>On Hello, get the honey.
<v Speaker 11>Hello, you guys, are we are right?
<v Speaker 12>We own Cherokee one nine six one two Cherokee On
<v Speaker 12>when these kids have been stabbed up.
<v Speaker 11>Okay, give me give me that address again, one nine
<v Speaker 11>six one two Cherokee.
<v Speaker 15>Who am I speaking to? Mister mn and police?
<v Speaker 12>Hurry up, please, these these girls has been stabbed bad.
<v Speaker 12>Come back your babies, I think doesn't find that.
<v Speaker 15>Ain't nobody gonna mess with y'all. Oh my goodness, come on,
<v Speaker 15>Oh my goodness, come on, baby, come on.
<v Speaker 5>Can't get up.
<v Speaker 1>The little girls confirmed that it was a cousin who
<v Speaker 1>stabbed them, and she's afraid he'll find them that when
<v Speaker 1>this guy's around, I mean, would you fuck with them?
<v Speaker 1>I wouldn't. Weekly. She tells him she can't get up.
<v Speaker 15>Open that door.
<v Speaker 5>This girl's been stabbed up bad.
<v Speaker 11>Okay, that's the address where they're gonna be. The one
<v Speaker 11>nine six twelve. That one took one to dare to
<v Speaker 11>hurry up. Oh my fucking goodness.
<v Speaker 15>Okay, you got your front pay? Yeah, but he all said,
<v Speaker 15>right there, Oh my fucking goodness, this girl is tabbed
<v Speaker 15>a real.
<v Speaker 6>Bad guess you know where to park the way?
<v Speaker 17>Yeah?
<v Speaker 15>They were uness where.
<v Speaker 11>What a person going to tab?
<v Speaker 15>They said, they're looking for him.
<v Speaker 11>Let me do this please, he said.
<v Speaker 15>They were the persons looking for me.
<v Speaker 1>The person job they said they looking for them. Oh boy,
<v Speaker 1>these gentlemen seem ready to carry out their own investigation,
<v Speaker 1>but police wanted a name. The little girls were scared
<v Speaker 1>and going in and out of awareness. It was hard
<v Speaker 1>to get the needed information, and confusion was getting in
<v Speaker 1>the way.
<v Speaker 15>They don't know you, y'all know staff y'all like that.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, both of them chat, Yeah you can't somebody. We
<v Speaker 4>got people on the way.
<v Speaker 11>I'm trying to get information from you.
<v Speaker 15>So yeah they are. You can kid them stabbed up
<v Speaker 15>fat They two little girls.
<v Speaker 12>Oh my puppy, big man, I find this dude.
<v Speaker 8>Who is this guy?
<v Speaker 11>Okay, I got who is this guy? Of sab y'all?
<v Speaker 15>God, I got thirteen year old Chad stop y'all chart
<v Speaker 15>young and Plumber.
<v Speaker 1>It was eighteen year old Jalen Plumber, their cousin, who
<v Speaker 1>was supposed to be staying with an aunt in a
<v Speaker 1>different part of the neighborhood, but decided to go on
<v Speaker 1>a killing spread his grandma's house instead, and the grandma
<v Speaker 1>was still back at the house.
<v Speaker 15>Man, y'all, please hurry up since somebody kids, he killed
<v Speaker 15>your grandmother.
<v Speaker 1>So much was going on as the couple in the
<v Speaker 1>house learned more information, the panic escalated. Some people are
<v Speaker 1>good in crisis and some aren't.
<v Speaker 12>Don't do what you should?
<v Speaker 15>Do what you say?
<v Speaker 6>Do they know where they live?
<v Speaker 2>Do I know where they live?
<v Speaker 6>Do they know? Then?
<v Speaker 1>As the address they called from Chickasaw Avenue, where their grandmother,
<v Speaker 1>Diane Madison lived. The two cousins escaped but left their
<v Speaker 1>grandmother behind. Then there was the cousin Jalen, who caused
<v Speaker 1>the bloodbath. No one knew his whereabouts yet, but you'd
<v Speaker 1>better hope he didn't cross paths with his neighbors.
<v Speaker 15>Come out, man.
<v Speaker 12>Talking to me, Sam, stop calling me, please, I'm not
<v Speaker 12>hitting the ship.
<v Speaker 15>I would this mother wood tree, the gass over hes.
<v Speaker 6>Okay, wish he's pulling up their Do you see them
<v Speaker 6>out there?
<v Speaker 15>Oh yeah, they're pulling up right now.
<v Speaker 1>And the immortal words of this Ohioan. Oh my fucking goodness.
<v Speaker 1>This was Cleveland, But even our seasoned veteran here hadn't
<v Speaker 1>seen anything like this before. You could tell this was
<v Speaker 1>some fucked up shit that would stick with him. After
<v Speaker 1>talking with the two little girls and the couple taking
<v Speaker 1>care of them, officers realized they needed to go to
<v Speaker 1>the crime scene. As soon as possible while the girls
<v Speaker 1>were on their way to the hospital. What they didn't
<v Speaker 1>know yet was that there was still another child in
<v Speaker 1>that house on Chickasaw Justin Madison, a twelve year old
<v Speaker 1>boy with autism. This was Jalen's brother, and Jalen was
<v Speaker 1>still in that house too.
<v Speaker 18>So this house, yeah, okay, so we you guys have
<v Speaker 18>a crime stee long or anything. Yeah, what happened? I
<v Speaker 18>was gonn get the address that came over here.
<v Speaker 10>His little brother has like a mental disability.
<v Speaker 18>He came up to that window.
<v Speaker 9>This person right here at those windows, she's laying in
<v Speaker 9>the south east corner of the room behind the door
<v Speaker 9>faced on.
<v Speaker 1>Justin was terrified and didn't completely understand what was going on.
<v Speaker 1>His sister had fled the scene with her cousin. Well
<v Speaker 1>more like escape. Justin was trapped in an upstairs bedroom
<v Speaker 1>and I didn't even know he was injured. The police
<v Speaker 1>were about to wade into a blood soaked house, but
<v Speaker 1>first needed to convince her grandson Justin, to unlock the
<v Speaker 1>door and come outside.
<v Speaker 18>Come here, open the window. Hey, what's your name?
<v Speaker 8>I'm in.
<v Speaker 18>What's now? Where's your brother? Okay, Hey, I'm the house Hey,
<v Speaker 18>I'm going to cover the bat.
<v Speaker 1>Justin was risking his life letting the officers in because
<v Speaker 1>the killer was still there. In the bathroom, the water
<v Speaker 1>was running. Jalen Plumber was fully clothed, standing under the shower.
<v Speaker 1>The blood from his own knife wounds swirled into the
<v Speaker 1>drain stereo moment.
<v Speaker 18>You're okay, you're okod what's it? You can get my
<v Speaker 18>clothes to me?
<v Speaker 11>I can't?
<v Speaker 18>Are you okay? Yeah?
<v Speaker 6>Wait?
<v Speaker 11>My letter, my.
<v Speaker 19>Dish?
