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Forensic Files (HD) - Season 13, Episode 47 - Dirty Little Secret - Full Episode

March 05, 2021 / 21:20

This episode covers the mysterious disappearance of Josh Ford and Jeannie Crutchley, the investigation into their last known whereabouts, and the subsequent arrest of Benjamin and Erica Sifrit.

Josh Ford and Jeannie Crutchley, a couple with an age difference, went missing during a Memorial Day weekend in Ocean City, Maryland. Their last known location was Secrets nightclub, where they were seen with another couple, Benjamin and Erica Sifrit.

After their disappearance, police discovered evidence linking the Sifrits to the couple's fate, including their IDs and a key to their condo. Forensic evidence indicated a violent confrontation had occurred.

Erica Sifrit later confessed to involvement in the murders, claiming they dismembered the bodies and disposed of them in Delaware. The couple was motivated by a thrill-seeking lifestyle.

The episode details the investigation, forensic findings, and the trials of the Sifrits, highlighting the brutality of the crime and the chilling nature of their actions.

TLDR

Josh Ford and Jeannie Crutchley vanished during a vacation; Benjamin and Erica Sifrit were later implicated in their brutal murders.

Episode

21:20
00:00:00
[Music] up next a couple goes on vacation and is never heard from again they're not looking for a missing person
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because adults don't go missing adults leave a trail and there's no trail okay police find
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evidence the couple may have been shot hodge shock brain of ammunition is specifically designed for use against
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human beings the last place they were seen was at a well-known nightclub in the resort town that was taken at
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secrets nightclub the last night they were alive but there were other secrets that night
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like what really happened to these two people [Music] it was at an office party where josh
00:00:51
ford and jeannie crutchley first met both had been married previously and the two were instantly attracted to one
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another despite a considerable age difference josh was 32 years old jeannie was 51
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and my normal response is if the shoe was on the other foot you wouldn't think twice about it
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in joshua 4 genie crutchley found a younger man who was exciting fun to be around
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who also wanted to do new things in life josh was a very successful mortgage broker
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jeannie was an accountant for an insurance company after dating for two years they moved in
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together sharing a house in fairfax virginia they were two spirits who really had the same
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personalities so when those same two personalities clicked i don't think the age made
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that much difference to them they just fell in love the couple rented a condo for the memorial day weekend
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in ocean city maryland a well-known resort town along the atlantic shore but neither one
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showed up for work when the holiday weekend was over they worked hard they never missed work
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they were on time they did their jobs when jeannie didn't show up for work her co-workers were
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really concerned and that's when they notified the ocean city police police went to their rented condo and
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found genie's car in the parking lot it was obvious to the police right away that the car had been there
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for an extended period of time in ocean city with the sand blowing around constantly sand begins to
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accumulate very quickly and nothing was out of place in the condominium there's absolutely no sign of foul play
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there wasn't any break in there wasn't any broken glass the place was relatively clean jeannie's car keys were
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still in the condo so with their clothes computer and camera it was as if they'd gone out for a walk
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and never came back it just looked like they just decided well let's go down the street and maybe go to
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the bar or something like that that's exactly how i look neighbors at the condo didn't see or
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hear anything unusual the entire memorial day weekend condos are more for private vacationers so you have the
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outside entrances it's much more private a background check revealed josh and jeannie use their credit card to buy
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drinks at the green turtle a sports bar on saturday night investigators found the waitress who
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served josh and jeannie she recalled they were sitting alone she remembered the couple nothing
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unusual she did remember that he was a fan of the celtics and was tuned into the game
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from there investigators learned that josh and genie took a bus to a nearby club one of the hottest
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nightclubs in ocean city where everybody just floods to secrets and that's where they were
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heading the bus driver identified josh and jeannie from a photo lineup and said they were talking with another
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couple on the bus a caucasian couple in their late twenties or early thirties they actually
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when they got off the bus all four of them waited in line for over an hour to get in
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witnesses saw the two couples drinking together and also saw them leave together
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but there was no trace of josh and jeannie after that no cell phone activity no credit card activity no nothing these
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people were just plucked off the face of the earth that day [Music] less than a week after josh ford and
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jeannie crutchley went missing police were called to a hooters restaurant in ocean city maryland
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a silent alarm went off after midnight telling police there was a robbery in progress
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upon the officer arriving he finds a jeep backed up to the door and two people walking out with arm loads of stolen
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merchandise the robbers a man and a woman were arrested on the spot they were so intoxicated that the male
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the husband says to one of the officers thinking it would be okay can't we just put it all back and we'll be cool
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benjamin and erica sifrit weren't your typical married couple they weren't your typical burglars
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either erica sifrit comes from an upper middle class family great student excellent basketball
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player statistically her three-point shooting was top five in the country her freshman
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or sophomore year benjamin suffered or bj as he was known was a former navy seal who had finished
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first in his class [Music] he was an expert shot he was the cream of the crop i was told by some of his seal buddies
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that this was the type of guy who could go out all right drink all night long okay
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stay out till five o'clock in the morning go back to the dorm sleep for an hour or two and do a
