Crime Seen | Episode 110: Tell Them You Love Me

[00:00:24] Hello everyone, I'm Mari Forth. I'm Sarah Carradine podcasting from Unseated Gadigal Land. And this is Crime Seen, the True Crime Review Podcast where we get to the heart of how true crime stories are told. You can get this podcast along with all the other fantastic

[00:00:39] reality TV content by subscribing at RobHasAWebsite.com where we know reality TV. We sure do. We'd love it if you would subscribe to our dedicated feed as well. Please go to RobHasAWebsite.com slash crime feed. You'll get your true crime on Tuesdays.

[00:00:58] If you've already subscribed, thank you so much. Last week we watched How to Rob a Bank and Movie Pass Movie Crash. Mari, what did we watch this week? This week we watched Tell Them You Love Me on Netflix. It was directed by Nick August

[00:01:17] Perna who directed the Oxxym Kingpins in 2021. And it currently, at least over here, is trending number one in the U.S. But first we'll always tell him we love him. It's our second ever eight timer and the birthday twin to my daughter, Mr. Matt Scott.

[00:01:39] Matt, how are you? I am thrilled to be here. And thank you for always telling me you love me. I love you both. I love crime scene and I'm just, I'm so glad to be here. It's been a minute

[00:01:51] but I'm happy to be the eight time, eight time, eight time, eight time, eight time, eight time, eight time, eight time guest. I think that was it. I think so too, but I'm not sure. We're always glad to have you here, Matt. But

[00:02:08] I fear that your streak of very downery stuff is going to keep coming here. Okay, but let me just bring in something that's kind of cool about the fact that you asked me to be on because you did, you reached out. You're like, Matt, you know, we're talking

[00:02:26] about something that no one else is going to want to talk about. So of course this is your moment and we'll get into it. But I am actually from West Swords, New Jersey, which is represented in this documentary. Actually a lot of the places in this documentary

[00:02:46] are very familiar to me because of where I grew up. I live in Washington DC now, but Irvington, New Jersey, not too far of a drive away. I know some of the places they mentioned

[00:02:56] Newark otherwise. So we're in my backyard with this one people. This hits close to home. And we're in your wheelhouse with difficult subjects. It's all that's perfect. When we have a difficult subject, it's like, oh, let's get Matt. Yeah, it all works out.

[00:03:19] I was going to say thankfully I don't know anyone who is actually in this documentary. Okay, well let's get to the crime. So in 2015, Professor Anna Stubbefield of Rutgers University was found guilty of two counts of first degree aggravated sexual assault against Derek D. Mann

[00:03:41] Johnson, a man with cerebral palsy who the state characterized as having severe mental disabilities. D. Mann was 33, unable to stand independently or accurately direct his body's movements and was nonverbal. Stubbefield had worked with him on facilitated communication

[00:04:03] where she supported his hand as he typed his thoughts and feelings. Stubbefield stated that she had successfully communicated with D. Mann, determining he was of normal intelligence. Stubbefield was sentenced to two 12-year terms to be run concurrently.

[00:04:21] After a successful appeal, she pled guilty to third degree aggravated criminal sexual contact and was sentenced to time served, which had been three years. In October 2016, D. Mann's family was awarded a $4 million civil suit against Stubbefield.

[00:04:40] Okay, so this is this documentary is so incredibly heavy. I'm going to be very uncomfortable for most of this and it's gonna be a lot of uncomfortable laughing. I'm not gonna lie because I want to get your overall thoughts here,

[00:04:59] Matt, because I was shook. I had no idea what the case was. So as it was unfolding, I was kind of like, wow. What are your thoughts? Yeah, it's interesting. Like growing up in West

[00:05:14] Orange, New Jersey, where Anna is from, I oddly like never heard about this story. At the same time, it didn't feel all that unfamiliar. Maybe in passing I'd heard about it, but just to start the story, it is so disturbing and also really fascinating how the documentary

[00:05:39] hits home this point again and again and again about the almost like the intersectionality of all these different issues when it comes to the case. So race, disability, sex, and class are all mentioned. And at one point we hear from one of the folks featured,

[00:05:59] Devya, who talks about some of the other intersections in the case. And it is really like fascinating stepping back from just how disturbing everything is because it does weave together so much that people don't talk about together. Sometimes we want to think about

[00:06:20] something. Actually, so often with many of the cases that you all cover, people want to think of things as being so cut and dry and straightforward. And this is disturbingly complicated, especially when you factor in the facilitated communication and when you factor

[00:06:36] in the just like the he said, she said, they said of it all. There's a lot here. There's a lot here. I have no clue where this podcast is going today. I know that makes three of us, I think. Yeah. Sarah, how about you?

[00:06:57] It's it's well made. Let's start there. Yes. Yes. Yes. So that is in its favor. You mentioned Deva, Matt, she is the MVP of this podcast. She's an ethnographer. She has torsion, which I wasn't sure about. She has a disability herself. She knows Anna. She's

[00:07:22] obviously thought deeply about all sorts of things. I could have listened to her three times as long because she talks about communication, sex and race. And I think class, Matt, as you added in is really important too. I think I'd love to get into the discussion

[00:07:46] because overall I'm just saying it's good and thank God for Deva. And other than that, let's talk a bit more granularly. What about you, Mari? What did you think overall?

[00:07:54] Yeah, like I saw I'm watching it as I'm watching it unfold. You know how I do my notes very like stream of conscious, like what am I thinking as I'm watching it more, more so than what

[00:08:08] I'm actually watching. If that makes sense. And like the first minute of it opening up with her voice and her telling it kind of from her point of view, I was like, I don't

[00:08:22] like this. Sarah knows I don't like when they let the perpetrator try and like weave the story. But as I felt, as it went along, as the documentary went along, I was like, okay,

[00:08:36] it's a give them enough rope type situation, which we know those are the situations I do like. So the documentary is very interesting. Let's dive deep into it. And I think we really can't we really can't dive into it without talking about the talking heads, because this

[00:08:56] documentary is basically all about the talking heads. And none so more important to me than D man who is Derek Johnson, I'm going to probably go back and forth between D man and Derek Johnson, who's the victim here, his family, Daisy Johnson, Derek's mom, and John

[00:09:18] Johnson, Derek's brother are here with us, telling the story. Again, their voices are not the first ones we hear. But I'm going to start with them because I think it's very important hearing their portion of the documentary as much as I want to go in

[00:09:35] chronological order with this, I still think it's more important that we center their voices, and them finding out that this woman, this professor who john, his brother had found her

[00:09:49] found her, he was he was, I believe studying in one of her classes. She she had he had saw the video on facilitated communication. He had talked to her about his brother, and he

[00:10:01] essentially introduced his brother to Anna, and the, the feeling of hurt in their voices once the trial and all of that is over. And once they find out what she had been doing to him,

[00:10:16] it's the gut punch of the documentary that comes at the end. And as much as I hate that it felt like their voices weren't given time in the beginning. I do agree with how it unfolded.

[00:10:32] What do you think Sarah about that? They are so impactful. Daisy at one point says, I had to compose myself when she's describing what had happened or how she found out. And my heart just broke and I thought yes, you did have to compose yourself and you shouldn't

[00:10:52] have had to. But you're super smart and you knew you knew you couldn't give out the the belly scream you probably wanted to give out that you had to advocate for your son as you had advocated for him for 33 years.

[00:11:10] And John Johnson, Dr. John Johnson, his brother, there's a moment where he can't even speak and is visibly restraining himself from from flying apart and bursting apart. And witnessing that and them letting us, I mean, they've signed a waiver, right? But them letting us witness

[00:11:34] their the physical reaction they both had to the emotions of this case was so powerful. So I agree, Mary, they're not the first to speak. They are the most powerful. We also see them interacting with Derek. Very hard to know whether to call him Derek or D man.

[00:11:56] And as claims that he wants to be called demand that he told her she said, what do you want to be called? So on one hand, you want to honor that and say, all right, we want to call people by

[00:12:07] the name they want. We only have her word for it. Yeah, so I think it's interesting looking at the at our little summary that we always do sometimes we have pages of talking heads. We have such a small number that each one has has such a great impact.

[00:12:29] Matt, what about you? What did you think about Daisy and John? Yeah, I mean, well, just to clearly lay it out, because again, one of the themes in this case in this documentary is race. And so we have Derek, Daisy, John, a black family from

[00:12:47] Irvington, New Jersey, which is predominantly black community, like, relatively low income community for Essex County in that area of New Jersey. And you have Anna who, you know, speaking from my experiences of like West Orange, New Jersey, an interesting community

[00:13:07] where you have so many different demographics represented and a lot mixing into the point where I could imagine on having like many interactions with black communities and black families and feeling comfortable. Obviously, she felt a little bit too comfortable.

[00:13:25] Well, and she's she's married to a black man and her children. She is. And that's that's also we will talk about that intriguing. I'm sitting on my hands like Daisy right now. Yeah, yeah.

[00:13:41] There's a lot there that's fascinating. But I do really appreciate how we heard so much from John and Daisy, and we got to see really clearly like their hesitations around this. I mean, John largely recognized us and Daisy did verbalize this too, to some extent, but like

[00:14:02] Daisy as the mom was often or she felt was she's often viewed as just a black woman in the states and not as someone. Yeah, as a black mom and someone who couldn't have

[00:14:13] expertise as someone who didn't know what they were doing. And I feel like that this is one of the things that's a little bit mind numbing about the documentary. But I guess really like

[00:14:23] this is the reality of the world we live in that sometimes, especially when you're dealing with the complexities of identity, like you have situations where, okay, in one sense, we are dealing with the reality of this black woman who's a mom who has spent a lot of time

[00:14:40] gaining expertise, decades gaining expertise when it comes to disability being discounted or being overlooked by this, this white woman who also has her own expertise. But is she overlooking what Daisy is is on overlooking what Daisy is saying because of

[00:14:59] race? Is that a factor or is it because of her actual expertise or like there's so much happening within here, but I love that the documentary does give us so many different perspectives.

[00:15:11] I don't feel like they left a ton on the floor. The questions that I asked as things went along, you know, even small questions about like what is like demand or I thought it was

[00:15:27] funny because Dema and Anna see I'm gonna mess up the names but Anna kept saying like demand as it went along, which I also thought was an interesting thing. So demand, demand, Derek, like, you know, what's his level of literacy that was addressed along the way?

[00:15:46] His education was mentioned in there, his personality was mentioned in there. And overall, I mean, for a situation where the main subject of the documentary couldn't really speak for himself in a traditional documentary format, they did a good job of attempting to give you

[00:16:06] perspective on what he was thinking. It gets really muddied in there, especially when we aren't getting the facilitated communication transcripts, even when we are it's kind of muddy. But I feel like they gave us, they gave us a lot to chew on. Yeah. Better or worse.

[00:16:26] And before we move on, I do want to say that was one of the things that I was looking for because Matt could probably back me up when this movie is starting. I'm like, okay,

[00:16:36] I need the main thing I'm going to look at. One of the main things I'm going to look out is how to assess this black family's thoughts on mental disability. Because, you know, in our

[00:16:46] community, sometimes it can be overlooked. It get people can try and like act like it's not there type of thing, you know? So I really wanted to see what was this family's relationship to Derek and his needs and their thoughts on it. And immediately it's answered that Daisy

[00:17:03] and John are such a, they are so loving of Derek. They've accepted him for who he was. It was actually Daisy advocating for Derek when he was younger, trying to figure out what was wrong with him. When other people were saying like, oh no, he's fine. He's having

[00:17:19] seizures and nobody is telling her what's wrong with her son. And she has to go to doctors, doctor after doctor after doctor until they finally figure out that he has cerebral palsy and stuff like that. So Daisy is not only very attuned to her son's condition, she's very

[00:17:39] sensitive to it. And like Matt said, she had joined organizations to better learn how to deal with his disability. Like she is in it. She is in it. Her and John, who's Derek's older brother. They're both in here for their son and their brother. They are not pretending

[00:17:57] that there's nothing wrong with him. They are not neglecting his needs. They are, they for every everything that we see in this documentary, they are trying to do their utmost to make Derek's life as comfortable as possible with the limits that are set upon him. And there's,

[00:18:14] they've even, they even said like at the end, they're like, it's okay. Like you won't be able to do a lot of things, but that's, that's okay. You know what I'm saying? Like,

[00:18:22] which I don't know if some people don't like hearing that or not, but I, for me, I think it's very refreshing to see a black family that's so accepting of their loved one who has like severe needs and, and who addressed them as lovingly as they do.