<v Speaker 18>Okay, you're fine, you're fine. Man told you though? Yees,
<v Speaker 18>I mean my my mom would not my mom and
<v Speaker 18>not at that? Where's your mom? At shit work? Yes?
<v Speaker 1>This was a mad house. When asked for his mother's name,
<v Speaker 1>he was able to give it to the officer, but
<v Speaker 1>he couldn't spell it, saying that she never told him.
<v Speaker 20>How, okay, we'll call her. Okay, you're okay though, you're
<v Speaker 20>not hurt, right, you're not bleeding at all?
<v Speaker 12>Oh?
<v Speaker 18>You you got stabbed? Huh? I got that?
<v Speaker 15>Yeah?
<v Speaker 18>You got you got some Look what I got lucky?
<v Speaker 15>Yeah?
<v Speaker 18>I thought the knife in there?
<v Speaker 15>You did?
<v Speaker 18>Where do you think the niset? And I tell you
<v Speaker 18>this and I cleaned it up? Did you clean it up. Yeah, okay,
<v Speaker 18>it didn't a thing.
<v Speaker 10>It is a thing.
<v Speaker 6>It is a thing right now.
<v Speaker 20>It's in the sink. He's saying, the noise in the sink.
<v Speaker 20>This guy, this victim, Yeah, he's got a little laceration of.
<v Speaker 18>The back right now.
<v Speaker 1>The discovery of the murder weapon was good news and
<v Speaker 1>bad news. Good news that this unlikely and lucky victim
<v Speaker 1>found it, but possibly bad news that he cleaned it up.
<v Speaker 18>What's gonna happened to me?
<v Speaker 8>Now?
<v Speaker 20>You're you're gonna get checked up by ums because you're
<v Speaker 20>you got stabbed. I'm gonna try to getting hold of
<v Speaker 20>your mouth.
<v Speaker 1>For your Justin naturally had a lot of questions about himself,
<v Speaker 1>his grandma, Diane, and his brother, who had been led
<v Speaker 1>away in handcuffs.
<v Speaker 18>Why did you make butt and out? We got him.
<v Speaker 18>He's not gonna hurt. Anyone's gonna be okay. Yeah, they're
<v Speaker 18>working on it right now. They're hoping her. Okay, not
<v Speaker 18>that you saw a little dog a little dog.
<v Speaker 19>I did not.
<v Speaker 18>I did not go in the house. I saw you outside.
<v Speaker 18>I came and grabbed you.
<v Speaker 1>What Justin didn't know was that his grandmother died almost
<v Speaker 1>immediately after being stabbed. By his brother. In her bedroom,
<v Speaker 1>they found Diane Madison dead of multiple stab wounds, including
<v Speaker 1>one that completely severed her carottid artery, and the little
<v Speaker 1>dog he was referring to was sitting on the bed
<v Speaker 1>in the same spot where he'd been sleeping peacefully next
<v Speaker 1>to his owner, now with a look of bewilderment. The
<v Speaker 1>dog wasn't alone. Almost everyone who knew Jalen Plumber was bewildered.
<v Speaker 1>No one could yet explain why college bound teenager, quiet,
<v Speaker 1>smart and planning to study pharmacology had suddenly turned into
<v Speaker 1>a violent killer. But there were cracks long before that night.
<v Speaker 1>This wasn't just one terrible night. It was the unveiling
<v Speaker 1>of a legacy that had been building long before Jalen
<v Speaker 1>had ever picked up a knife. On June twenty second,
<v Speaker 1>twenty nineteen, in East Cleveland's South Collinwood neighbor police responded
<v Speaker 1>to a bloody scene on Chickasaw Avenue. Two ten year
<v Speaker 1>old girls escaped their home, reporting they'd been stabbed in
<v Speaker 1>their sleep. When officers got to the house, they found
<v Speaker 1>a third victim, a twelve year old autistic boy who
<v Speaker 1>confirmed that his brother was the killer. Eighteen year old
<v Speaker 1>Jalen Plumber was in the shower rinsing off blood after
<v Speaker 1>stabbing the entire household in a bedroom. His grandmother, Diane Madison,
<v Speaker 1>lay dead from multiple stab wounds, and her little dog
<v Speaker 1>also laid nearby. Jalen offered only a chilling explanation, the
<v Speaker 1>mental healthcare system failed me, so I tried to kill
<v Speaker 1>my family. Signs of mental illness seemed obvious when Jalen
<v Speaker 1>was taken to the hospital and questioned. Nurses bandaged the
<v Speaker 1>deep cuts on his hands, but it was as if
<v Speaker 1>his voice was bound as tightly. His muffled words barely escaped.
<v Speaker 1>He spoke in vague, detached terms, referring to his siblings
<v Speaker 1>as child number one and child number two. He claimed
<v Speaker 1>he didn't know the names of his mother and grandmother
<v Speaker 1>and said he just called them mommy or grandma, his
<v Speaker 1>mother to neo. Plumber would later tell detectives that Jalen
<v Speaker 1>had no official diagnosis, but his behavior had drastically changed
<v Speaker 1>between the ages of twelve and fifteen. He'd been drinking, smoking,
<v Speaker 1>shutting down, and fixating on dark things. She had just
<v Speaker 1>decided to get him into therapy. But here's what Jalen's
<v Speaker 1>mother didn't want to say. She remembered that his behavior
<v Speaker 1>had started to change around the time of another arrest.
<v Speaker 1>Police already knew the name that would leave her lips.
<v Speaker 1>This was a man from the same city, a serial
<v Speaker 1>killer that had haunted Cleveland and was arrested and convicted
<v Speaker 1>during Jalen's crucial adolescent years. It seemed possible this disturbed
<v Speaker 1>Jalen so much that he became fascinated with killing and
<v Speaker 1>ultimately exploded in a murderous fit that night, leaving his
<v Speaker 1>grandmother Deaddanne.
<v Speaker 21>Was a loving, kind person, and I think sometimes that
<v Speaker 21>gets lost. Almost all of us who worked with her
<v Speaker 21>remained friends with her afterwards. That's the kind of person
<v Speaker 21>she was.
<v Speaker 1>She was the kind of person others felt comfortable with
<v Speaker 1>because they knew she'd been through it. They knew she
<v Speaker 1>was the first to sympathize. She was always open to
<v Speaker 1>hearing about everybody's hard times because God knows, she'd had
<v Speaker 1>enough of her own.
<v Speaker 13>And I just want them to remember her smile and
<v Speaker 13>remember how much laughter and joy she brought to people's lives.
<v Speaker 21>She was someone who was compassionate, who cared about her family,
<v Speaker 21>who cared about her grandkids, who cared a her kids
<v Speaker 21>even when they couldn't reciprocate.
<v Speaker 1>Maybe Diane Madison wasn't just a grandmother. She was a
<v Speaker 1>mother of one of the most notorious killers in Cleveland's history.
<v Speaker 1>Her son, Michael Madison, grew up in that same house
<v Speaker 1>on Chickasaw Avenue. As an adult, he returned to raise
<v Speaker 1>a family there with his girlfriend, Tania Plummer. They had
<v Speaker 1>two children, including a disabled son. Eventually Michael left them behind,
<v Speaker 1>not before Jalen witnessed it all though, the growing suspicion,
<v Speaker 1>the arrest, the conviction of a killer, someone who had
<v Speaker 1>once called that house home.
<v Speaker 6>Conversation recorded on July nineteenth, two thousand and thirteenth, at
<v Speaker 6>eight fifty.
<v Speaker 8>Four religious specificatis.
<v Speaker 15>So just need to see you all the tents somebody
<v Speaker 15>over here. We can just goe to row. So what's
<v Speaker 15>going on?
<v Speaker 2>You wanna sell?
<v Speaker 15>Because that we can't get a garage thor open bus.
<v Speaker 15>It's a smell. I know when the dead animals smelled.
<v Speaker 15>I know what gopic snails, but apply coming out of
<v Speaker 15>the wall from the one side of the garage. I mean,
<v Speaker 15>the smell so freaking calls you could throw up. I mean,
<v Speaker 15>we just want to make sure ain't nobody in the
<v Speaker 15>other side or something. I mean, it's so bad enough, man,
<v Speaker 15>you will throw up the card even take the smell.
<v Speaker 7>So what's the address?
<v Speaker 19>Thirteen ninety five hate, So what's the name?
<v Speaker 15>My straight.
<v Speaker 8>I say, Chile.
<v Speaker 15>Number to eight seven zero eighty nine fifty six. Okay,
<v Speaker 15>yeah we are. I'm out here now, so we're waiting.
<v Speaker 15>Nobody ain't come up. Yeah, we can't call. That's crazy,
<v Speaker 15>okay saying you all right?
<v Speaker 1>That smell in the garage if you've never had the pleasure,
<v Speaker 1>it's a mixture of rotting fish, dead animal, skunk and
<v Speaker 1>ross sewage. How's that lunch treating you? You're welcome. This
<v Speaker 1>call came in six years before Diane's murder, and it
<v Speaker 1>wasn't just the first sign of something horrific. It was
<v Speaker 1>the past catching up.
<v Speaker 14>It was a call to police from a cable company
<v Speaker 14>worker in this building that eventually led to the arrest
<v Speaker 14>of Michael Madison on murder charges. He lived there in
<v Speaker 14>an apartment and one employee saw flies swarming in a
<v Speaker 14>nearby garage.
<v Speaker 22>So I went in there and when I smelled the smell,
<v Speaker 22>I was like, oh my god, we need to call
<v Speaker 22>the police.
<v Speaker 14>East Cleveland police found the decomposing body of a female
<v Speaker 14>victim on Friday. The ideed Madison as a suspect, arrested
<v Speaker 14>him at his mother's home and began questioning.
<v Speaker 1>The garage wasn't behind Diane's house. It was on Haydene,
<v Speaker 1>near a small upstairs apartment Michael had been renting just
<v Speaker 1>a few miles away. Because by twenty thirteen, he wasn't
<v Speaker 1>living under his mother's roof anymore, and he wasn't the
<v Speaker 1>same cute, cuddly little boy she'd raised. He had turned cold.
<v Speaker 1>Michael Madison, Diane's son, was no stranger to trouble. He
<v Speaker 1>was quiet and withdrawn. He's always been that way. He'd
<v Speaker 1>been drifting for years, through dead end jobs, short tempers,
<v Speaker 1>and the kind of isolation that makes neighbors nervous.
<v Speaker 15>He had anger issues.
<v Speaker 22>Sometime. I would see him upset, yelling, and I just
<v Speaker 22>told him to calm down.
<v Speaker 23>And he was okay, And you know, he spoke to everybody.
<v Speaker 1>When the garage door finally opened and the truth finally
<v Speaker 1>came spilling out, literally, it wasn't just the neighborhood that changed.
<v Speaker 1>It was the entire Madison household, especially his step son Jalen.
<v Speaker 1>The man he had once called stepdad would now be
<v Speaker 1>called something else, entirely a killer. Michael wasn't exactly a copycat,
<v Speaker 1>but his crimes bore chilling similarities to those of another
<v Speaker 1>Cleveland serial killer he reportedly admired, Anthony Sowell, infamously known
<v Speaker 1>as the Cleveland Strangler. Sowell was convicted in twenty eleven
<v Speaker 1>after the remains of eleven women were found at his home.
<v Speaker 1>Years later, Jalen Plummer, who lived with his stepfather Michael
<v Speaker 1>in the same house, appeared to develop a disturbing interest
<v Speaker 1>in the same notorious figure.
<v Speaker 14>The coroner in Cleveland, Ohio, says six bodies found in
<v Speaker 14>the home of a convicted rapist were female. All were
<v Speaker 14>homicide victims. Police arrested fifty year old Anthony Sowell Saturday.
<v Speaker 1>Thank you Jesus, Thank you Heavy Father.
<v Speaker 22>I am so glad they got him, because I wasn't
<v Speaker 22>gonna risk you know, until they did.
<v Speaker 12>Before. I had to put my frize against the door
<v Speaker 12>and locked myself in before I could even go to sleep.
<v Speaker 1>Just two years after the Cleveland Strangler was put away,
<v Speaker 1>Michael Madison emerged onto the crime scene. Michael was born
<v Speaker 1>in East Cleveland in nineteen seventy seven. Former classmates barely
<v Speaker 1>remembered him because he had no real friends. He was,
<v Speaker 1>I guess what you would call forgettable. He didn't graduate
<v Speaker 1>from high school, but he was far from stupid. He
<v Speaker 1>had a lot going on in his head, but no
<v Speaker 1>one ever bothered to ask what that was, and he
<v Speaker 1>never saw a therapist. But he needed one because he
<v Speaker 1>hated women, specifically black women. The women who fell into
<v Speaker 1>his nightmare weren't prostitutes or drugged out street women, not
<v Speaker 1>that they would deserve his faith. Instead, they were women
<v Speaker 1>with families, full lives and plans, and for a brief,
<v Speaker 1>fateful moment, each of them crossed paths with Michael Madison.
<v Speaker 1>The first body found was eighteen year old Shireald to Terry.
<v Speaker 1>She had just graduated from high school with plans for
<v Speaker 1>good life. That summer, she worked at an elementary school
<v Speaker 1>in East Cleveland, helping run youth programs and earning respect
<v Speaker 1>from teachers and neighbors. She was last seen alive on
<v Speaker 1>July tenth, twenty thirteen, leaving school after her shift, but
<v Speaker 1>she never made it home. They met somewhere in the
<v Speaker 1>previous weeks and started texting. Michael lied, saying he was
<v Speaker 1>twenty five with no children. When they opened the garage door,
<v Speaker 1>thousands of flies swarmed in the putrid air. Officers moved
<v Speaker 1>the bags containing her remains, and a trail of decomposition
<v Speaker 1>fluid left them mind of brown, gray, red, and yellow,
<v Speaker 1>flowing like a dirty river on the concrete in front
<v Speaker 1>of it. It was one of the most gruesome crime
<v Speaker 1>scenes they'd ever laid their eyes on. She died from
<v Speaker 1>ligature strangulation, and investigators also noted a severe vaginal laceration
<v Speaker 1>consistent with sexual assault while she was still alive.
<v Speaker 24>Sirelda's my angel. Well, everybody called her Sirella. I called
<v Speaker 24>her heaven. That's good, I called I called my kids.
<v Speaker 24>According how to act, I mean, that's my heaven. So
<v Speaker 24>to me, he took mine. She's a praise dancer, she's
<v Speaker 24>she's a holy person. She's heavy into the church, and
<v Speaker 24>she's she's my reader, my bookworm.
<v Speaker 1>It didn't take long for Michael to be arrested and
<v Speaker 1>brought in for questioning, but it came after a standoff
<v Speaker 1>at his mother's house. DNA and circumstantial evidence were strong,
<v Speaker 1>but during questioning, Detective Hope to get some answers as
<v Speaker 1>to why Michael had the spotlight.
<v Speaker 14>For once.
<v Speaker 1>He talked a lot, but not about what mattered, and
<v Speaker 1>he wasn't a loud, bragging type. Instead, he gave metaphors, quietly, parables,
<v Speaker 1>detached theories about the human condition. It was as if
<v Speaker 1>the man accused of stuffing women into trash bags thought
<v Speaker 1>he was there to give a philosophical lecture. And while
<v Speaker 1>detectives paused for timelines and names, Michael offered riddles and speculations.
<v Speaker 3>You know, it's my first time realized just how different
<v Speaker 3>Walsh life are land.
<v Speaker 2>He said, on the west side, and we say included.
<v Speaker 19>We go to school on the west side, the West
<v Speaker 19>High School.
<v Speaker 17>Rabbite you know, Warge his wife and that's pretty good
<v Speaker 17>minister that move here.
<v Speaker 2>And it was going pretty much you know, back in
<v Speaker 2>my life, I've always you know, I told him myself.
<v Speaker 2>I told myself, I would like to stay up in
<v Speaker 2>the country. He was on cent grade four or a
<v Speaker 2>couple of cows. And see, you know what I'm saying
<v Speaker 2>for Ram so go, I would like to see the
<v Speaker 2>Rams like you did. I think they had like the
<v Speaker 2>most epot wrong the King Adam.
<v Speaker 16>The Ram thing you were going at it one time,
<v Speaker 16>Mike banging lingon gooding up in the million.
<v Speaker 10>Now like.
<v Speaker 2>Like the Ram swagger?
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, he really did just say, I like the Ram swagger.
<v Speaker 1>The conversation shifted for a minute to the day police
<v Speaker 1>picked him up. It was a sweltering day when police
<v Speaker 1>moved to arrest him on July nineteenth, twenty thirteen. He
<v Speaker 1>happened to be at his mom's house on Chickasaw and
<v Speaker 1>barricaded himself side for hours. Swat was called, and the
<v Speaker 1>standoff ended only when officers used tear gas and broke
<v Speaker 1>the door down to force him out. They asked him
<v Speaker 1>what he was thinking at the time. If it sounds garbled,
<v Speaker 1>it's probably because of the cheeseburger he was eating.
<v Speaker 2>Not really just running into my head. That's been really
<v Speaker 2>happy and pretty much this way out the wheel and
<v Speaker 2>from a a cause, I've got to know it's my
<v Speaker 2>looking wheel from me.
<v Speaker 1>This guy's maybe the chillest killer they've ever interviewed. He
<v Speaker 1>went on to say that while police car sirens blared
<v Speaker 1>and lights flashed while voices boomed over the megaphone yelling
<v Speaker 1>for him to come out, he was listening to his
<v Speaker 1>mother's wind chimes, smoking cigarette butts from the ash tray
<v Speaker 1>and thinking about his childhood.
<v Speaker 25>Always friends, family, no, finally every one who has done
<v Speaker 25>me gone worse than mom. Like you know, like thinking
<v Speaker 25>hart it Man, Like do you think if I really,
<v Speaker 25>like if I really just just all out guide of
<v Speaker 25>you my mother and her opinion.
<v Speaker 2>And how she could feel. But you think I really
<v Speaker 2>came out the door before that, you know what I'm saying,
<v Speaker 2>before that door got hit like that kept up that
<v Speaker 2>door up.
<v Speaker 16>Yeah, I'm saying like, and I'm not saying I that
<v Speaker 16>that's the reason that I didn't come out with like
<v Speaker 16>I said, and the family and her friends would do
<v Speaker 16>the worst.
<v Speaker 2>And you know I love her mother, but you know
<v Speaker 2>she's when I her got to a point where I was,
<v Speaker 2>you know, really pretty much didn't care to see her again.
<v Speaker 2>But you know, during a certain times when life, she
<v Speaker 2>was there for me. You know what I'm saying. You
<v Speaker 2>know the whole thing was done for sex, appearance and
<v Speaker 2>or before it. Don't hold it on it this donna
<v Speaker 2>hold on to day.
<v Speaker 8>You know we talking.
<v Speaker 2>I put it all of that behind me.
<v Speaker 1>But if I really at several points throughout the more
<v Speaker 1>than eight hours of interrogation, Michael alluded to a loveless
<v Speaker 1>childhood of neglect. According to him, his mother prioritized appearance
<v Speaker 1>and money over him. As much as detectives wanted to
<v Speaker 1>make him comfortable and hear about his past. They still
<v Speaker 1>had a job to do, and it wasn't to be
<v Speaker 1>a therapist for a killer.
<v Speaker 8>We start at the beginning, when I was born, Start
<v Speaker 8>at the beginning. Whenever you want to start this is
<v Speaker 8>this is your opportunity kill me.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, what is good? Came got before? Yeah? Well, when
<v Speaker 2>I called a saying that they wanted the body in
<v Speaker 2>the garage, a play.
<v Speaker 10>On so on.
<v Speaker 19>Hey mm hmm.
<v Speaker 2>People have called me to say they know me to
<v Speaker 2>be around here, and that where you live.
<v Speaker 15>Aft.
<v Speaker 1>Let's answer that, yes, that's it. That's where Michael lived.
<v Speaker 1>But all of a sudden it was not really his place.
<v Speaker 1>His baby mama's name was on the lease, and people
<v Speaker 1>just sort of came and went all helping pay the
<v Speaker 1>bills together somehow in some sort of weird collective. You know,
<v Speaker 1>anybody could have been there, anybody could have had access
<v Speaker 1>to that garage.
<v Speaker 26>Michael, I don't know if you had conversation with the
<v Speaker 26>commander about I was the last the last sha. However,
<v Speaker 26>has I been over in your spot with an organization
<v Speaker 26>called BCA. I don't know you know what BCA has done.
<v Speaker 26>You never watch any of the CSI shows.
<v Speaker 27>Whatever something happens, you leave intentionally or and intentionally, you
<v Speaker 27>leave stuff behind, whether it be DNA evidence, fingerprints, blood.
<v Speaker 8>We'll give you the opportunity to tell you said the story.
<v Speaker 27>Man, Okay, but please don't don't sit here.
<v Speaker 10>And sell me. All right.
<v Speaker 27>I've been spend the least seven hours process in your apartment.
<v Speaker 19>I know the evidence in your apartment. I know the
<v Speaker 19>evidence in your garage. I mean, please, please, please juve
<v Speaker 19>me the courtesy of.
<v Speaker 2>Listen.
<v Speaker 19>I understand that people make mistakes. I told you before.
<v Speaker 2>I'm not here to judge you.
<v Speaker 19>Well, please give me the courtesy of being an honest man.
<v Speaker 2>All know me, though, but that you like you all
<v Speaker 2>know me.
<v Speaker 10>I know my.
<v Speaker 8>Rides my mind is because it's running to you know.
<v Speaker 8>Everybody says that you've lived there, and.
<v Speaker 25>The repute over the information is report because we got
<v Speaker 25>people that saw you.
<v Speaker 18>In the apartment.
<v Speaker 1>Man, He argued that he was in and out of
<v Speaker 1>the apartment and been in the garage for weeks. The
<v Speaker 1>body was put in the garage less than a week before.
<v Speaker 1>All the detectives wanted was for him to fess up
<v Speaker 1>and tell them what he did, and they weren't getting anywhere.
<v Speaker 1>It was time to bring God into it.
<v Speaker 19>For you.
<v Speaker 1>With God very an little did they know that they
<v Speaker 1>had just made a massive overreach. This was the perfect
<v Speaker 1>opportunity for the suspect to.
<v Speaker 2>Preach all I want, That's all I got for you,
<v Speaker 2>That's all I ever had a guy. So then you
<v Speaker 2>believe in an annoyed and role right, and I also
<v Speaker 2>believe in the chest gang here on earth where you
<v Speaker 2>met at Dublin and you have died, Hill is right
<v Speaker 2>here on earth like you, like you, no.
<v Speaker 16>Marrier who was a reverend, a past or, a deacon
<v Speaker 16>like you are not without seeing like you saying he's
<v Speaker 16>and like no one, whether it be police, pastor, no
<v Speaker 16>one can tell me that without saying no one can
<v Speaker 16>tell me that they have never committed a sin, never
<v Speaker 16>broken the law, whether they be misdemeanor.
<v Speaker 25>Or suddenly somebody, like everybody had a frown type of
<v Speaker 25>skeleton they call cause.
<v Speaker 2>And whether it be.
<v Speaker 19>Pastor or chief of police, like you know, throw a name.
<v Speaker 2>On me skeletons.
<v Speaker 19>Skeletons can be as big as the name, like chief
<v Speaker 19>of police and his skeletons can be just as big
<v Speaker 19>as say Anthony so.
<v Speaker 2>Will, all the way down to the little girls just
<v Speaker 2>leaving their care like.
<v Speaker 19>No one like, yeah, no, it's to God, and I
<v Speaker 19>know you know what I'm saying.
<v Speaker 2>It's I know it's good and I know it's bad.
<v Speaker 1>They just let them keep talking. They let them draft
<v Speaker 1>through the vague philosophies and half baked sermons in his
<v Speaker 1>little cabasa. According to him, no one wanted to hear
<v Speaker 1>his story, the real story, quote unquote again, you'll never
<v Speaker 1>convince a retard. They're not a genius. He was fine
<v Speaker 1>talking about literally everything except the murders.
<v Speaker 2>Good, listen to your story. The bingo dingo, we're here.
<v Speaker 2>I don't want to hear this.
<v Speaker 19>And we're the ones there ammunications.
<v Speaker 2>Here that's doing your job job. They all disagree with you,
<v Speaker 2>like man, I you know, hate to seem like.
<v Speaker 3>I'm litening to town or anything, but you know this
<v Speaker 3>is like like I told you earlier, I might have
<v Speaker 3>to begin in line.
<v Speaker 16>Of so sick that you don't want to go through
<v Speaker 16>you don't want to go through and probably you'll probably
<v Speaker 16>wouldn't wish on y'all worst enemy and I.
<v Speaker 2>Have just starting line up.
<v Speaker 10>It's not like.
<v Speaker 2>It's not like we're giving you one of the if
<v Speaker 2>you are going to make it any.
<v Speaker 8>Easier for you know what I want to do. I
<v Speaker 8>want to do the hardest thing that the police officer
<v Speaker 8>ever has to do.
<v Speaker 10>Do you know what that is?
<v Speaker 2>Go to work?
<v Speaker 8>No, that's easy, going out there when people are doing
<v Speaker 8>bad things and catching them, chasing on them, playing with them, whatever, tas.
<v Speaker 2>That's easy.
<v Speaker 8>I want to do the hardest job when I have
<v Speaker 8>to go to somebody and say I'm sorry to tell
<v Speaker 8>you this with your loved oness no longer with us,
<v Speaker 8>they're dead.
<v Speaker 1>This didn't face Michael. He just kept talking until everyone
<v Speaker 1>in the room was No. It's a cool parlor trick
<v Speaker 1>if you could do it, politicians are great at it.
<v Speaker 1>It's a shame though he didn't talk until he was numb,
<v Speaker 1>because you would have already been there a long time ago.
<v Speaker 2>I'm no, surely no, surely not, surely. I'm not expecting
<v Speaker 2>to be heard. You know some uh what you say,
<v Speaker 2>prepared for the worst, hope for the best prepared for
<v Speaker 2>the worst, like whatever the worst.
<v Speaker 19>He is, Like, I know, it's still like it's not
<v Speaker 19>like I'm about to go to war.
<v Speaker 2>How I'm about to be shooting and shit going to war.
<v Speaker 2>I'm about to get in front of him, Jill. It's
<v Speaker 2>around other criminals. That's what I'm saying, is man, like,
<v Speaker 2>I don't I feel. I feel nothing. I feel. It's
<v Speaker 2>not a damn thing, Like I'm sort of heroine.
<v Speaker 19>It's like I said, man, this shit like it's this
<v Speaker 19>this this world.
<v Speaker 25>That we live in, like from generals in the army
<v Speaker 25>to tennis comaratus, Like how you.
<v Speaker 2>Think some of these wars is one of 'em?
<v Speaker 19>He just send somebody yat on the front line, knowing.
<v Speaker 16>That these dudes ain't gonna come back, ain't even supposed
<v Speaker 16>to even come back.
<v Speaker 1>For the record, Michael was never in the military. He
<v Speaker 1>was just pulling out all the stops to make his case,
<v Speaker 1>even by stealing valor, even though he hadn't admitted to
<v Speaker 1>anything yet. He knew they had him, so he would
<v Speaker 1>just hint at the motive, which was I was neglected.
<v Speaker 1>Nobody ever listened to me. My baby Mama nags me
<v Speaker 1>all the time because I don't have a job. Why
<v Speaker 1>she makes me feel less than a mad women all
<v Speaker 1>want one thing?