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20-mile run the next day and beat everybody because it was up here he's motivated up here
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neither one had ever been arrested before but inside their car police were surprised
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by what they found these people are armed to the teeth she has a gun in her waistband
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it's a 357 five shot revolver i mean he's got a sig sauer nine millimeter that's fully loaded ready to go
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and then in the vehicle there's a 45 caliber hnk combat weapon so you know you look at looking at that
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they mean business and the arresting officers discovered something else inside erica's purse
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with the virginia driver's licenses of joshua ford and jeannie crutchley and automatically
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the hair on the back of their neck stands up and they realize this is a lot bigger than just a burglary at
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hooters with handguns when asked where she got the licenses erica said she and bj
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found them and denied ever meeting or even seeing josh and jeannie it's very very
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possible that they found these licenses on the beach or maybe they're planning a future
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crime of maybe stealing someone's identity in the back of the sifrit's vehicle police found
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ski masks and flex cuffs it makes you think maybe they've held these people hostage or taken them
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hostage and they're holding them somewhere against their will investigators now had
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probable cause to search the seyfritz nearby condo they found a lot more than they
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bargained for on the table outside the dining room they find two spent bullets police also found
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evidence that bj and erica lied to them they find a stack of photographs uh really a cache of photographs and on the
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top is a picture of jeannie and joshua at secrets that was taken at secrets nightclub
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the last night that they were alive one of the pictures in the siffritz condo showed a ring on josh ford's hand
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in another picture taken two days after josh and jeannie went missing erica siffred is wearing josh's ring
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on a chain around her neck and when she was arrested for the robbery police found that ring in her purse
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even more damning police found in the separate's possession a key to the atlantis condominiums where
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josh and jeannie had been staying they turned the key it unlocked the door it was the key to
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josh and jeannie's unit police were now certain that the separates had something to do with josh and
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jeannie's disappearance but what the last known photograph of josh ford and jeannie crutchley was taken
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at the secrets nightclub from a photo lineup the bus driver identified b.j and erica
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sifrit as the couple he saw with josh ford and jeannie crutchley when he dropped
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them off at secrets and witnesses saw the two couples leave secrets together but what happened after that
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investigators took a much closer forensic look in the bathroom of the siffritz condo
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and there they noticed something i saw some orange colored substance on the tile i noticed a little bit running
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down the side of the shower stall and when i saw that i thought well you know maybe this could be blood they pull out
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the sink stopper for the washing sink and they find all kinds of hair attached to it
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with blood and flesh underneath that sink investigators discovered a bullet hole
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that went clear through the wall into the adjacent bedroom this matched the two bullets found
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on the seyfritz coffee table one of them looked like i had some drywall dust in it
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one oven looked like i had blood in the crews and joints and stuff like that on the large glass window inside the
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bathroom crime scene technicians discovered a partial palm print tests on the blood in the bathroom and
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on the mangle 357 slug found on the coffee table yielded a dna profile investigators took samples from josh and
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jeannie's toothbrushes and hairbrushes and generated their dna profiles most of the dna that we tested came back
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mixed dna both of joshua ford and jeannie crutchley the dna on the mangled 357 slug found
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on the coffee table was josh's so that bullet had been in joshua ford's body at some point and
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then dug out or pulled out and kept as a trophy by the separates we didn't have the bodies but we knew
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that somebody had met a very brutal and gruesome end in that room [Music] bullets test fired from erika siffritz
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357 revolver were compared to the damaged bullets when the hollow point expands soft tissue it'll mushroom out many
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people might think that this expansion is damaged to a bullet and might prevent or even hinder
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firearms examination however this is just simply not true the two bullets recovered from the
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dining room table positively associated or in other words matched back to the 357
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magnum revolver when faced with this evidence erika sifrit made a deal with prosecutors
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she agreed to lead them to josh and jeannie's bodies and testify against b.j in exchange for a reduced charge
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she told investigators they dismembered josh and jeannie's bodies and put them in dumpsters in the
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neighboring state of delaware 10 miles away for investigators this was a lucky break
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delaware has a unique system of dumping they know where everything they dump they know what plot it is at their
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dumpsite eight days after josh and jeannie went missing parts of their dismembered bodies were
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found bullets recovered from josh's body matched erica sifrit's gun josh's palm print matched the print on the bathroom
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window in the separates condo incredibly josh ford and jeannie crutchley were random victims of a couple for whom
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breaking the law had become a strange romantic obsession but just when investigators thought
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the case had been solved erica came forward with a story they could hardly believe
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i think she has her own evil side and i think he has his evil side together they were exposed like a civil
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poor one's a match one's a fuse prosecutors made a deal with erica sifrit if she told them the truth about what
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happened to josh ford and jeannie crutchley she would face a reduced charge one of the requirements