[00:18:40] If that makes sense. Yeah. And I would just add to, I completely agree with everything you mentioned, Mari, and it was also refreshing kind of going back to the little bits that we had with the detective where, or I'm assuming a detective who was talking with Daisy

[00:18:59] and asked, when did you find out about your son? And she, Daisy basically says like, I always knew. And that, and it points to the fact that, you know, oftentimes we do see for certain communities, I mean, for black people in general, but also thinking of

[00:19:15] the fact that Daisy is a black woman, like medical care or like any insight that she might have had on her son was overlooked and invalidated from the beginning. So they're already fighting an uphill battle. But I also would point out that one reason I'm not so

[00:19:34] surprised about the, like about that not being a bigger issue, like the police completely discarding what she was saying. Actually, the police were, surprise, surprise, like kind of doing the right thing here or as much as possible. And I think again, that goes, that's a

[00:19:51] reflection of a lot of the racial dynamics in like this part of New Jersey. It could keep going on and on, but there's a lot there that I think really informs what we're seeing,

[00:20:03] which would have been different in a different place where police, where they could, where they completely throw out the concerns of a black family and a black woman, black mom who's doing this work. So yeah. That's a great point. They could have completely dismissed the allegations

[00:20:22] against Anna. That's true. Well, let's get to Anna herself. Anna Stubblefield, like I said, she's sitting here talking to us and, you know, and she opened it. Yes. And so I want

[00:20:35] to talk about her as a talking head, but I also want to start the discussion into the documentary itself because we're hearing on, we're getting Anna's voice here. She's talking about how like,

[00:20:44] you know, it was hard that once I got out, I had to, it was like, who do I tell that I was in prison? Like when I got my first haircut and all this stuff and I'm like,

[00:20:53] I just, woo, I don't like this woman. Like immediately I'm like, I do not like her. And she goes into her story. She's like, she even like prefaces it like, I hope I'm not making

[00:21:06] stuff up, but this is my memory as from what I remember. She like prefaces her own comments before she starts talking about how she meets Derek's family and stuff like that, or how she

[00:21:18] got into her disability work because she was a director in the philosophy department at Rutgers and she actually like specialized in race, disability and ethics. And like one of her main driving studies was disability rights, like for disabled people.

[00:21:40] And as she's spewing out her bona fides here to me, it was very, very over liberal white woman stuff. I was like, oh no, like I was not having it. And it really,

[00:21:56] it was really chafing me a little bit. Did you get any of that Sarah? Like especially, especially when she's talking about the struggles of this disabled people. Yes. Where does compassion fall over into fetishization? Oh yes. Oh yes.

[00:22:23] So we meet her mother later on, Sandy McClellan, another academic. So Anna is the child of academics. So you're in a rarefied atmosphere, rarefied stupid word. You know what I mean? You're in a bit of a bell jar of thought. Her attitude that the disabled

[00:22:44] must, can and should be allowed to communicate that they have their own thoughts and feelings and desires and wishes is fantastic. I mean, it's interesting, Matt, you mentioned Daisy initially talking to the SVU police officer and he provides words for her. And I thought,

[00:23:02] yeah, that's what people do to disabled people. And that's what that white man is doing to that black woman as she's trying to tell the story, trying to be straightforward, get all the information out. So she might pause. She would pause and he would supply words.

[00:23:17] Don't don't do that everybody. This is why listening to Deva is so instructive because she's so thoughtful. And she says, because it takes me three times as long to say a sentence as it does you, I have to be really sure that what I'm saying is important.

[00:23:32] I thought you're incredible. So Anna's attitude about assisting communication is fantastic. Her attitude about bodily autonomy, fantastic. All these things are great. What happened? That's what I think the documentary is saying. Yeah, I am hesitate.

[00:23:55] I am also sitting on my hands because the phrase do good is coming to my lips. There's a slogan here in Australia for works about film, TV and so on. Nothing about us without us comes from the disability community. And yeah, I just think where is the discussion?

[00:24:19] You know, you are you are making the pipeline direct to Derek. Is there anything wrong with that? We can discuss that. But where is the consultation and the involvement of disabled people in that space? Yeah. So so on a like you're pointing out, Sarah, her mom,

[00:24:41] her mom was an academic that dealt with disabled rights. And so Anna describes to us, Matt, that she grew up. She says idolizing, idolizing disabled people, she would blindfold herself and and, you know, act as if she was blind. Her mom says that she taught

[00:25:05] her how to read in Braille and had and that Anna had asked her to find a blind pen pal so she could communicate to a blind pen pal and learn Braille. She learned American Sign language.

[00:25:17] She would like act around the house like she couldn't walk or she couldn't talk or she couldn't hear. And she said she became very fascinated with people who had cerebral cerebral palsy. She even she said that as a kid. So and she's saying this,

[00:25:37] all of this stuff with a smile like this is how I got into I this is how I was fascinated with their rights and stuff like that. I just always wanted to fight for their rights and

[00:25:45] stuff like that. And for her, she hears it, Matt, I think she thinks this is a good thing. I don't know that. Yeah, I look, there's a line, there's a line that definitely is crossed.

[00:26:01] Like, it's good when people are curious about topics, we could agree on that, right? And it's good when they want to learn and when they immerse themselves to an extent. But she just takes everything way too far. And it's a little laugh, Matt. But that is the

[00:26:21] understatement of way too far. I mean, way too far. It's like, you know, and I think that that's kind of the simple thing that so many people overlook or don't check her on, which is that like, Anna, you like, you

[00:26:40] You can't do this. You can't cosplay disability. I'm sorry. Because at the end of the day, it's not like you can take it off. You can't cosplay it, you can't take it off. You can't put it on. Like that's just not your lived experience. And

[00:26:55] I feel like her doing everything that you laid out Mari results in her feeling like, what does it lead to? Because what does it lead to? It leads her feeling. It feels like it leads her overstepping, leads her feeling she has a better understanding of these issues than

[00:27:11] she actually does. It leads to her, I'm sure imprinting a lot of her perspective, her wants, her desires onto those that she's aiming to help or that she thinks that she wants to help.

[00:27:24] And I will just put this out there, that one of the overarching things I find so suspicious just a question for us to consider. Did Anna's wants, her desires, her needs ever, ever diverge from demands? Did they ever? Did they once diverge from his in what she explained?

[00:27:47] No, never not once in her narrative did she state that her perspective, what she wanted, what she was turned on by even diverge from what he wanted. That to me is suspicious. That's incredibly suspicious because it just shows that she cannot perceive demands,

[00:28:09] wants, desires, his humanity outside of like outside of what she thought that he'd want, which she seemed to affirm with that facilitated communication machine and whatever other interaction. It just doesn't make any sense because there's never going to be a time

[00:28:28] when you're communicating with someone, whether that's your kid, whether that's someone you love or you know that you don't disagree at some point, but every single thing that she did and every single thing she wanted, he seemed to magically want, which I'm like,

[00:28:41] Anna, that's a little sus to me, man. According to her, when the topic of sex comes up between them because they love each other and he would like to have sex with her,

[00:28:55] he says, according to her, he says, how can we do it? Which is a perfectly reasonable question. In my opinion, her answer should have been not, we'll figure it out, but let us consult

[00:29:16] someone who is skilled and expert in this area and see what we can do safely, whatever it might be. Let's say that Derek did think and say and feel all the things that she says he did.

[00:29:35] I mean, he has a right to bodily autonomy. He has a right to want sex. He has a right to all of those things. She took those rights away from him, which is, it sounds contradictory,

[00:29:51] but his right to touch and being a fully realized sexual being as we all have was his and not hers. She took that from him with what she did.

[00:30:40] So, if you haven't watched, let's break down this facilitated communication so that we can break down how we think Anna's wants may have been imprinted upon Derek. So, when John had approached Anna saying, hey,

[00:31:25] my brother, he has a lot of the symptoms of what I've seen in this video she had showed in the class, there was a video showing up a girl who was communicating through facilitated communication who also had cerebral palsy. And Anna said that, well, the closest center

[00:31:47] who does this is in Syracuse, which is further away, but let me work with him because she was apparently she did have some experience in facilitated communication or she wanted to. So, she starts working with Derek. Again, this was when I was definitely like when she was

[00:32:06] explaining the cosplaying disability, I was like, okay, this is bordering on fetishization. And then when she agreed to be demands like to help him with facilitated communication, I was then thinking I was like, or does she want to use him almost like a guinea pig to

[00:32:28] help prove some of her theories about disabled rights and disabled communication and stuff like that. But either way, they use something called the Neo Keyboard D. This was used to communicate the Neo Keyboard D saves all communication. So, one part of the documentary is that we got a

[00:32:50] lot of the transcripts from the Neo Keyboard D, which I really like this is one of the pluses for the production of the show because I'm glad we got to see like a track record of

[00:33:06] stuff. And this keyboard, this is how demand uses it to communicate and she is the one who helps his hand go to the different letters for what he wants to type. And I think at one point

[00:33:27] I wrote down like a Ouija board. Exactly. So she has to interpret what he's trying to say, she's only supposed to facilitate his hands to pick out these words and to spell these words.

[00:33:43] But we know that he doesn't have total control of his hands. And we later found out what his mental capacity is. She felt that he had a proper intelligence, proper mental capacity, he just could not communicate. Her feeling was if you give him a tool to communicate,

[00:34:03] he can then do whatever he can. Communication will open the doors for him because the only blockade for him was the communication, not his lack of intelligence, not anything like that. And John and Daisy for a time went with it because who wouldn't want to hear that,

[00:34:24] somebody saying your loved one, now we found something that can make it easier for them to get through life. And it's like the Holy Grail for them. But as this goes on, like Sarah says,

[00:34:38] she talks about how she knew when she was starting to have feelings for him. And I found it very when she talks about their conversation about them having feelings, I noted that she was

[00:34:50] the one who said that she loved him first. And she said that he said he loved her back. Again, I think it was very interesting that we didn't get transcripts for certain parts of this story. Did y'all notice that? Yes. Especially during the sexual encounters,

[00:35:08] they didn't put up any transcripts from this the so called sexual encounter. So, again, I don't know if that's the director choosing not to put those up or those not being present. But even if they are present, again, she's the one holding his hand. So it

[00:35:25] really it really throws into question every and everything. But let me just wrap up this thought and I'll toss it to you, Matt. When I found out that as she's talking about falling

[00:35:40] in love with him and she's like, but I was married, didn't know she was married up until this point. This reveal was crazy to me. She's like, yes, I was falling for him. But,

[00:35:49] you know, I was married and we were friends. But, you know, I was falling for him. And I realized that I couldn't be with my husband. Cut to a picture of her husband, a black man,

[00:36:02] and she has two kids with him. And I was just like, Oh my God, like my gut dropped. I was like, D man is like the per her perfect fetish fetishized representation, like in actuality,

[00:36:18] like a black man who is disabled with cerebral palsy, which she had, you know, grown up. Matt, tell me I'm not. I wasn't. No, you're spot on because we've laid it out. Like she has an affinity for people with disabilities in particular cerebral palsy. She obviously also

[00:36:43] appreciates, appreciates black men, which she does, which it's like hard to talk about because it's like there's nothing wrong. Like her being in an interracial relationship is not an issue. And you know, I'm like, go off. Like, I'm glad that you feel comfortable

[00:37:04] being with people who are not your own race. That's something we need more in this world. People just to be more open minded. But what I guess I'm saying is like, it is so

[00:37:21] like just strange that for me, it's the power dynamic. I just want to come back to that. There we go. Yeah. Because regardless of the situation, like, how is D man going to be in

[00:37:39] a place in my opinion, I don't believe that demands in a place to consent in a situation where he's literally looking to Anna, Anna for like his life for his for him to be able to communicate

[00:37:53] for him to be able to thrive. Yes. If someone is, is making it possible for me to communicate or if they are taking care of me or if they're like doing all these things to improve my life.

[00:38:04] Yeah, I'm going to develop some sort of feelings for them. Maybe in the case of demand, like who who knows what his experience with those feelings of love and affection and attraction are but you

[00:38:17] can't be surprised that he would develop feelings of love for her in some type of way. It would also be strange if he didn't. But she took advantage of that power dynamic, in my opinion. And I guess like there's so much we could talk about around like her

[00:38:32] fetishizing potentially fetishizing black people and fetishizing people with disabilities. But like, I think that also just muddies the fact that it was insanely inappropriate for her to advance a dynamic where she had the power to control his communication to advance that to something that was sexual like if

[00:38:51] Come on man. He ordered her around. He ordered her to take her clothes off. Yeah, she was into that. Like what the hell that that reminds me of a lot of the other some of the other God we have to mention every time around the BDSM

[00:39:04] style situations that we've covered on here where it's like, that's not that's not it. That's not right. Like she kept going and the fact that she as you as you said, Mari early on she gave you know she was given enough rope here to really incriminate herself

[00:39:23] along the way and she did because I'm like, man, like, really, what are we doing? Yeah, Matt, I think that's that's so clear. It's if we if we say that demand is saying the things that are on the neo keyboard. We have some evidence he does do

[00:39:48] some school papers where somebody else is the facilitator and she doesn't know the subjects that he's writing about. I mean, sure, it's it's literature, right? So she might know but let's say and let's say that he was able to say to Anna once in class don't, you know,

[00:40:10] basically don't paraphrase me you must say what I write. Given all of that, she still did the wrong thing given that he felt affection, given that he felt attraction for her. I mean, she is

[00:40:24] the person other than his mother and his brother who is in physical contact with him the most because she's holding his hand. She's sitting beside him. She probably smells nice. I mean, you know, not to trivialize it but that's so for all these, you know, power imbalance

[00:40:41] dynamics. If he confessed his love and sexual feelings for her, that is when you say I'm we need to stop this now. I need to get you another facilitator and let's talk to, you know, potentially a sex worker that might introduce you safely to to the sex,

[00:41:04] whatever it might be. She was wrong. Full stop. Shut up, Anna. I don't want to see you and your perfect haircut ever again. That haircut was sharp. It was sharp. That haircut was offensive. Like she just got it. Yeah, like it was such an offensive haircut.

[00:41:23] It was like she was a Bond villain that haircut. That's how like. I'm so stuck with each other. Sorry, I was trying to restrain myself. Because I was trying to figure out, that's why I love discussing because I was trying to figure

[00:41:38] out my feelings about but if he did feel that and if he did say those things then he has a right to but of course he is not the person to be acting on those things. Yeah, chapter two

[00:41:52] is power. You know, it's right there. They say it right there. It's the power dynamic. Exactly. Yeah. So. Yes, so. Recovering. I know exactly. I'm like catching my breath over here. Gosh.

[00:42:07] So I saw the problem comes after they have sex or after Anna rapes him, which is twice. Yeah, twice. That's what she said. But I don't know exactly when Anna tries to get demand to tell Daisy and John from what we understand. This is the clip that

[00:42:33] if you're watching Netflix, this is kind of the clip that you see and it's like harrowing. But this is where it starts to get criminal because this is when Daisy and John are like,

[00:42:44] you did what with our son? And especially after Anna has now been trying to control Demand's living situation. She's trying to get him to move out. She's trying to tell them, Daisy and John, what demand actually means. Like, oh, he doesn't want to wear this.

[00:43:04] Oh, he doesn't want to listen to this. Like Anna is like inserting herself into their lives in such a way that John felt was very racist and classist in a sense of Anna thought she was better than them. She thought she knew better than them and she was

[00:43:26] what they felt like was trying to take demand from them in a sense. Well, just to jump in for a second, the stories she reached over and changed the radio station in Daisy's car from the gospel music to classical music. And she sat in their

[00:43:50] damn house and told them how she had sex with their son and brother. So in my opinion, especially for someone who's supposed to be so versed in race and identity and other things

[00:44:08] that she claims to be an expert in on top of disability, that is effed up. That is so effed up. Who would do that? You don't change the radio in anyone's car. The driver is in charge

[00:44:24] of the air conditioning and the radio. Even the way that she did everything, the call recording when Daisy called and asked her what to me would sound like the most suspicious call. How many times you had sex with my son? And she explained in the talking head, like

[00:44:50] Anna said, I kept going. I felt it was maybe a little strange to divulge this information, but I did because I thought it might bring me closer to demand. And she just kept going.

[00:45:05] I just don't know how her brain functions or what is going on there, but to me something just felt very disconnected from cultural norms and understanding how to interact with these people. And it could have gotten so much darker. I'm surprised that it didn't.

[00:45:28] These people, right? That's probably how she's thinking of these people. The thing is that the thing that should be noted very strongly that Daisy and John were not going to pursue anything criminal. They said leave our house and don't speak to our

[00:45:44] son and brother or have anything to do with him ever again. And they were prepared to leave at that. But she was continually trying to insert herself back into demands life. And that's when they brought in law enforcement. So even with these ghastly

[00:46:00] revelations that rocked them to their souls and to their cause and the way she was treating them as a family, all they wanted was for her to go away and leave them alone. But no, she didn't.

[00:46:13] Right. She left voicemail after voicemail after voicemail wanting to see demand. She left the voicemail saying that she was going to leave her husband. She'll write it in blood that she'll leave her husband so she can start a life with demand. Right, in blood.

[00:46:27] Oh, it was so cringy. It was so cringy. And you could hear it. You could hear the thing. And John was like, we were scared. She was sending emails to demand his program,

[00:46:42] the program that he went to during the day, his program director asking if she could come and see him because you know, oh, the family they don't know what's best for him. They

[00:46:52] want me to stay away from him. But we know how it is. So let me come and see him. Like, you sound bananas. It was like the thing she's saying to them sounded like naive,

[00:47:04] naive entitlement. But like, the her actions after they're trying to keep them apart was obsessive. It was very obsessive. Yeah, to take it a step or not even take a step further, but just add to what you're saying,

[00:47:23] Mari, that something that crossed my mind many times is that if you are working with a family, if you're and they just don't want you there. Like, yeah, and I even think about this from

[00:47:37] the perspective of, again, in Essex County, New Jersey, I grew up in a family, my dad had a home healthcare business that, you know, you're sending or you're there often you have white families who are employing like black people, many of them immigrants in their homes. And

[00:47:56] if someone, I mean, is yelling at you, they don't want you there. You know, they might call you racial slurs, whatever it might be. It's like, you just leave that situation. Like, you don't

[00:48:06] stay there. And I just feel like she was overstepping even by not leaving in the moments that they asked her to not be there and to leave. She kept pushing, and pushing,

[00:48:17] and pushing. And that was not her place. And even that is a sign that her motivations and her approach were far from professional, if we're going to put it mildly. Yeah. So like Sarah said, they weren't going to press charges, but then her actions did

[00:48:38] necessitate that. And because of the trial, we already told you how the trial worked out. But because of trial, we are introduced to Howard Shane. And this was the moment where the facilitated communication stuff flipped, which I thought was such an interesting part

[00:48:56] of the documentary. We get all of this like, oh, the success of facilitated communication, how it can help certain people get degrees, all of this. And then all of a sudden when John

[00:49:08] is like, I look deeper into it, and then we get the deeperness. And we get Howard Shane, who is internationally known for his research and development of augmented and alternative communication systems to support the communication needs of people with neuromuscular disorders,

[00:49:28] autism and other disabilities. And we get his work with facilitated communication devices and his studies. Yo, this double blind study y'all. Oh my gosh. Wow. How did he do that? He was a magician. He was a magician. He was dismal.

[00:49:49] So Howard Shane does this double blind study to test the efficacy of facilitated communication. So what he does is he has the subject and their facilitated communicator with them, the person who would hold their hand or touch their arm, whichever the person who would help

[00:50:07] guide the disabled person to type out what they want to say and how they want to communicate. He would take a folder and he would have a picture in the folder and it would be like a cup.

[00:50:18] And so he would show the person who was doing the facilitated communication, the assistant, he would show them the cup. And then he would show the disabled person a picture, let's say still the cup. And then he would say, what did you see?

[00:50:38] And then they would type on their, the FC keyboard, what they saw and they say cup. Okay. If both of them saw the cup, they would say cup. He then for some of them would show,

[00:50:50] say a picture of a dog. So it, oh my God, this part was so great. So he would open the folder. Yeah. He would open the folder, show the communicator a picture of the dog. He would then slightly close the folder,

[00:51:03] turn it to the disabled person. And he would like, like flick of the wrist, you like flick of the wrist and the picture turned from like a dog to a hat. And he would show the disabled person. And then he would say, type what you saw.

[00:51:19] And I don't know what the percentage was, but they said that the disabled person would, would type dog, even though they saw the hat and the facilitator saw the dog. And I was like, Oh my God. I was like, it's a way to polish.

[00:51:38] How did you do that so fast? Like, wow. Yes. That was, that was, that was mind blowing. That was so impressive. And I do feel like he, he really for me brought in an important perspective because whether or not these

[00:51:57] facilitated communications machines work, I mean, I would imagine that there are certain cases where it could work if someone has to. Yeah. Case by case basis. Exactly. Right? So I think there's that and I'm sure we, I feel like we did hear from a

[00:52:11] number of people who spoke in favor of those, including Rosemary Crosley, who is a facility communications expert. We heard from a number of people who did, right? But that blew my mind because it pointed to what we thought could be the case and what we already

[00:52:30] thought we knew. It also didn't clear up, you know, when is someone making it up and when is someone not making up? Cause again, it's case by case, but I think that that's the important thing to note is that yes, these machines could be reliable in some cases.

[00:52:47] I will point out that at the end of the documentary, we got a note that the use of facilitated communication has been rejected by the American Psychological Association, the American Speech-Language Hearing Association and several other prominent organizations.

[00:53:03] But the fact that it's still used by a number of folks to me points to the fact that as I could imagine like, yeah, it could be useful for certain people who are able to actually

[00:53:14] press the buttons and type something. But oh my gosh, he really blew so much open with that one and the very little technology just sleight of hands like, wow. Yeah, it really was sleight of hand. It was street madness.

[00:53:31] It really was. It was just a flick. And the fact that the facilitator, like even the way he just held the folder in a way that the facilitator couldn't see the picture, it was amazing. Yeah. And that the camera could.

[00:53:44] Right. Yeah. Really great. But also Howard Shane, not only did he do that study, we saw the study, but they brought him in in order to evaluate demand, Derek. And he did see demands medical record prior. He said that he saw his prior medical record

[00:54:10] his history, but then he did sit and spend a few hours with him to evaluate him on it by himself. And he even said, Sarah, correct me if I'm wrong, he said demand didn't have he had like the capacity, the mental capacity of a one year old basically.

[00:54:29] Six months old is what he yeah. He had severe mental disability as he agreed with everything that the previous history had stated him being nonverbal, never will never be verbal, cannot control his bodily movements, all of that. And so Howard Shane didn't even come

[00:54:51] in to really talk about the facilitated communication. He came in as a specialist to evaluate demand and he basically found that he couldn't have done any of the things that she

[00:55:05] said that he did. Yeah, at the same time, we also get in fact, in the documentary after the sentencing that Howard Shane mentions that he really feels that on a truly believed it was all

[00:55:23] in his best interest that she's a victim of problematic mythology. She was having conversations with himself, with herself from his perspective. Right. So I mean, from his perspective, I feel like it was all very clear and to your point, Mari, I was wondering, like, did he see

[00:55:41] the medical records before he made this assessment? But and again, it goes back to the theme of this, like, when are people's motivations tainted? When aren't they? And the fact that like we could even question him, like, did he see the medical record

[00:55:56] and then just affirm the medical record or did he go with his expertise? I believe that he went with his expertise. But the fact that we have to question everybody in this documentary and in

[00:56:07] this case is it is actually mind numbing. I believe that Anna believes that what happened in her mind happened. Right. And even given that it was true, she still did the wrong thing. And that's what I find unconscionable. Exactly. Because even if he's there in a disabled

[00:56:31] body, but with a perfectly functioning mind, even if he's doing schoolwork, writing essays, even if he's making imaginative leaps about the literature that he's reading, even if he's reading, even if he has attraction and sexual feelings towards her, even if he loves her,

[00:56:48] even if all of that is true, she still did the wrong thing. And that's what I can't get past that she says she did nothing wrong. Yeah. And trigger warning here. I think the story

[00:57:02] that very much encapsulates what you just said there was a story that John told literally at the end of the documentary to kind of put that nail in the coffin. Trigger warning again,

[00:57:14] he talks about how he was changing demands diaper and he just saw all these marks on demand's back. These red marks, these bruises, he was calling them strawberries on his back. And he was asking everybody like, where did he get these marks? Where do you get

[00:57:30] his marks? He asked his program directors, he asked all these people and they were like, they don't know. They didn't know. And cut to a crime scene photo of Anna's office. And she has a mat in her office. And John said he realized that Anna had raped demand

[00:57:49] in her office on that floor, on that mat, pressing her whole body down on him to the point that he was getting bruises on his back from what she was doing to his brother, to the point where John is like crying, telling this story. And I thought that

[00:58:11] the placement of this story, if you were on the fence, I don't know why at this point in the documentary would you be on the fence about Anna's wrongdoings or anything like that.

[00:58:22] I think this story here helps to really hit the nail on the head that again, what she did was not right. No matter how you slice the apple, it's rotten at the core. It's rotten.

[00:58:40] It's so interesting because one thing that came up for me thinking about a number of moons ago as I kind of learned about consent and like some of the definitions of it, some people will say

[00:58:54] that consent is a verbal enthusiastic yes, which we could obviously see there other ways that people could give consent that might not be verbal and enthusiastic in that same exact way. So that's a whole other conversation for a different time. But like, I know that the

[00:59:13] facilitated communication machine wasn't like he wasn't typing into the machine as she did those things. And he didn't have the ability to communicate his consent along the way as he was just having his body and his back or whatever else, every abused by her along the way.

[00:59:37] Yeah, it's just gross. But again, it's very clear that she stands by it. It's very clear that she stands by it along the way because she keeps speaking to it. But I mean, that's the scariest

[00:59:50] part of all of this is that she thinks it's okay. Despite all of the evidence. It's not a moment of reflection. Exactly, Matt. Like consent can be withdrawn at any point. But if the person who is

[01:00:04] supposed to be helping you communicate is the one who is like, yeah, anyways, with further properties. Yes, I'd like to recommend Walkley Award winning short audio documentary Walkley Awards of journalism awards here in Australia by my friend John blades. John had MS and towards

[01:00:26] the end of his life he was paralyzed from the neck down. He was an engineer musician and writer and continued all those things to the end. He manoeuvred his wheelchair with a blow tube

[01:00:39] and he used his computer with a laser on his head. He was an extraordinary man. He made a documentary called The Too Hard Basket which is about the importance of touch to every human

[01:00:51] being. He talks to sex workers about why they work with disabled clients, himself among them. About why they work with disabled clients, himself among them. And to people with disabilities about their sexual experiences. Particularly interesting topic but a very taboo topic.

[01:01:10] So if you're interested in knowing a little bit more of that side of it, that is The Too Hard Basket. It's a short audio documentary. Matt, how many magnifying glasses are you going to rate? Tell them you love me out of a

[01:01:25] possible five. It's so tough. Right. I'm glad you're going first. Just the property itself, remember the property? Yeah. Again, I mentioned it went into so many different aspects of what we can consider. It answered so many different questions. I really

[01:01:45] loved the chapter approach. I really love not only the talking heads we heard from but how they were also connected to the case. Right? So I just think I'm going to give it four magnifying

[01:02:04] glasses out of five only because some of the areas where we... Maybe it's impossible for the documentary to tell us is this something that actually happened? Is this what Anna is giving

[01:02:16] us? But I'll give it four because it really did a solid job of answering a lot of our questions even though there is some murkiness. And maybe it's just because there's murkiness in the case and in what happened. But yeah, four. Yeah. Sarah, how about you?

[01:02:33] Yes, I'm the same. I'm going to give it four. I'm sort of questioning why I'm not giving it five because it's very well made. And murky is the word. Murky like life. Murky

[01:02:45] is a great place for us to go. It's an uncomfortable place for us to sit. But I think it brings up so many important questions. I love the limited number of talking heads. So we were

[01:02:55] really in there with them. It's almost... It's weirdly immersive as you watch it. It is definitely not a two screener. Do not be on your phone. You won't want to be. It is a very strong recommend for me. Just be aware of the subject matter, I suppose.

[01:03:13] Yes, what I would say. How about you, Murray? Yeah, I agree. I'm going to give it 4.5. I'm only going to knock the point five for the subject matter because I don't know if the subject matters. Like, I don't know if it's for everybody.

[01:03:29] Like, you don't understand. Yeah, very true. I don't know if it is. And I do strongly recommend. I do agree with everything. I think everything was so well put together. It's only

[01:03:41] an hour and 40 some minutes. It was not a three parter. It was very succinct. Like I said, at first I got scared because I was like, this is sounding very white savory. This is sounding

[01:03:52] white savory. They did a good job of duping me at first thinking that this was going to be a tale of a white savior. But at the end, it's about a black family's anguish

[01:04:03] that I think they did a great job. But it's just... I can't give it a five because I cannot sit here and like, I'm not watching that again. You know what I'm saying? Like, I can't

[01:04:16] because it was too hard. Like, I feel so bad for that family. That family's lives were turned upside down by a woman who to this day just doesn't realize that she did something

[01:04:29] wrong. To the point where she's talking about how bad her life is because she can't teach anymore. She can't do this, can't do that. And she's like, she doesn't understand. I don't know. I don't... It's rough, y'all. It's rough. And the fact that she's out there,

[01:04:44] she's still out here. I'm glad she's not waitressing anymore. But it just, it's terrifying to think for me, literally as someone who is going to the town where she lives, as a black man going to the town where she lives, visiting family. And also someone who just knows

[01:05:06] new people in that area who grew up living with disabilities. It is just terrifying to think that she's someone who you will see in your local supermarket or who you'll... You could just walk by. People like this with beautiful hair just can't be trusted.

[01:05:27] Yeah. Also, I know we're done, but I also just remembered her husband's letter. Yes. Yeah. My gag, gagged him a bit. What did he say? He said don't, basically don't... He said that he believes she's

[01:05:45] a pathological liar, a narcissist and will stop at nothing to fool the court at the expense of many others. He went scorched earth and I thought yes. But then you also have to think is that because he's bitter on the other side things or

[01:06:02] was that stuff that he picked up on along the way? I feel so confused. Again, that's why it gets a four for me because there's just a lot of other questions I need

[01:06:12] answered. I feel like we're going to be thinking about this one for a long time to come. That was the... They're like, okay, so the victims are going to read a victim impact statement. We heard John and Daisy's victim impact statement. It was very... It

[01:06:27] wasn't impactful. Then the judge said, and now I'm going to read a letter from the defendant's husband. When they said that, I was like, oh, I was like, oh my gosh. Anyways, yes. I think we all do recommend... This is a strong recommend. Again, I just don't know.

[01:06:49] Be kind to yourself if it's not something you know you can watch, it's fine. Listen to us. That's all that matters. It was a hard one. It was a hard watch. Matt, do you have anything to recommend to our listeners?

[01:07:05] Some rest after watching this one. If you are someone who really enjoys hearing about and learning about horrible people in history, there's a podcast that I've enjoyed, appreciated listening to called the Behind the Bastards Podcast. Mari, there was a six-part

[01:07:28] series on Vince McMahon, horrible. Some might say alleged, but a horrible predator and human being all around. They do a lot of other series just diving into the history around some of these people who you don't even know are horrible. You're like, wow, that's why I

[01:07:45] didn't know about... Insert person here, I almost said a name that I wasn't sure was included on the podcast. I would recommend that to folks, the Behind the Bastards Podcast. Awesome. Sarah, what do you have to recommend to our listeners?

[01:08:02] First of all, I'm going to plug again Rebecca Lavoie's daily updates on the Karen Reed case. That's on the Crime Riders on Patreon. Honestly, just joined for a month to get access to this series of short podcasts. You won't be disappointed. I'm going to recommend another

[01:08:18] podcast. It's called Broomgate. It's about the broom scandal in international curling. I love curling. It is so well-made. It is such a great documentary. It's five short episodes. They're only 25 or 30 minutes. You will be gripped from start to finish. You will know

[01:08:39] all about stones and brooms and black magic and all sorts of things when you listen. That's a huge recommend from me for Broomgate. At Crime Scene, we are eager to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes. You can follow Crime Scene on Twitter at

[01:08:54] crimescene.seen or email us at crimescene.seen.com. We're on TikTok at crime.scene and other social media at crime scene podcast. And please remember to subscribe to our feed, robhasthewebsite.com

[01:09:12] slash crime feed. It makes a big difference. Matt, what have you got going on and where can people find you? Thanks for asking. The people can find me at mattscotgw and check out some things.

[01:09:29] Follow me there, but also check out what I've been up to with The Pride Has Spoken here on RHAP talking with interviewing LGBTQIA plus survivor players from the show Survivor, in case you're not familiar with the show Survivor. That's what it's about. And that's

[01:09:48] a lot of fun doing that with Dr. Evy Jagoda and Grace Leeder. And I'd also just always put the plug for my show Pod Friends, where you could hear interviews with people who are not horrible people.

[01:10:01] And that's what I'm up to. Mari and I are on maternity leave for the wrestling half up, so there's that. But search for those podcast feeds for Pod Friends and The Pride Has Spoken. Again, Matt, Scott, GW on whatever platforms I want to be found on.

[01:10:21] Sarah, I want to ask you where the people can find you, what you're up to. Is that okay? Could I do that? That is okay. Thank you for asking. You can follow me at Sarah Carradine

[01:10:31] on all the things. Here on RHAP, I chatted all things Nicaragua with Mike Bloom for the Survivor Wishlist series. Over on Silent Podcasts, I'm covering season two of Taskmaster Australia. And Sam Smith and I just finished our coverage of The Traitors Quebec with an interview with

[01:10:50] the fabulous Maxence, a huge favourite from the show. And then we go straight into The Traitors New Zealand season two. It's all traitors all the time. What about you, my faithful friend,

[01:11:03] Mari? You can find me on Twitter at Mari Talks Too Much. That's too like the number two. Every week you can find me on the recap kickback with Chappelle. We're hosting the Westeros kickback because we are talking about season two of House of the Dragons. We're

[01:11:22] having so much fun over there, so you can go subscribe to our YouTube channel at recap kickback on YouTube, or you could go to recapkickback.com to subscribe wherever you get your podcast. We are literally having so much fun. Team Green versus Team Black, come join

[01:11:42] us. Come pick a side. It's been so fun over there. I also guest hosted with Mike Bloom for the Survivor Wishlist where I talked about Survivor Exile Island, also known as Survivor

[01:11:55] Panama. It was a fun time and getting a lot of good feedback on that. So go support Mike as he does the Summer of Survivor over on RHAP We Know Reality TV. Sarah, what are we watching next week?

[01:12:15] Next week on Crime Scene, we're watching Deadly Influence, the social media murders with first timer, Naomi Calhoun. Watch this full part series on Max and send us your comments and questions. Thanks to Matt Scott for joining us, Will from America for the theme music,

[01:12:35] and the whole RHAP team behind the scenes. Until next time, case closed.