<v Speaker 15>Why?
<v Speaker 1>Why?
<v Speaker 15>Why?
<v Speaker 1>Holy shit? What an insufferable asshole.
<v Speaker 25>I hope it serves as a way could be females
<v Speaker 25>stop trying them up.
<v Speaker 2>Guys over you know what I'm saying.
<v Speaker 8>That wasnake fuck to go oh, I mean, other than
<v Speaker 8>the regular unnecessarily, But it's gonna it's gonna serve at
<v Speaker 8>some point.
<v Speaker 19>It's gonna tan. It's gonna be some type of sake
<v Speaker 19>of small love.
<v Speaker 2>Just only what is about. I don't know what the about.
<v Speaker 25>I don't know, but you know, good percentage of us
<v Speaker 25>see good wives running self for rid.
<v Speaker 1>Then, out of the blue, probably because they were so
<v Speaker 1>numb from the talking, the cops flipped the switch and
<v Speaker 1>asked him point blank.
<v Speaker 8>First time you were killed?
<v Speaker 19>Anybody hear the parson that wout? I answer your questions?
<v Speaker 2>Why a request.
<v Speaker 19>Kill me?
<v Speaker 2>A couple of bugs? Somebody ain't there? Killed nobody?
<v Speaker 1>But that was a lie. In an obscured part of
<v Speaker 1>the interview that's barely audible, unfortunately, he admits to strangling
<v Speaker 1>one of the women. He was annoyed that she wouldn't
<v Speaker 1>leave and felt like she was trying to take advantage
<v Speaker 1>of him in some way. He was drunk, and all
<v Speaker 1>he remembered was putting his hand around her neck. He
<v Speaker 1>never said she died, but he never said her name.
<v Speaker 1>Later he claimed he found a body in a garbage
<v Speaker 1>bag and carried it down to the garage, but he
<v Speaker 1>never put it in there. It was a mirage of pieces,
<v Speaker 1>but the pieces corroborated the evidence, and it didn't take
<v Speaker 1>a genius to fill in the missing pieces.
<v Speaker 8>You could be the man right now, let's do it, Mike.
<v Speaker 8>I know, I know you've got power. Now, what do
<v Speaker 8>you think I mean, Mike?
<v Speaker 2>No, he's never really being clear with you.
<v Speaker 19>You kind of.
<v Speaker 8>You know what we found yesterday?
<v Speaker 10>Right?
<v Speaker 8>Think about what I found today, Mike. What were you
<v Speaker 8>talking about here today? He said they're gonna.
<v Speaker 2>Learn, We're to teach.
<v Speaker 19>They deserve it.
<v Speaker 2>I just talk about the start that the learys.
<v Speaker 8>No, I'm Mike, you aren't. And I was sitting there
<v Speaker 8>trying to put it all together. And after you, we
<v Speaker 8>took you back downstairs yesterday started Ruth and I and
<v Speaker 8>started Gardener. We sat down in my office and we
<v Speaker 8>talked for a long time and we just were trying
<v Speaker 8>to figure out what.
<v Speaker 2>You were tryna tell us.
<v Speaker 8>And the eye in certain Ruth know now which exactly.
<v Speaker 2>What you were saying?
<v Speaker 8>Bro, Mike, I know now we jumped right in like
<v Speaker 8>we found it. I found out you're you're the man?
<v Speaker 2>Do you want bullshitting?
<v Speaker 19>You know?
<v Speaker 2>I was h you know for the Englis You're not
<v Speaker 2>really telling you what? Mike? What is he saying? I got?
<v Speaker 19>I got, I got another body.
<v Speaker 8>I thought you were kind of blown to smoke up
<v Speaker 8>my ass yesterday me and Gardner and Ruth were talking
<v Speaker 8>about it, and I thought you were blowing smoke up
<v Speaker 8>my ass yesterday.
<v Speaker 19>I said, I don't know.
<v Speaker 10>I said, said, wait, I think I think he's telling
<v Speaker 10>me just by his body language, just by a demeanor,
<v Speaker 10>some of the things you were saying.
<v Speaker 8>You say, you're talking outside of your mouth. I think
<v Speaker 8>that that was that we should want to tell your story.
<v Speaker 8>And I'm giving you an opportunity now to do it.
<v Speaker 8>And I'm telling you I believe you now. I got
<v Speaker 8>a half assed believed you yesterday, and I'm believing you
<v Speaker 8>one hundred percent now.
<v Speaker 2>So you ain't. We ain't even how his one body
<v Speaker 2>he combo something totally different now.
<v Speaker 8>Whichever one you want to talk about, MIKEE. It ain't one,
<v Speaker 8>it ain't two.
<v Speaker 14>Let's do us all away run.
<v Speaker 1>Michael barely flinched. He had admitted to having dates to
<v Speaker 1>his apartment and getting so shitfaced that he didn't remember
<v Speaker 1>them leaving. He confessed to putting his hands around one
<v Speaker 1>of the women's necks and awakening to find a body
<v Speaker 1>in a garbage pack. That's bad. But even now, when
<v Speaker 1>confronted with more evidence and yet another body, he deflected.
<v Speaker 1>The detectives were running out of patience, and now they
<v Speaker 1>didn't just want to know why he killed. They wanted
<v Speaker 1>to know how many more dead women would be found
<v Speaker 1>and where they were located. When they found the first
<v Speaker 1>body in East Cleveland in twenty thirteen, it was a
<v Speaker 1>trash bag in a garage. The neighbors had smelt something.
<v Speaker 1>By the time the police arrived, the case was already strange.
<v Speaker 1>The suspect, Michael Madison, was calm. He denied everything and
<v Speaker 1>admitted only enough to seem helpful. One woman, and he said,
<v Speaker 1>was dead, but he hadn't killed her. He found her
<v Speaker 1>in a bag. He just moved her, That's all he claimed.
<v Speaker 1>But the evidence was there. They still didn't have a
<v Speaker 1>clear motive, though, only a suspect who talked in metaphors
<v Speaker 1>and acted like a victim all the time. This victim
<v Speaker 1>was also a father of two and a stepfather to
<v Speaker 1>one quiet teenager named Jalen, who years later would erupt
<v Speaker 1>into his own kind of violence in the same house
<v Speaker 1>on Chickasaw Avenue. The violence from both men was directed
<v Speaker 1>only at women, the women who raised Michael and her grandson, Jalen,
<v Speaker 1>and three other innocent women who just happened to cross
<v Speaker 1>the wrong path.
<v Speaker 10>Might you get the power? Obviously she disrespected you. Obviously
<v Speaker 10>she puts you into a position. Something happened, Bro, she
<v Speaker 10>made you have to show her. And now all I
<v Speaker 10>want you to do is to show me. We'll talk
<v Speaker 10>about whatever you wanna talk about. You wanna talk about
<v Speaker 10>the most recent only first, or you wanna talk about no,
<v Speaker 10>whatever one you want.
<v Speaker 8>Bro.
<v Speaker 1>In this tiny blue interrogation room that resembled the prison cell,
<v Speaker 1>detectives and Michael sat for hours on end, eating cheeseburgers
<v Speaker 1>from McDonald's as the questions came one after another. Well
<v Speaker 1>the barred window raised, Michael smoked black and mild cigars.
<v Speaker 1>The smoke mixing with the scent of sweat and making
<v Speaker 1>its way out the window to the sweltering streets of Cleveland.
<v Speaker 1>They were finally coming to understand this killer.
<v Speaker 17>And I guess even before you before here just you know,
<v Speaker 17>pretty much all light then at thirty five, with no
<v Speaker 17>real background in school and no career, no four oh one.
<v Speaker 2>Kay, kids a.
<v Speaker 3>Big mom as far as even as they come. You know,
<v Speaker 3>I'm a real like, I'm a real compassionate do and
<v Speaker 3>kind of certain things, what kind of things, just know,
<v Speaker 3>people people.
<v Speaker 2>But somewhere along the way, I just lost like I
<v Speaker 2>love like, I like, I love female. Nay, but a man,
<v Speaker 2>A man's a man's a man's man.
<v Speaker 17>Who should never be compromised when it comes to a
<v Speaker 17>female who's never been a man.
<v Speaker 1>It was a simple but disturbing statement. In that one sentence,
<v Speaker 1>Michael revealed a cracked mirror of identity, pride, and resentment
<v Speaker 1>against women. In twenty twenty five, especially, it's not unusual
<v Speaker 1>to hear the voices of frustration from men who feel
<v Speaker 1>diminished in relationships in society at large. Still, his words,
<v Speaker 1>the rapped in philosophical language, reveal a specific grievance. This
<v Speaker 1>was a man whose sense of self had been shaped
<v Speaker 1>and maybe shattered by the women around him. Still nothing
<v Speaker 1>could justify the brutality that followed. He never offered a
<v Speaker 1>formal confession, not in so many words, but he did
<v Speaker 1>give what experts call a functional confession. That's when a
<v Speaker 1>suspect doesn't technically admit guilt, but their behavior shows him.
<v Speaker 1>They lead police to evidence only the killer would know.
<v Speaker 1>They describe crime scenes in detail. They helped close the loop.
<v Speaker 1>Think of Ted Bundy, who helped investigators find remains even
<v Speaker 1>years after denying some of his murders, or Israel Keys,
<v Speaker 1>who mapped out the burial site of one of his
<v Speaker 1>victims despite refusing to name all of his crimes. It's
<v Speaker 1>not in what they say, it's in what they do.
<v Speaker 1>Michael finally took detectives to the bodies. The first was
<v Speaker 1>Shirelda Terry, the body found in the garage, the young
<v Speaker 1>girl just starting her life. Next was twenty eight year
<v Speaker 1>old Shatisha Sheili, who had a daughter. Her body was
<v Speaker 1>discovered in a brush pile near the garage behind Michael's apartment.
<v Speaker 1>It was found in layers of heavy trash backs, the
<v Speaker 1>same method used for the other victims. Forensic examination was
<v Speaker 1>limited due to decomposition, but there were signs of trauma
<v Speaker 1>and possible strangulation. Shatisha had bruises on her face and
<v Speaker 1>her clothing had ligature marks. Last to be found was
<v Speaker 1>thirty eight year old Angela descons. She was discovered days
<v Speaker 1>after the first body, in a musty basement of an
<v Speaker 1>abandoned house near Michael's apartment. Angelo was a quiet woman
<v Speaker 1>with a soft voice, trying to piece her life back together.
<v Speaker 1>She had once worked as a hairdresser, someone who brought
<v Speaker 1>beauty to others, but she struggled to get by and
<v Speaker 1>pull her own life together. Someone introduced her to Michael.
<v Speaker 1>He seemed somewhat safe enough and had a calm personality.
<v Speaker 1>That was all it took.
<v Speaker 28>June seventh, they tell us, that's when they last saw Angela,
<v Speaker 28>and since then, they say they have been frantically searching
<v Speaker 28>for her. But this week police confirmed their worst fear
<v Speaker 28>that cops had found her body, that thirty eight year
<v Speaker 28>olds of body. Investigators right now aren't saying how she died.
<v Speaker 28>Cops discovered her remains in a backyard Saturday near Shaw Avenue.
<v Speaker 28>Now Knew this morning. A statement from the family quote
<v Speaker 28>Angela Daskins was a beautiful, sweet, kind hearted woman. She
<v Speaker 28>was raised in Novelty, Ohio, by her father, Robert Daskins,
<v Speaker 28>and her stepmother, mother Linda Skins. Everyone who knew her
<v Speaker 28>loved her. She was a wonderful daughter, sister, and anne
<v Speaker 28>who truly cared about her family and friends. She has
<v Speaker 28>loved so much and will be missed by everyone who
<v Speaker 28>knew her.
<v Speaker 1>In the days after Michael's arrest, neighbors were quick to
<v Speaker 1>share their memories, not about him, but about his mother,
<v Speaker 1>Diane Madison, and what she'd been through. Everyone spoke highly
<v Speaker 1>of her.
<v Speaker 13>I want her to be remembered as someone who cared
<v Speaker 13>deeply for her children, someone who cared passionately about her community.
<v Speaker 21>She was just a fine person. I am a better
<v Speaker 21>person for having known her.
<v Speaker 1>Michael loved his mother. He admitted this openly, but he
<v Speaker 1>also alluded to neglect. What he didn't do in the
<v Speaker 1>interrogation was throw her under the bus, but the defense
<v Speaker 1>did that for him at the trial. The trial formerly
<v Speaker 1>started in April of twenty sixteen. By early May, Madison
<v Speaker 1>had been convicted on all counts, three counts of aggravated murder,
<v Speaker 1>three counts of kidnapping, three counts of gross abuse of
<v Speaker 1>a corpse, three counts of rape, and one count of
<v Speaker 1>possession of criminal tools. The following week, the court turned
<v Speaker 1>to mitigation evidence, opening the door for a glimpse into
<v Speaker 1>Michael's upbringing. Underneath the calm exterior of the woman next door,
<v Speaker 1>the community activist and loving mother and grandmother, the defense
<v Speaker 1>painted an entirely different portrait. They described Diane as cruel, neglectful,
<v Speaker 1>and violently abusive. Michael's attorneys revealed years of torment that
<v Speaker 1>started in childhood, documented by an expert clinical psychologist who
<v Speaker 1>evaluated Michael and examined his records. They said Diane beat
<v Speaker 1>him regularly, locked him in closets, and even forced him
<v Speaker 1>to eat feces. It didn't stop there, the defense told
<v Speaker 1>the court, he was also sexually abused and emotionally abandoned.
<v Speaker 1>They argued that Diane's abuse left scars so deep that
<v Speaker 1>they helped shape the monster he would later become. During
<v Speaker 1>the victim impacts statement given by Shilda's father, chaos broke
<v Speaker 1>out in the courtroom when, for some reason he stopped
<v Speaker 1>mid sentence and lunged across tables towards Michael. He started
<v Speaker 1>attacking him and had to be pulled off. His sister
<v Speaker 1>later clarified what happened at that moment.
<v Speaker 23>They're the sentency. You have the families there, and they're
<v Speaker 23>pouring out their hearts and saying how they're going to
<v Speaker 23>miss their families and what their families meant to him,
<v Speaker 23>And he sent over there smiling, which caused my brother
<v Speaker 23>to launch at him. To him, he heard, fucked the door,
<v Speaker 23>excuse me, okay, the life of my daughter, the life
<v Speaker 23>of my niece, the life of our baby whom we
<v Speaker 23>caught heaven.
<v Speaker 14>Okay.
<v Speaker 23>So it was horrible to be that close, to have
<v Speaker 23>to breathe his air, to be in the same room
<v Speaker 23>with a person that is so horrible and don't even care.
<v Speaker 23>He don't care. He was laughing, which he gave him
<v Speaker 23>the death penalty.
<v Speaker 1>You heard it at the end of the trial. No
<v Speaker 1>mitigating circumstances were going to stand in the way of justice.
<v Speaker 1>Michael Madison has now spent nearly a decade on Ohio's
<v Speaker 1>death row. He was sentenced on June second, twenty sixteen,
<v Speaker 1>and was scheduled to die by lethal injection on May twentieth,
<v Speaker 1>twenty twenty one, but an unofficial moratorium on executions installed
<v Speaker 1>all lethal injections in Ohio since twenty twenty. Want to
<v Speaker 1>know why, Well, they're waiting for an alternative execution method
<v Speaker 1>in place of lethal injection. You see, they can't get
<v Speaker 1>their hands on the right drugs to make the deadly cocktail.
<v Speaker 1>They could put dogs and cats to sleep all day long,
<v Speaker 1>all the strays, put them all to sleep in a
<v Speaker 1>humane way, we're told, But they can't get the cocktail
<v Speaker 1>right for humans. Isn't that strange. It's almost as if
<v Speaker 1>they don't want to and are just hiding behind some
<v Speaker 1>bullshit regulation in order to not do it, despite what
<v Speaker 1>the populace might have voted for already. Doesn't sound very democratic,
<v Speaker 1>does it anyway. For now, this asshole is still alive,
<v Speaker 1>as the system that condemned him sits frozen in time,
<v Speaker 1>almost by design.
<v Speaker 29>I am struck by the sheer inhumanity of what one
<v Speaker 29>human being could do to that one but three human beings.
<v Speaker 29>It is incomprehensible.
<v Speaker 30>You cajoled Lord and deceased Satisha Shieling, Angela Deskins, and
<v Speaker 30>child Terry to your apartment for your depraved purposes. You
<v Speaker 30>went on to abuse the corpses of these three victims.
<v Speaker 29>You stripped them from the waist down.
<v Speaker 31>You folded them in half, finding them so that their
<v Speaker 31>feet were up by their ears. You wrapped them in
<v Speaker 31>multiple layers of trash bags, and you discarded them.
<v Speaker 1>This killer didn't just kill out of nowhere. His crimes
<v Speaker 1>were monstrous, but they happened after unresolved festering thoughts from
<v Speaker 1>a long, entangled legacy of suffering. Then you add the
<v Speaker 1>alcohol and possibly drugs, and poof, you get a certain
<v Speaker 1>scale episode lucky you. Decades later, in a cramped Cleveland apartment,
<v Speaker 1>a young Michael was beaten, locked in closets, humiliated, and
<v Speaker 1>allegedly forced to eat feces by the very person who
<v Speaker 1>was supposed to protect him, his mother, Diane Madison, a
<v Speaker 1>woman the public celebrated after her death. Later, he was
<v Speaker 1>allegedly sexually abused by one of her boyfriends. Michael felt
<v Speaker 1>emotionally discarded and shot through the cracks of a system
<v Speaker 1>that barely noticed he was falling. Then came to Nea Plummer,
<v Speaker 1>the mother of his child, who, according to Michael, belittled
<v Speaker 1>him and called him less than a man. A man's manhood,
<v Speaker 1>he said, should never be compromised by a female who's
<v Speaker 1>never been a man. That quote me sound absurd on
<v Speaker 1>the surface, but beneath it lies a cold bit of truth,
<v Speaker 1>one that points to a deeper identity crisis, especially among
<v Speaker 1>men raised in trauma by women who are in trauma themselves.
<v Speaker 1>It's a warped belief, born in pain and shaped by powerlessness.
<v Speaker 1>It's an endless sloop. I don't know how the fuck
<v Speaker 1>we get out of Do you have any ideas?
<v Speaker 8>Now?
<v Speaker 1>Then came Jalen, Diane's grandson, the quiet boy who watched
<v Speaker 1>all of this unfold, who once lived under the same
<v Speaker 1>roof as Michael. In twenty nineteen, Jalen, just eighteen years old,
<v Speaker 1>would creep into Diane Madison's home and stab her to
<v Speaker 1>death in her own bed. He didn't just kill her,
<v Speaker 1>he nearly decapitated her. He pleaded guilty in twenty twenty
<v Speaker 1>one and is serving a life sentence with eligibility for
<v Speaker 1>parole in thirty years. His brother, sister, cousin, and sad
<v Speaker 1>little dog all survived the incident and remained in the
<v Speaker 1>care of their mother to Nia plumber. So here is
<v Speaker 1>the question. Did Jalen inherit the same demons that haunted
<v Speaker 1>Michael was this demonic possession some sort of poltergeist in
<v Speaker 1>this house of horror? Or do we accept a more
<v Speaker 1>rational explanation. Did Jalen learn violence by watching his uncle
<v Speaker 1>in and out of his life, bringing stories of abuse
<v Speaker 1>and death with him. Did Diane really change into the
<v Speaker 1>person neighbors claimed, or did the darkness inside that house
<v Speaker 1>simply go unnoticed until it exploded again? Did the systems
<v Speaker 1>America has in place fail both of these men, or
<v Speaker 1>did society simply stop asking the hard questions and stop
<v Speaker 1>doing the hard things once the bodies were found In
<v Speaker 1>the end, does it all really matter anyway? It should?
<v Speaker 1>We all have this feeling in the back of our
<v Speaker 1>mind that it should. We should do better at raising
<v Speaker 1>all of our children. We should have a safer and
<v Speaker 1>happier and more mentally sound civilization. It started with the
<v Speaker 1>allegations of abuse at the hands of one woman. Two
<v Speaker 1>men carried it forward, and three innocent women, in addition
<v Speaker 1>to Diane herself, paid the ultimate price. Not one of
<v Speaker 1>them deserved to die. That's going to do it this week.
<v Speaker 1>Thank you for joining us. I invite you to go
<v Speaker 1>check out our latest episode of Sword Scale Television entitled
<v Speaker 1>Home Easily one of the most fucked up things you'll
<v Speaker 1>ever see.
<v Speaker 2>I promise