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of the deal was that she had to pass a polygraph test originally she told prosecutors that she
00:14:00
had nothing to do with the murders that all she did was help dispose of the bodies
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later however she changed her story she admitted during the pre-test interview that she was more involved in
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the homicides than she had told us up to then she admitted taking the knife and stabbing jeannie
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erica also admitted the tattoo on her abdomen had a special significance following
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the stabbing of jeannie crutchly she got a tattoo on her side in the same place where she stabbed
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jeannie crutchley and that was so she could forever be reminded of that night she was involved from the get-go and she
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essentially admitted she ordered the killings so based on that you know we couldn't uh
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couldn't continue with this deal first degree murder charges were filed against both
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bj and erica sifrit each ended up turning on the other as the trials approached investigators struggled to find a motive
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for the crime we believe that these murders were committed simply for the fun or the thrill of killing
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we've come up with no other possible motive in this case the couple owned a scrap booking store near a mall in
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altoona pennsylvania but two months before the murders they began turning to a life of crime according to erica
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there was very little sexual contact between her and her husband b.j she told me that bj
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thrived on the burglaries and doing things of risk and that's what got him off they start out burglarizing places close
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to where erica and bj own the business that's not fun anymore okay so they upped the annie they needed
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more thrill more thrill more thrill they were a strange strange couple together that's
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for sure prosecutors say the separates were hunting for thrills when they met josh and jeannie
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at secrets nightclub after some conversation they all decided to go back to the seyfritz condo
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for more drinking conversation and a dip in the hot tub but the separates decided
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to toy with josh and genie erica claimed her purse was missing with her expensive jewelry
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inside [Music] anywhere and she wanted josh and genie to help look for it but only erica and bj
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were in on the game [Music] if josh and jeannie found the purse they could live if not they'd have to pay the price
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when josh and jeannie didn't find the purse bj accused them of stealing it you took it apart
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where is it we don't have it prove it take your clothes off are you serious [Music]
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josh and jeannie made a run for the bathroom and locked the door they tried to escape with josh leaving
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his palm print on the window the evidence shows four shots were fired the first two went through the door and
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hit josh in the torso erica said bj fired the third shot into josh's head prosecutors believe erica fired the
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fourth shot towards genie and missed either accidentally or deliberately as part of their cruel game
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[Music] the bullet went through the wall into the adjoining bedroom erica told prosecutors she stabbed
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jeannie in the abdomen with a knife [Music] later when erica brought some rags and
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detergent to clean up the blood she said bj was in the hot tub with the heads of their two victims
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she said bj removed the slug from josh's head to keep it as a trophy over the next 24 hours the couple
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dismembered the bodies placed them in garbage bags and put them in various dumpsters throughout delaware
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they also went to a hardware store to buy a new bathroom door and more cleaning supplies to
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repair the bathroom as best they could afterwards the couple acted as if nothing had
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happened drinking beer having a great time going to miniature golf nobody would have
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suspected them of being the animals they are erica wore josh's ring as a trophy and carried around their driver's
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licenses and kept the slugs from the shootings i've never seen a crime like this where
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a couple just kills another couple for the thrill of it they had nothing against these people
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they did nothing to them they were chosen the story was so incredible that without forensic evidence no one
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was likely to believe it even the best cleaning doesn't always get it up like in this case i mean there
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was still blood there that was visible you just had to know what you were looking for erica and bj
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were tried separately her defense was i didn't do it he did his defense was i didn't do it
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she did in the absence of any physical evidence against him and the fact that erica's gun was used
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in josh's murder bj was convicted of only one count of second degree murder he was sentenced
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to 38 years in prison erica was convicted of both murders and sentenced to life in prison plus
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20 years she had the gun in her possession she has you know the victim's identification in her purse
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she has all the souvenirs if you will with her and her possession or in her purse
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still bothers me why this case stands out i'll probably never see another case like this in my career
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and hopefully in my lifetime without the forensic evidence it would have been difficult to get
00:21:01
a um a conviction of homicide in any degree as to these two defendants it was possible
00:21:09
um but it would have been much much more [Music] difficult you

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 90
    Most shocking
  • 90
    Most unpredictable
  • 85
    Most intense
  • 85
    Most surprising

Episode Highlights

  • The Mysterious Disappearance
    A couple goes on vacation and is never heard from again, leaving police baffled.
    “They're not looking for a missing person because adults don't go missing.”
    @ 00m 06s
    March 05, 2021
  • The Sifrits Arrested
    Police arrest a couple for robbery, uncovering a shocking connection to the missing couple.
    “These people are armed to the teeth.”
    @ 06m 18s
    March 05, 2021
  • A Gruesome Discovery
    Investigators find evidence of a brutal crime linked to the Sifrits, including dismembered bodies.
    “We knew somebody had met a very brutal and gruesome end in that room.”
    @ 11m 21s
    March 05, 2021

Episode Quotes

  • They were just plucked off the face of the earth that day.
    Forensic Files (HD) - Season 13, Episode 47 - Dirty Little Secret - Full Episode

Key Moments

  • Couple Goes Missing00:06
  • Robbery Arrest04:40
  • Dismemberment Confession12:11
  • Thrill Killers15:17
  • Trial and Sentencing20:32

Tension Over Time

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown