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Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence and is not intended for all audiences.
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Listener discretion is advised. He told me he needs my help to make her smaller.
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Did he tell you how she died? No, but it was pretty obvious. What did you see? Her head was caved in.
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Hello and welcome to Season 10, Episode 254 of Sword and Scale. A show that reveals that the worst monsters are real.
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Before you say anything, we do realize that the Android app is completely broken,
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but we're working on a new one. We've been working on a new one for a while now.
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It will be out next year as soon as we can. And yeah, a lot of stuff's broken. We're working on fixing it.
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I promise you we will have it all fixed with a shiny brand new app. we've got so much cool stuff planned, but there's only so much we can do at once.
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And it's been a bit of a rough year because of that. But listen, 2024 is looking bright.
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But before we get there, we do have a holiday season to get through. And that reminds me, the best place to shop for this asshole in your life that you love for some reason is our store.
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Just go to swordandscale.com and hit the store link on the top of the page. that'll take you to all of the current stuff
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that will be going away very, very soon. So go get it before the holidays. Go get it right now.
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And don't forget to log in and use your discount if you're a Plus member. Starting a business sounds exciting
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until you actually do it. Then suddenly you're the product guy, the website guy,
00:02:17
the shipping department, the marketing department, customer service, all of it. And if you're anything like me when I started,
00:02:23
you're thinking, am I doing this right? Is anyone going to actually care? That's where Shopify makes a lot of sense.
00:02:31
Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world,
00:02:35
including 10% of all e-commerce in the U.S. They give you hundreds of ready-to-use templates
00:02:40
so you can build a clean, professional online store that actually looks like your brand.
00:02:46
And once you're up and running, Shopify has tools for inventory, payments, analytics, returns, and international shipping all in one place.
00:02:55
They even have AI tools to help you write product descriptions, improve page headlines, and enhance product photography.
00:03:02
Plus, easy email and social media campaigns to help customers actually find you.
00:03:08
It's time to turn those what-ifs into with Shopify today. Sign up for your $1 a month trial today at shopify.com slash sword and scale.
00:03:20
Go to shopify.com slash sword and scale. That's shopify.com slash sword and scale.
00:03:28
Cha-ching. All right, try to imagine this. It's midday. You're at home, sitting or lying on your couch, watching some TV.
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Maybe you're catching up on a new Netflix show or finding out what the hell Tubi is.
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You're kicking back with the TV on, flipping through your phone, searching through social media, looking for something or someone to judge.
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when suddenly you feel something. It's not some sort of spiritual awakening or realization about who you are and your place in the universe.
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You're just hungry. There's a rumbling in your stomach and it's creeping up on you.
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Maybe you're not quite ready to eat just then and there, but you know that pretty soon you will be.
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So you start to think, what should I make for dinner? Then all of a sudden it hits you.
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You're in the mood for pasta. That sounds pretty good. Spaghetti sounds pretty good right about now.
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Yeah. So you'll walk over to your kitchen and you find the things you need. You got your pot, your strainer, your sauce, your pasta.
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And you've even found some salad and bread to go along with your meal. Lucky you.
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But then you think, you know what would make this even better? Meat. Meat makes everything better.
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Nothing beats a good meat sauce on your spaghetti. Right? So you go check the fridge and, damn, nothing there.
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Not even an old gray packet of ground beef at the back of the freezer that you forgot about.
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You're just out. There's nothing in there. But hold on a second. There may be some frozen ground beef down in the freezer that you can thaw.
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Yeah, that's it. The freezer. So you go downstairs and open the freezer But something weird There a strange bag in there you don recognize it it looks like a like a black trash bag so you you touch it but it frozen solid
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you peel it open as best you can and an overwhelming and awful smell smacks you in the face
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you see what's inside the bag and you can't make sense of it but you know what you're looking at
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and then suddenly just like that your appetite is gone The End Is it a female? I think it's a female.
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Just across the western border of Pennsylvania, and sitting directly in the middle of Pittsburgh and Cleveland,
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is the moderately sized city of Youngstown, Ohio. Traditionally, Youngstown is known for being a major player in U.S. steel manufacturing.
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But when the steel industry saw a steep decline in the 1970s, Youngstown and its people were left without a major industry.
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Since then, the city has struggled to redefine itself and has earned a bad reputation.
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At one point, it was considered the murder capital of the United States. Today, that title belongs to New Orleans, of course.
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In any case, if you peruse message boards about Youngstown, like we did, you'll find that the people living there mostly agree that Youngstown isn't all that different from any other mid-sized city.
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in America. In Youngstown, there are safe, crime-free areas, and there are dangerous areas
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where crime is known to happen, just like everywhere else. Back in 2017, a 28-year-old
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woman named Shannon Graves was living in Youngstown. But in June of that year, Shannon's older sister went to her local police department and reported Shannon missing.
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The lead investigator that was eventually assigned to this case was Detective Sergeant Michael Lambert.
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Shannon Graves was a young girl in her 20s who had been living on Youngstown's west side.
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Shannon Graves was a struggling hairdresser. She was going through school close to graduation.
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She had supplemented her income to pay for her education by working as a dancer.
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She had a sister and a brother and a father who was an ex-Youngstown police detective.
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Detective Lambert kindly refers to Shannon's chosen profession as dancer. But if we're going to be real about it, she worked as a stripper.
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Which, hey, there's nothing wrong with that. Shannon was an attractive young woman and she took advantage of her good looks to make a living.
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The problem is that Shannon fell into that line of work just a bit too early. According to her sister, Shannon started stripping at a very young age.
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How long did she strip? Maybe like 12 years ago that I know of, maybe before that when I didn't really know.
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So she's 15, 16? Probably. Shannon Graves was born in November of 1988 after her father cheated on his wife with another woman.
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Shannon's dad and her half-sister didn't even know about Shannon's existence until Shannon was six years old,
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when Shannon's mom revealed to her dad that he was the father. Soon after, Shannon's mom tragically died of cancer while Shannon was still very young.
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Subsequently, Shannon dropped out of high school and started supporting herself by dancing at a local strip club.
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Such a sad story we keep hearing in America repeated over and over again. Despite the struggles that Shannon had to face and the career that she eventually found herself in,
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Shannon was a pretty smart and responsible young woman. She didn't abuse drugs. She earned her GED.
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and by age 28 she started looking for ways to support herself that didn't involve taking her
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clothes off for money. So you see your Christmas time and then when you start to think you know
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hey we haven't heard from Shannon in a while. Well that's right. Your birthday? When's your birthday?
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March. And then it was Easter right after she wasn't at my aunt's house which you know she didn't show
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up it really wasn't a big deal because sometimes she wouldn't but most of the time she was there.
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So I made that excuse in my mind. And then I think it was Father's Day after that.
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And I'm like, okay, no, no, something's wrong. In 2017, Shannon missed three family holiday get-togethers in a row.
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That's when the red flags went up. Strangely, when attempts were made to reach Shannon by phone, she did respond.
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At least, that's what her dad originally thought. So I kept trying to do it One time it ran Nobody answered So I says this is your dad Call me Then she called me back She goes who is this I said this is your dad jackass Yeah And then that that was it So then I told my son text your sister and tell her to call me Then he text that number She texted back I have no brothers
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So that's when I said something's up. So that's what I told Debbie. This girl doesn't make a missing person's report.
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After this bizarre phone call and text exchange, Shannon's family realized that one of two things had to be true.
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Either Shannon was cutting all ties with her family and she was going about it in a very strange way,
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or a different woman was using Shannon's cell phone. For police, the latter seemed like the likely scenario.
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When Shannon was reported missing, detectives at the Youngstown Police Department began focusing their attention on the people that Shannon was close to.
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And that meant her boyfriend and ex-boyfriend. They learned that before her disappearance, Shannon was engaged to a guy named John Scarada.
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John was 41 years old. He owned and operated a small home improvement business that Shannon helped him run.
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She acted as his bookkeeper and helped John with marketing. In keeping with her goal to get out of the stripper business,
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Shannon was hopeful that John's business would take off. In an effort to make that happen,
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Shannon produced a commercial for John's company that aired locally in Youngstown.
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And being the performer that she was, Shannon appeared in her own commercial. Unfortunately, John's business never really got off its feet
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because not long after he and Shannon got engaged, John got arrested. He was also on the side a small-time drug trafficker
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and as a result of that had been sent to prison So when John went to prison, Shannon began dating Arturo while John was away.
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How did she get involved with Arturo? From what I've learned, this whole group she was with, they're a weird little group.
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That's an understatement. Yeah. In researching Shannon's life, the police quickly realized that Shannon hung out with a pretty strange cast of characters,
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almost all of whom used bizarre nicknames or aliases that had nothing to do with their actual names.
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Even Shannon was known to sometimes go by her stripper name, which was Star. In any case, after her fiancé went to prison,
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Shannon began dating someone else. 31-year-old Arturo Navoa, who often used the alias Anthony Gonzalez.
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going forward you'll notice that some people refer to arturo as anthony and some people call
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him arturo so just remember it's the same guy arturo navoa was a young man from the east side
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of youngstown he was a self-proclaimed rapper trying to break into the music world uh hadn't
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really had a lot of success, had a history of small part-time jobs that he had trouble holding,
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and at that time he was unemployed. Unemployed Arturo lived with Shannon in her apartment,
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and largely depended on her for income as he perused his music industry aspirations.
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As far as his musical talent, well, Arturo wasn't necessarily a bad rap artist. I mean, I'm not a rap expert, but it's not like it's a particularly difficult thing to do to find words that rhyme together.
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In any case, to the casual untrained ear, it sounds like a lot of his tunes are pretty generic.
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Let's put it that way. I gotta say that rap today has truly gotten worse. I'm sick of radio stations out here promoting dirt.
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Perhaps unsurprisingly, Shannon's and Arturo's relationship was pretty rocky. They were known to argue a lot, and there were many instances of breaking up and then reuniting.
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Naturally, when Shannon's family realized that they hadn't heard from Shannon in a while,
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the first person they reached out to was Arturo. He was, after all, still living in her apartment.
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I says, you guys get an argument or something? We broke up. She came, some guy picked her up.
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I said, hold on a minute. You're telling me that Shannon just left. Left her clothes, left her dog, and left her car.
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That don't sound right to me. According to Arturo, Shannon just up and left him.
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which, given their history, made sense. What didn't make sense is that Shannon seemingly left all of her belongings behind,
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including her pit bull, Molly. Her relationship with her dog, what was that like?
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People said it was like her kid. She took her everywhere and did everything with her and did everything for her
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and how she would take care of her. Shannon treated Molly like a daughter. For her, nothing was too good for that dog.
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if Shannon did ditch Arturo and her apartment there was simply no chance that she wouldn take her baby with her Making matters even more suspicious the police eventually spoke to one of Arturo closest friends
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who had helped Arturo burn some of Shannon's belongings. Not looking good. During the investigation, we learned that Arturo Navarro had a friend named Andrew Herman,
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who assisted him in burning Shannon's belongings. several witnesses actually saw this and when we were able to catch up with Andrew Herman
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he did agree to come in and give us a statement basically what he wanted me to do is he wanted me
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to help him get rid of the last of her crap that she left there okay well documents um clothes
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stupid shit like that I figured he was being spiteful I kind of helped him burn it but now
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over the months and everything's going on she seems to be missing he told me that she left him
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she wasn't staying with him anymore they elaborate on that that's really all he really told me she
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left him for some other dude and that was it according to andrew he was just trying to be
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helpful and trying to console a friend that seemed heartbroken over the fact that his girlfriend left
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him for another man. But now that Shannon was missing, Andrew had some concerns.
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Even so, he seemed on the fence about the idea that Arturo was capable of hurting Shannon, let alone
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capable of killing her. I started thinking about that fire. I said, you know what?
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I've seen too many crime shows. This does not look good. That, and from what I hear,
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he still has a dog. Yeah, that's what I heard, Ted. And from when I lived with her, that dog was treated better than a freaking toddler.
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That was her baby. I don't see why he has her dog. I don't see why she would leave it.
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Yeah, everybody thinks he killed him, which is a logical jump, I guess. Yeah, if that was the case, I really highly doubt that.
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He doesn't seem like the type to do that. Eventually, the police also learned that Arturo wasn't living in Shannon's apartment by himself.
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He had some roommates. Also sharing the apartment was a young woman that Arturo had dated before he met Shannon.
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Her name was Katrina Layton. And when Katrina moved into the apartment with Arturo, she brought along her two young children.
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Katrina and Arturo had dated each other for several years on and off prior to Shannon's disappearance.
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All accounts of the relationship between Arturo and Katrina were that the two fought off and it was a tumultuous relationship.
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In a few instances, Katrina and Shannon actually had physical confrontations because of the love triangle situation.
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naturally after learning about this love triangle the police wanted to speak with both arturo
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and katrina unfortunately none of them seemed to be very cooperative surprise surprise and every
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time the cops went to shannon's apartment nobody would answer the door it wasn't until we towed a
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vehicle belonging to katrina that was unlicensed and abandoned on the street in front that katrina
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contacted us so we used that opportunity to interview Katrina. One of the reasons we've
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been knocking on doors down there is because we're looking for Shannon. Oh yeah I've heard
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something about that. I haven't really been following it all too closely all like that
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just because I mean for the simple fact that me and Anthony were together for about seven years
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and then, you know, we just needed a break. We split up for a little bit. They were together for a very short period of time.
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We started talking. We got back together. According to Katrina, she didn't know much about Shannon's disappearance
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and she freely admitted that Shannon wasn't her favorite person. What was she like?
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She was trouble, in my opinion. I feel like she just didn't care about other people
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She was the type that wanted to be with somebody who had a lot of money Who could take care of her
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Where she could just kind of live that life And she could just kind of do what she wanted
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And just the type of person she portrayed herself as I don't hang around with people like that
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I tried to be nice to her because she did live in Clown's house And then she turned around and slept with Anthony
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Katrina explained that her understanding was that Shannon left Arturo for another man.
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And before she did, Arturo and Shannon came to an agreement about the car that Shannon left behind, as well as her dog Molly.
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She basically told him, you know, can you hold the dog for me? And he said, yeah.
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he said you know but since you're kind of up and leaving you know can't use the car just till i
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get around so i could get around try to get some work this and that so they had some sort of mutual
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agreement over the car and the dog for months both katrina and arturo used shannon's car
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to get around now if that wasn't suspicious enough katrina had also used shannon's cell phone
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as her own. I don't think it's any longer in service. That was like one of those minute phones,
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like those Obama phones. But I mean, I got my phone out, so it's like, I don't, but I was using it like temporarily type thing.
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This girl disappears. Yeah. She leaves behind her dog, which everybody says is her baby.
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Then she leaves his phone, and Anthony's, go ahead, I'm sorry. not new girlfriend,
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but old girlfriend who's now back is not using the phone. I got you. Shannon was using.
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Yeah. And so it looks weird. Yeah, it all looked very weird. And things were only getting weirder.
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Not only did Katrina use Shannon's car and her cell phone, but someone was also using Shannon's directional card,
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which is sometimes referred to as a welfare card or a food stamp card. If Shannon left, do you think she would leave behind her directional card?
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Honestly, I don't know. That's one thing I can't... Would you leave yours somewhere? That's your lifeline.
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That's just something really like... You've never used her card, right? No, I've never used her card.
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It could very well. You've never seen Anthony use her card. I've never seen him use it.
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Has he ever used it? Not that I... Has he ever mentioned he's ever used it? Not that I know of, no.
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Suspiciously after Shannon went missing, every time her directional card was used,
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Arturo and Katrina's directional cards were also used at the same location within seconds of Shannon's card being used.
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Huh. Now, I'm not a detective, but see where I'm going with this? Basically, everything about this situation looked bad,
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but even so, Katrina maintained that Arturo didn't have anything to do with Shannon's disappearance.
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Did you say Anthony killed her? No. and I'll tell you why because I've known him a very long time
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and I've never once seen a violent side to him because so you don't believe she's dead
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and you don't believe if she is dead he would have anything to do with it if she is I don't think he would have anything to do with it
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well I'm connected to the dots what do you think I'm afraid of of her from what you're saying and from what you're telling me
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you're afraid that Anthony did something to her what Katrina didn't realize or maybe she did
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was simply playing dumb was that the detectives weren't only considering the possibility
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that Arturo killed Shannon. Maybe. Just maybe. If Shannon had been murdered, the killer
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was sitting in the interview room. Maybe she got rid of her. Oh. Her. Do you see how tiny I am?
00:26:17
Really? I hope it's not as bad as it looks for you because, I mean, you've got this...
00:26:23
Honestly, guys, honestly, guys, in all honesty, I really, when it comes to Anthony,
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I don't think you have anything to worry about. I just don't. I mean, I know... But you can see how everything's pointing there.
00:26:33
Well, yeah, I mean, I can see she's the last boyfriend, obviously. You know what I mean?
00:26:37
But not only that, but then you got the car, the dog, the directional car. I mean, I just feel that she probably met some guy.
00:26:48
She's probably out doing her own thing. Katrina did her best to put the detective's suspicions to bed, but there were too many strange things to ignore.
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Even so, the cops didn't have a body or any direct evidence of foul play. If they were going to pursue this investigation further, they were going to have to interview Arturo.
00:27:14
Well, those are the things we would like to talk to Anthony about, but Anthony isn't really in the...
00:27:19
I want to talk about it. And I'll be honest with you. One of the weirdest things here is that...
00:27:25
That... You got to understand, he's not purposely avoiding you guys. It's just with his work schedule.
00:27:32
What time does he work? Um, it varies. Like the weekends. What is he doing? Dishwashing.
00:27:40
You heard that right. With a straight face, Katrina explained that Arturo was too busy to meet with police.
00:27:49
to discuss his missing ex-girlfriend because Arturo's dish-washing job at Outback Steakhouse was too demanding.
00:27:59
To sum up, Katrina was clearly stonewalling the detectives. And I'll tell you something.
00:28:07
Detectives don't like to be stonewalled. But it didn't matter because five days after this interview, something unexpected happened.
00:28:17
Call 911. What is your emergency? Hi, my name is Ken Esenbaugh. I need a camera please here right away. Me and my wife, we just found a dead body. You're in a freezer.
00:28:27
Dead body? Is it a male? Is it a female? I think it's a female. In late July of 2017, a married couple in Youngstown's neighboring town of Campbell found dismembered body parts in their basement freezer.
00:28:46
A pair of legs, a pair of arms, and part of a human head. Tragically, but perhaps unsurprisingly, police were eventually able to confirm that these body parts belonged to 28-year-old Shannon Graves.
00:29:05
The next few things that they needed to figure out were, who put Shannon's body parts in there?
00:29:11
Why had they done so, and where was the rest? of Shannon. Starting a business sounds exciting
00:29:31
until you actually do it. Then suddenly you're the product guy, the website guy,
00:29:36
the shipping department, the marketing department, customer service, all of it. And if you're anything like me when I started,
00:29:42
you're thinking, am I doing this right? Is anyone going to actually care? That's where Shopify makes a lot of sense.
00:29:50
Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world,
00:29:54
including 10 of all e in the U They give you hundreds of ready templates so you can build a clean professional online store that actually looks like your brand
00:30:05
And once you're up and running, Shopify has tools for inventory, payments, analytics, returns,
00:30:10
and international shipping all in one place. They even have AI tools to help you write product descriptions,
00:30:18
improve page headlines, and enhance product photography, plus easy email and social media campaigns
00:30:24
to help customers actually find you. It's time to turn those what-ifs into with Shopify today.
00:30:32
Sign up for your $1 a month trial today at shopify.com slash swordandscale. Go to shopify.com slash swordandscale.
00:30:42
That's shopify.com slash swordandscale. Cha-ching. In February of 2017, 28-year-old Shannon Graves went missing.
00:31:06
But her family didn't take note of Shannon's absence until she missed three holiday get-togethers in a row.
00:31:14
Four months after Shannon was last seen, in June of 2017, Shannon's sister filed a missing persons report
00:31:23
with Youngstown Police Department in Ohio. About a month later in Youngstown's neighboring town of Campbell
00:31:31
a young wife was at home when she started thinking about what to make for dinner. She decided that she wanted to make
00:31:39
some spaghetti but she didn't have any ground beef to put in the spaghetti sauce.
00:31:45
The Campbell Police Department in Ohio got a phone call from a couple who explained that a friend of theirs had asked if they would keep a freezer for him
00:31:57
because his power went out and he was afraid he was going to lose his meat. The young wife remembered that one of her husband's friends had recently stored a small chest freezer
00:32:08
along with some meat in their basement. Her thinking was that she could borrow some of the ground beef from the freezer and replace it later.
00:32:19
but when she went to her basement, she noticed something strange. The freezer had a padlock on it.
00:32:29
My husband went over to our house, and I was thinking about what to make for dinner.
00:32:36
I didn't have any hamburger in our freezer, so I thought maybe there may be some in there,
00:32:41
so I went down, and I knew that the padlock was on that freezer, and I took a little screwdriver down with me
00:32:50
and I just unscrewed it and when I opened it up I saw the black trash bag it smelled horrible
00:32:57
I thought it was spoiled meat at first I was hoping that it was just spoiled meat
00:33:03
After finding a black trash bag in the freezer this young wife told her husband what she found and
00:33:10
he immediately went to go take a look for himself I went down and I did it and I opened it
00:33:16
As soon as I opened it, my stomach just flipped. And I was just like, what? This what?
00:33:21
This is how you store your meat? Got these scissors and it smells really bad. I'm like, why would it?
00:33:27
That's when I knew. I said, why would you? You wouldn't put rotten meat in the freezer and freeze it.
00:33:31
It didn't rot in the freezer because it would be frozen. And then I recognized the foot and the thing.
00:33:36
And I just, my wife grabbed her head and I grabbed mine. You knew it was a body.
00:33:40
I said, I think I turned around and I said, call the police. We responded. During the initial response, we knew that we had the remains of a white female.
00:33:52
And at that point, because her remains were frozen, we were not sure how much of her body we actually had.
00:34:01
And later, during the autopsy process, we realized we were missing a torso and part of her head.
00:34:08
The body parts found in the freezer were eventually identified as belonging to missing 28-year-old Shannon Graves.
00:34:17
But before detectives confirmed that, they sought to identify the person that put the freezer in the basement.
00:34:26
In our subsequent interviews, the Eschenbaas identified Arturo Novella as the man who brought the freezer to their house.
00:34:33
Why don't you start with how you met Anthony? I met Anthony. I went over to my neighbor's house.
00:34:40
How long ago was this? This had to be, I'm guessing, I'm right about on time, sorry, but I'd say between four and four and a half years ago.
00:34:48
And then he lived right up the street from me, actually, not too far up the street.
00:34:52
And he just started hanging around, and, you know, we started playing Xbox together.
00:34:56
You know, just typical friendship stuff, you know. On the day after Katrina Layton was questioned by Youngstown detectives,
00:35:04
Arturo called a friend and explained that his power was out and that he wanted to store a freezer in his friend's basement to preserve his meat.
00:35:13
A few hours later, he dropped off the freezer, put it in the friend's basement, plugged it in, and left.
00:35:22
Four days later, his friend's wife decided that she wanted some spaghetti, which led to the discovery of Shannon's arms, legs, and part of her head.
00:35:33
After this discovery, both Arturo and Katrina were picked up by police and brought in for questioning.
00:35:41
without prompting you in any way can you tell me everything you know about chanon and her
00:35:46
disappearance and where she is that the problem is like i said before i don't know much about her
00:35:52
like as a person i not really worried about personal information i worried about where is she right now that I don know Okay I mean I just I don know So Katrina since Shanna disappearance you been driving her car
00:36:12
No, no, no. Since she disappeared, you're using the phone that she used when she was with him.
00:36:17
And then since she's been gone, her dog's been at your apartment. Okay. Since she's been gone, her card has been used to feed you.
00:36:28
You understand what I'm running down here, this list of things? We've already went over these.
00:36:32
Okay. Now imagine we're telling this to a room full of 12 reasonable people. What do they think you did?
00:36:39
I didn't do anything. When Katrina was interviewed for a second time, she gave the same oblivious responses that she'd given the first time.
00:36:48
But now the police had body parts and a whole lot more information. During a search warrant at Shannon's apartment, we recovered a rent receipt for another apartment on Youngstown's South Side.
00:37:03
It appeared to us that the couple were now renting a new apartment. However, they were not living in it.
00:37:11
Arturo and Katrina were living in Shannon's apartment. But they were also paying rent for another apartment that was only a few miles away.
00:37:21
When detectives visited this second apartment, they found noticeable drag marks on the floor that perfectly matched the bottom of the freezer that contained Shannon's body parts.
00:37:35
Clearly, someone had dragged the freezer into and then out of this apartment. And clearly this apartment really only had one purpose, to hide Shannon's dismembered body parts.
00:37:50
The detectives eventually concluded that their first interview with Katrina must have spooked her and Arturo, prompting them to move the freezer into a friend's house.
00:38:02
Anthony just said something about buying a freezer until we got a fridge and stove to hold the food.
00:38:09
So a month ago you bought a freezer to put in a house that you don't live in? We were at least at this apartment. It's not open yet.
00:38:18
Well, it's not like you're living the life of luxury, but you bought a freezer. Of all the shit that you don't have, you bought a freezer.
00:38:25
Yeah, because... You don't have furniture. How did he pay for it? I gave him... I'm pretty sure I gave him cash.
00:38:32
Where'd you buy it at? I think he got it at Walmart. Ah, yes. A murder plot is never complete without a visit to Walmart.
00:38:44
At this point in her interview, Katrina did admit that she and Arturo had purchased a small chest freezer.
00:38:51
But the cops had not revealed that they found that freezer or Shannon's body parts inside.
00:38:59
When they did, Katrina's response was interesting. And when I found the bugs, I wasn't sure if they came from the new place or the place we're now.
00:39:12
What about if it came because of your freezer? Why did the bugs come from a random freezer?
00:39:17
Because when you put a body in a freezer, it brings bugs. The bugs came. The bugs came.
00:39:23
Did you hear what I just said? What do you mean when you put a body in the freezer?
00:39:27
Yeah, I was wondering if you, I mean, I understand you're trying to get your story out, but did you hear what I just said?
00:39:31
Yes, but I don't even understand what you're kidding them from. Okay. Did it occur to you that the bugs might be from the body in the freezer?
00:39:37
Uh, no, because the landlord across the street from where we're at now had a bug guy in his driveway the other day.
00:39:45
Okay. And that's why I was like, all right, well, the new place doesn't have them.
00:39:48
So it's not because of the body in the freezer. What do you mean body in the freezer?
00:39:52
What are you talking about? The body in the freezer. That's not what brought the bugs.
00:39:57
Why do you keep saying a body in the freezer? Because there was a body in the freezer.
00:40:00
What do you mean there's a body in the freezer? In what freezer? The freezer that you guys bought.
00:40:04
Let me show you something. This is the freezer. This is the body. Body in freezer.
00:40:11
Katrina denied having any knowledge of a dead body being left in the freezer that she paid for.
00:40:18
And she continued to deny that she had any knowledge of Shannon Graves being dead.
00:40:25
Unfortunately for her, during these emotional denials, she let a few things slip.
00:40:32
You know, I told you about ten times. That the missing girl is dead in your freezer?
00:40:39
I'm looking for some kind of reaction. You don't look shocked at all. Yeah. Forget all this.
00:40:45
Did you kill her? Hell no. Were you there when she was killed? No. What? Well, it sure looks like you did.
00:40:52
No, what do you mean it looks like I did? She's in your freezer. The one you paid for.
00:40:57
So it kind of looks like you killed her. She was banging your band. You hated her.
00:41:01
And you are in possession of all her earthly goods. So it kind of looks like you killed her.
00:41:05
Okay, it looks like I killed her. It sure does. Okay, I have to interject here for a moment because I'm a true crime fan and I know that you are.
00:41:12
This moment you're about to hear, this doesn't happen very often. I call it a Matlock moment.
00:41:19
If you ever watch the old 70s TV show, I think it was 70s. Anyway, if you ever watch Matlock, there's that got you moment where he just pulls out of nowhere this aha moment
00:41:31
that comes from the criminal just talking and talking themselves into a trap. It really doesn't happen very often.
00:41:40
It's kind of like a movie or TV show thing. So it's pretty fascinating to hear it in real life.
00:41:47
Check it out. You guys are sitting here telling me that there's anybody in this freezer
00:41:54
that I did not bring to Kenny house Who said anything about Kenny house You just told me it was in Kenny basement Oh okay In Kenny house whatever
00:42:06
I mean, I'm assuming... We never said anything about a basement. Well, Kenny's...
00:42:09
We never said anything about that. Okay. We never told you that. Okay, well, here's the thing.
00:42:14
How did you know that? How did I know that? Yes. It's common knowledge. I know what Kenny's house looks like.
00:42:21
Obviously, the cops weren't buying what Katrina was selling. But even after several hours of interrogation, she simply wouldn't admit to anything.
00:42:32
Eventually, detectives decided to just arrest her. I'm afraid to say anything right now because I don't know what you're going to try to use against me now.
00:42:40
Tell me that you don't know nothing about that. I don't know anything about that.
00:42:44
I'm good. Take your chances. No, I'm telling you. I got you. I totally understand. You don't need to do it, right?
00:42:53
Good enough. Have a seat there. We'll be right back. Hold on. No, no, hold on. No, fuck that.
00:43:03
What? Wow, what the fuck, man? Ma, they're trying to get me for something I didn't fucking do.
00:43:11
It's what's wrong. Oh, yeah. I forgot to mention that while Katrina was being interrogated,
00:43:16
her mom was sitting outside the interview room babysitting Katrina's two children
00:43:22
can you hold your foot on straight like this please my foot yes why you're not already for what I'm not just going anywhere can I speak to you for a minute
00:43:36
what the fuck dude are you serious right now mom hell no man mom mom meatloaf fuck that man
00:43:58
what the fuck mom no fuck that they're trying to tell me there's a body in the freezer
00:44:08
and I didn't fucking put that freezer there Katrina sat in her interview room with her ankle cuffed to a table as she mindlessly screamed at her mom.
00:44:20
Meanwhile, detectives went to another interview room and questioned her boyfriend, Arturo.
00:44:26
The last time you saw Shannon was when? I don't even know. Like the end of February?
00:44:34
Okay. You have no idea what became of her? I do not. I have said this to everybody.
00:44:42
Okay, people know you Said this that you burned things up now I have people that know you saying you brought a freezer to our house when they opened it up guess what they thought
00:44:52
What did they find sir? Why do you think you're here the charges abuse of a corpse?
00:45:00
Excuse me abuse of a corpse Are you serious right now? I'm not fooling with you man. Yeah, I'm 100% serious right now. I would not make this up. Yeah, absolutely
00:45:12
What the fuck? Not unlike Katrina, Arturo denied having any knowledge of Shannon's whereabouts.
00:45:21
But he also took things a step further and denied ever bringing a freezer to his friend's house.
00:45:27
This is going to take so long. I lose my job. You're going to lose your job? Did you hear what I said?
00:45:34
This ain't about your outback dishwasher job anymore. There's a body in a freezer.
00:45:40
And the guy said you're going to do his house. Yeah. Your dishwasher job at Outback is fucked.
00:45:45
Okay? That's a weird thing for you to say. Like, my job's fucked up? If you're trying to tell me all these fingers are pointing at me and I supposedly went to this house and supposedly put this thing in this guy's house, this is fucking insanity to me.
00:46:04
It really is. So I'm trying to figure out where something might have, like, somewhere might have went wrong.
00:46:10
I'm telling you that four people who know you said you burned your shit up, and now two people who know you said you brought a freezer with a body in it to their house,
00:46:19
and you're talking to me about your dishwasher job. It's impossible, because I didn't do no system.
00:46:25
Okay. I don't do nothing but work and sleep. Did you, at any point, take a freezer to a house in Campbell?
00:46:32
I did not. You did not. Arturo's interview only lasted for about 20 minutes before he asked for a lawyer.
00:46:40
But the takeaway was that Arturo denied everything. Unfortunately for him, he was going to have a hard time maintaining his denials
00:46:50
because the cops found something very interesting when they emptied his pockets.
00:46:56
Arturo completely denied any knowledge of any of this, even though at the time of his arrest
00:47:02
we found him to be in possession of the key that unlocked the padlock that was on the freezer.
00:47:08
Arturo was arrested and at that point his only charge was abuse of a corpse. With eyewitness statements
00:47:18
and some pretty solid physical evidence detectives could prove that Arturo had burned Shannon's belongings
00:47:26
and transported some of her body parts from one location to another. But there were still a lot of questions,
00:47:35
like how did Shannon die? Who killed her? And why? Also, Arturo and Katrina didn't buy the chest freezer until July,
00:47:48
which was five months after Shannon went missing. Where had Katrina and Arturo been storing her body this entire time?
00:47:57
the cops were not going to be able to get any answers from Arturo because he lawyered up immediately.
00:48:06
Katrina, however, was still willing to try and talk her way out of the situation.
00:48:13
The problem, the problem. What's wrong with you? Why can't you just stop all this bullshit and tell the truth?
00:48:20
Because I'm trying to tell you guys. Just tell us what Anthony did. Tell us what he did.
00:48:25
Okay. Tell me Anthony did and you didn't because right now. No, I didn't do anything.
00:48:30
Katrina, you know what this looks like? Yeah, I know what it looks like, obviously.
00:48:36
Let me put it this way, okay? Here's Anthony. He's got you over here, and what do you have?
00:48:42
That. And she's got her over there, and what's she got? Piece of ass. He's getting everything he wants.
00:48:51
Why would he kill anybody? He didn't buy a freezer. You did. He didn't rent an apartment over there.
00:48:57
You did. I didn't do shit to that girl There's a dead girl I fucking get that Detectives knew or
00:49:06
at least strongly suspected that Arturo and Katrina had murdered Shannon and whoever didn't commit the crime
00:49:15
helped the other clean up the mess Detective Lambert had a hunch that Katrina was the killer
00:49:23
because Arturo didn't really seem to have a motive But again, there were still a lot of questions.
00:49:48
During her interviews, Katrina never admitted to anything. She maintained that she didn't murder Shannon and she also never pointed the finger at Arturo.
00:50:01
Unfortunately, these interviews with Katrina and Arturo gave the cops almost nothing to work with.
00:50:08
You understand this looks like you did it and he helped you. I know. That's what it looks like.
00:50:15
On top of any other damn things he did to you, he was talking to your boyfriend.
00:50:20
It's not complicated. It's real simple. She took what was yours. She screwed your boyfriend.
00:50:28
Then she disappeared. And then you got all her shit. And she's in your freezer that he says he don't know nothing about.
00:50:35
Just tell me what happened. It's got to be better than what it looks. It can't be as bad as it looks.
00:50:41
I mean, I didn't... It cannot be as bad as it looks, can it? I don't know anymore.
00:50:48
On top of the obvious questions of who killed Shannon Graves, there was also something else that was bothering detectives.
00:50:58
The freezer that Arturo had moved into his friend's basement only contained Shannon's arms, legs, and a small piece of her head.
00:51:09
So, where was the rest of her? What had Arturo and Katrina done with Shannon's torso and the remainder of her head?
00:51:21
When Detective Michael Lambert learned the answers to these questions, he realized that he was right about something.
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00:55:04
Cha-ching. In July of 2017, 31-year-old self-proclaimed rap artist Arturo Navoa was arrested after his ex-girlfriend's dismembered body parts were found inside a freezer that Arturo had moved into a friend's basement.
00:55:38
Also arrested was 34-year-old Katrina Layton, who Arturo had dated on and off for about nine years.
00:55:46
At the time of their arrest, they were back together. The body parts that were discovered belonged to 28-year-old Shannon Graves,
00:55:58
who went missing in Youngstown, Ohio, five months before pieces of her were found inside this freezer.
00:56:06
Shannon dated Arturo for less than a year, and at the time of her disappearance, they were both living in Shannon's apartment.
00:56:14
After Shannon went missing, Katrina Layton moved in to that same apartment. Homicide detectives in Youngstown believed that Arturo and or Katrina murdered Shannon.
00:56:29
But during their respective interrogations, neither of them confessed or pointed the finger at the other.
00:56:36
At this point, the evidence that the cops had only proved Katrina purchased the freezer and Arturo moved it.
00:56:46
At best, this couple could only be charged with tampering with evidence and abuse of a corpse.
00:56:54
Here's what we've got to find out. Yeah. We've got to find out where she was killed, how she was killed.
00:57:03
Where was the body dismembered? Right. It has to be somewhere. Where was it stored for four months?
00:57:08
You and I know, hey, they probably killed her. Right. But we don't have enough to even make that allegation yet.
00:57:16
Right. And we're close. As far as a motive was concerned, Katrina Layton had a good one.
00:57:22
And it was pretty simple. According to her friends, Katrina and Arturo argued constantly when they were dating.
00:57:30
Usually it was because Katrina suspected that Arturo was being unfaithful. And to be fair, he often was.
00:57:41
Then, after they broke up and Arturo began dating Shannon Graves, Katrina became enraged.
00:57:50
And there's nothing worse than someone named Katrina being enraged. Take my word for it.
00:57:57
And then other than that, she only came over and they were fighting. It was bad.
00:58:01
It was real bad. I mean, I have, oh man. What were you fighting over? She always thought he was cheating on her with somebody.
00:58:09
And there were times I just couldn't listen to Trina anymore about Arturo. Could not do it.
00:58:17
Like, she was- What are you talking about or what? No, she was obsessed with him, dude.
00:58:22
I mean, bad. And like, I mean, her disdain for Shannon's. In short, if Katrina murdered Shannon, her motive was likely jealousy.
00:58:38
As for Arturo, Detective Michael Lambert wasn't sure if he had a motive. One of the things that was in my mind during the entire case was the fact that Arturo had both of these women.
00:58:53
he had Shannon providing money a place to live, a car pretty much everything he wanted
00:59:01
and he also had Katrina providing whatever Shannon wasn't giving him on top of that both women
00:59:09
knew about each other so this wasn't a secret so at no point did I really believe that Arturo
00:59:17
had the better motive between him and Katrina Even though Katrina had a motive and she and Arturo were clearly responsible for or involved with Shannon's murder and dismemberment, prosecutors in Ohio did what prosecutors normally do.
00:59:38
They offered a plea deal to the woman so that they could have a stronger case against the man.
00:59:44
Because, you know, equality. After the arrest of Arturo Nouveau and Katrina Layton the prosecutor office entered into a deal with Katrina Layton thinking that she had the least amount of culpability in the case and could provide damaging testimony against Arturo
01:00:05
As a result of Katrina's deal, she would receive no jail time for cooperation, which
01:00:14
includes testimony against Arturo in the case. Shannon's family did not react well to this deal
01:00:23
and they immediately began raising alarms that it was their belief that Katrina had as much to do with Shannon's death as Arturo did
01:00:32
I cannot explain why the deal was made because I wasn't part of it my assumption would be that after the prosecutor assessed what we gave them
01:00:45
The actual murder case was still very circumstantial. And without the push of a cooperating witness, all we really had was a tampering with evidence case.
01:00:58
Katrina's defense attorney worked out a pretty incredible deal on her behalf. She was given complete immunity from prosecution.
01:01:09
Yeah, complete immunity. The only requirements were that she testified against Arturo and that she be completely honest.
01:01:20
So, in the latter half of 2018, Katrina and her defense attorney met with prosecutors several times to discuss the murder of Shannon Graves.
01:01:29
According to Katrina on an evening in late February 2017, she was at home with her two children when she unexpectedly received a phone call from Arturo.
01:01:43
Again, it's important to remember that Arturo is sometimes referred to as Anthony.
01:01:49
So Anthony calls you hysterical on the phone, telling me Shannon's dead, right? Yep.
01:01:55
And about an hour later, he's at your house. roughly about an hour yes okay so what's he said when he gets in the house i don't remember exactly
01:02:07
like how the conversation went but i found out that she was in the trunk of the car
01:02:11
katrina explained that when arturo arrived at her house he had shannon's dead body in the trunk of
01:02:18
shannon's car and the two of them decided to move shannon into katrina's garage so who got her out
01:02:26
the trunk he got her the rest of the way out okay and what happened after that now she's out
01:02:32
at that point i realized you know i couldn't i couldn't lift her i was already freaking out
01:02:40
you know that's when i called andrew remember andrew herman the guy that helped arturo burn
01:02:48
shannon's belongings well according to katrina andrew did a lot more than just burn some property
01:02:56
Katrina explained that after Shannon's corpse was laid out in her garage, she called Andrew and told him to come over.
01:03:03
When he got there, Arturo led Andrew into the garage while Katrina went into her house.
01:03:10
Katrina claimed that she didn't know what went on inside the garage, but she did eventually see Andrew leave.
01:03:18
Nothing really. I don't even think Andrew was there that long after they came back in the house.
01:03:23
I think he left. Okay. But I know he didn't stay all night. I know that. He left.
01:03:29
He didn't. And what happens with Anthony? He laid down. He was upset. So you laid in bed together?
01:03:37
Yeah, he was upset. After Katrina named Andrew Herman, investigators began looking into the kind of person that Andrew was.
01:03:47
What they found seemed to substantiate what Katrina had told them. Like Arturo, Andrew was an amateur wannabe rap artist
01:04:00
and had made a bunch of disturbing recordings that were obsessed with death and the occult
01:04:09
and all things weird, really. Like, I make his music. It's all dark, weird shit.
01:04:18
You know what I mean? Like, I used to make his music. I used to make Andrew's music.
01:04:23
Like, I would record it, do all that. It was just always, like, real dark stuff, you know what I mean?
01:04:30
Like, even the rap name he goes by is strange. It's a dead necrophiliac assassin.
01:04:38
I made him go by DNA because that was weird. Like, he's always been a weird dude,
01:04:45
but I always just thought it was just a gimmick for the music thing, you know what I mean?
01:04:49
It turned out that Andrew's interest in dead bodies wasn't a gimmick. Apparently, Andrew had a thing for cold and dismembered corpses.
01:05:01
His girlfriend tells he has videos of people having sex with dead bodies on his phone.
01:05:07
One body is headless. Oh. Him and I have sex or people? People. Okay. Andrew was eventually confronted with the accusation that he assisted in the disposal of Shannon's corpse, and he denied it.
01:05:23
We believe Anthony and Katrina, and possibly you, were involved in killing Shannon.
01:05:31
Andrew, what else do you know about this? I don't know anything else. Because right now, I don't think there's anybody on the planet who thinks you don't know more about this.
01:05:41
I don't know anything else. I told you what happened. Despite Andrew's denial, Katrina maintained her story and insisted that Andrew assisted Arturo in some way,
01:05:52
though she wasn sure how and she didn know what happened to Shannon body after Andrew intervention A few days later Katrina moved into Shannon apartment with Arturo and eventually discovered that Shannon dismembered body was in the apartment
01:06:11
When I saw it, it was on the floor next to the toilet. One bag? No, there was two.
01:06:21
But you never looked in the bag. You saw a bag with honey? Yeah, that was after we poured the acid.
01:06:29
If you didn't catch that, Katrina just said, after we poured the acid. At some point, Katrina and Arturo decided to go full Breaking Bad with Shannon's body.
01:06:42
If you're not familiar, which, by the way, by now you should be. It's probably one of the best shows ever made.
01:06:48
In any case, the main characters on that show often use acid-filled barrels to dissolve and hide dead bodies.
01:07:18
I realized that she was in the back room and that there was still a problem. It should be noted that Katrina did not come forward
01:07:27
and admit that she and Arturo made plans to dissolve Shannon's body in acid. Before Katrina agreed to cooperate, the cops figured this out on their own.
01:07:39
During the resulting media coverage from the arrest of Arturo and Katrina, we received a call from a local Walmart from a clerk who recognized the pair
01:07:51
because they had purchased online a large amount of sulfuric acid drain opener. Anyway, the guy we arrested, he made some kind of internet order.
01:08:03
Yes. All of the items that he ordered. And what were those items? They were bottles of sulfuric acid.
01:08:11
Now, when you said they came in on a tenth. Both of them. Him and her. Both. They give me the order, I type it in, and it comes up.
01:08:20
And I instantly knew, like, I can't give this to you. So I explained to him, I said, I apologize, but I know your name is not Chicken Man.
01:08:29
For obvious reasons, when Katrina and Arturo placed their Walmart order for sulfuric acid,
01:08:36
they didn't want to use their real name. So in their infinite wisdom, they decided to use an alias.
01:08:43
It was just addressed to Chicken Man. So a guy walks into Walmart and says, hey, I'm Chicken Man.
01:08:49
You got a package for me? You're kidding, right? I can't make this up. I'm sorry.
01:08:59
That's the correct response, by the way. When Katrina and Arturo went to Walmart to pick up the acid,
01:09:07
the sales clerk gave them a hard time about the name that they used. But eventually they got it all worked out and Katrina and Arturo walked out of the store with their 12 gallons of sulfuric acid.
01:09:20
What is it with Walmart and murder? Don't you know they got cameras there? Okay, so the day you do the acid, there's a plastic tote?
01:09:31
Yes. And you're putting parts into the tote? Yeah. What kind of parts? It was her head and like the torso, like, just this whole middle part.
01:09:40
No. Legs? No. Head? Whole head? Yes. Now you've got this tote, this plastic container, full of shanty.
01:09:51
Yeah. What happens next? I don't remember it happening, like, right away. It wasn't poof like in the curtains.
01:10:01
Right. Right. I think it took a little bit, like a week or two, maybe. And you end up with a sludgy bunch of shit in there.
01:10:08
Katrina explained that they let Shannon's torso and a good chunk of her head dissolve in acid for about a week.
01:10:19
Then, Arturo incrementally disposed of the resulting human sludge. So he told you he took it and dumped it somewhere off Glenwood Avenue?
01:10:30
Yeah. And how far did you live from Glenwood Avenue? Not far. Right. And the arms and legs are somewhere.
01:10:38
Right. And as we now know, because you saw the picture, they're still in one piece.
01:10:43
So there's no way they make it for one piece. So they're somewhere and they're somewhere frozen.
01:10:48
Yeah, that's what I can't help you guys with because I know that they were back there and then they were in the other freezer.
01:10:57
According to Katrina, she and Arturo didn't have enough acid to dissolve Shannon's entire body.
01:11:03
and they were still stuck with her arms, her legs, and a piece of her head. Katrina claimed that Arturo stored these body parts somewhere,
01:11:14
but she didn't know where until they ended up in the chest freezer that the couple purchased months later.
01:11:22
There were a lot of gaps in Katrina's story, and prosecutors were hoping that Arturo's friend Andrew Herman could fill them in.
01:11:31
So based on Katrina's statements, Andrew was arrested. Andrew was eventually indicted for his role in the case when Katrina revealed to us that Andrew had a lot to do with the dismemberment.
01:11:50
Once he was arrested and charged, he immediately became a cooperator and gave us as much information as he could.
01:12:00
He had. After Andrew agreed to cooperate, he gave the prosecutors and investigators his version of the events.
01:12:10
According to Andrew, on a cold night in late February of 2017, Arturo contacted him and told him to come to Katrina's house.
01:12:22
Once there, Arturo led Andrew into Katrina's garage. What happened to the garage?
01:12:28
He explained to me that he had a problem that he really needed help with. He told me to pick up a pair of garbage bags and open them up.
01:12:43
When I did, there happened to be a body inside. Who was inside? Shannon. He told me he needs my help to make her smaller.
01:12:56
He'd tell you how she died. No, but it was pretty obvious. What did you see? Her head was caved in.
01:13:05
So what happened after that? We dismembered her. Okay, how did you dismember? With a machete.
01:13:15
So you used a machete to chop the arms because it was easy. Tried it on the legs.
01:13:24
Didn't work out so good, so switched to the blade side. I switched to the saw side.
01:13:29
Yeah, saw side. And how much of this blade is saw? The whole back is the whole saw.
01:13:35
So basically you've got a big hand saw. Yes. So does it go right through it, no problem?
01:13:40
Pretty much, yeah. How about the neck? No, no, it was rather easy. Saw or machete?
01:13:46
Machete. Just chopped. Now that the authorities had Andrew's cooperation, they didn't need Katrina's anymore.
01:13:54
and frankly, she didn't really give him anything useful anyway. She claimed she didn't witness Shannon's murder
01:14:02
and that Arturo never told Katrina how Shannon died, which was pretty unlikely and also completely unbelievable.
01:14:12
So here's what you want these police and prosecutors to believe. You had this nine-year relationship where you always seemed to get back together
01:14:21
and he's telling everybody else on the planet how he killed Sharon but you. Yeah, that I do wonder.
01:14:28
Really? No, he shows up with a dead body and you don't see what the fuck happened?
01:14:34
I've never had a client take a deal where I've had to work this hard to get them.
01:14:38
I mean, this is ridiculous. I've never been in trouble like this either. I've never had another client be so stupid that for five meetings they would deny, deny, deny,
01:14:49
and then go, oh yeah, and smirk and say, well, I didn't want to get in trouble. After repeatedly being told there's nothing you can say that you're going to get in trouble about.
01:14:57
Okay? The only thing that jeopardizes your deal is you not being honest. You're giving you enough rope to hang yourself, and my concern is you're going to hang yourself.
01:15:07
In the end, Katrina did hang herself, and prosecutors were able to convince a judge that Katrina Layton was still lying.
01:15:17
In this case, Katrina absolutely had a get out of jail free card. She could have said anything up to and including that she actually killed Shannon and nothing could have happened to her as a result.
01:15:31
The only way she could have blown this is the way she did by telling provable lies to us.
01:15:39
As a result of that, she faced the full brunt of the case just like Arturo did. But eventually Arturo made the decision to plead guilty in this case.
01:15:53
And during his plea, he had the opportunity, as did Katrina early on, to just tell the truth because his future was sealed.
01:16:03
Arturo knew that one way or another, he was going down for Shannon's murder. So he decided to also accept a plea.
01:16:13
When Arturo sat down with prosecutors, he explained his side of the story. According to him, on February 25, 2017, he was at Shannon's apartment,
01:16:25
which was also his apartment because Shannon let him live there. That night, he got into an argument with Shannon shortly before she left for work.
01:16:35
In order to calm himself down, Arturo decided to walk to a local bar and have some drinks.
01:16:42
While there, he also decided to call Katrina. And thinking that Shannon would be working all night, and being the degenerate scumbag that he is, he invited Katrina to Shannon's apartment.
01:16:56
I was basically just trying to have a few dreams. Just chill out. I called Katrina for a little nightcap.
01:17:04
And I told her, you know, I asked her if she would like to come by. She breathed. She came over.
01:17:11
I left the back door open for her so when she gets there she can just go in because I was still at the bar.
01:17:18
I told her, you know, just go in and make yourself back home when you get there.
01:17:22
Arturo agreed to meet Katrina at Shannon's apartment, but when he got there he saw that Shannon's car was
01:17:29
parked outside. Presumably, Shannon had come home early. Something to note here is that Arturo
01:17:37
refers to Shannon by her nickname Star. I scared the shit out of me because I knew either Trina was there or she was about to
01:17:45
do that. I went to the house. As soon as I got to the door, I already heard a commotion.
01:17:51
The dog was barking like crazy. A bunch of yelling and screaming and shit and noise I walked in the house Star was swinging and grabbing hair Shreena goes over She in the living room
01:18:07
There's a part of the room where I keep all my tools. She grabbed a hammer and she hit Star with the hammer.
01:18:14
I think just in the heat of the moment, you know what I mean? She grabbed a hammer?
01:18:20
She grabbed a hammer that was sitting next to her on her toe. According to Arturo, he witnessed Katrina murder Shannon by hitting her in the head several times with a claw hammer, after which he and Katrina started the very, very long process of trying to cover up this murder.
01:18:39
He dragged her all the way to the bathroom. And how'd you clean the blood up? Bleach.
01:18:46
How much blood was it? She was eating pretty bad. So you dragged her to the bathroom and put her in the bathtub?
01:18:54
Mm-hmm. Clothes on, clothes off? Clothes on. Who shaved her head? I did. Why'd you shave her head?
01:19:03
I don't know. I didn't know what to do at the time, so I was just trying to figure out a way to cover it up.
01:19:09
Eventually, Arturo and Katrina moved Shannon into the trunk of Shannon's car and drove to Katrina's house.
01:19:16
When I do get over there, we lay her in the garage. It was really cold out. I'm going to suggest
01:19:24
that I should call Andrew for help. Who's searching on Trina's phone for 55-gallon
01:19:32
totes and bins? It's all her. And why is she searching for that? She had this crazy idea that
01:19:42
if we got rid of the body completely, she said, would have poured some acid on them.
01:19:51
According to Arturo, Katrina was committed to dissolving Shannon's body in acid.
01:19:58
While she was Googling the best kind of barrels and bins to do this with, because that's what you do when you're a dumb murderer,
01:20:07
Arturo called his friend Andrew Herman, who eventually arrived at the garage with his machete.
01:20:14
Then, Andrew dismembered Shannon while Arturo assisted. toad. Katrina and Arturo
01:20:48
transported Shannon back to Shannon's apartment. A few days later, they poured acid on her torso
01:20:56
and the portion of her head that revealed the cause of death. We separated the body.
01:21:04
We grabbed the arms and legs out of there, put them in bags, and we laid her out
01:21:09
with a bigger toe, and we poured the acid on that part of the body? The head or the torso?
01:21:16
The head and the torso. As for the remaining body parts, Arturo explained that they folded up
01:21:25
Shannon's arms and legs and kept them in Shannon's apartment freezer. She was in the freezer,
01:21:31
the fridge of your house, March, April, May, and June, for four months. That's got to be a big freezer.
01:21:40
Decent. she would just fold it up it was just her arms and legs what are you guys thinking?
01:21:49
you're living there right? you got arms and legs in a freezer in your freezer and you got the rest of her in a tote
01:21:57
so you guys talking about it? what are you a lot Arturo, Katrina and Katrina's two children
01:22:08
lived in Shannon's apartment for five months. Presumably, Arturo and Katrina were sleeping together
01:22:16
on Shannon's bed during this time. They were using her car, using her cell phone,
01:22:25
and using her welfare card. All the while, some of Shannon was crammed into the refrigerator freezer
01:22:34
while the rest of her was dissolving in acid. Truly a horror house. It just dissolved most of it.
01:22:50
The goo that used to be her body. It's a tune in the liquid. Right. The liquid got put in buckets.
01:23:00
and we drove, we went our way to go pick up the kids. So whenever her kids would get off of school,
01:23:07
I can't remember, her son, and we would dump her remains on the street called Lamar Street.
01:23:17
Imagine that conversation. Hey, honey, don't forget on our way back from picking up the kids,
01:23:24
we need to drop off some of the human sludge that we've been hiding in the back room.
01:23:29
let's uh let's not forget that uh it's kind of uh piling up back there and uh you know we should
01:23:35
probably get rid of some of that clean that out do a little spring cleaning you know maybe we can
01:23:41
repurpose that space you know uh put some boxes back there go down to the container store
01:23:45
we still got the arms and legs catch how she's at your phone we ran into a money problem after a
01:23:50
while especially when we had two apartments so once once we got fully moved into the second apartment we have planned on getting more acid Okay So you were happy with how the acid worked on the part you did do Arturo and Katrina planned to dissolve the rest of Shannon in acid
01:24:10
But they never got the chance. After police came knocking on their door and asking questions,
01:24:17
Shannon was moved into a chest freezer and eventually found herself in the basement of Arturo's friend's house.
01:24:26
After that friend named Arturo, some of the truth came out. But even to this day, nobody but Katrina and Arturo
01:24:37
know for sure who killed Shannon Graves. At this point, there is no proof positive 100% answer to who killed Shannon Graves.
01:24:50
In this case, though, interestingly enough, it was Arturo who identified Katrina as the killer,
01:24:57
but Katrina never identified either of them as the killer, just claimed to not know.
01:25:04
If Katrina killed Shannon, her motive was a simple love triangle motive where she wanted Arturo all to himself.
01:25:13
For the majority of the investigation, Detective Lambert only saw a motive for Katrina.
01:25:20
But as time went on, he began to see that Arturo may have had a motive as well. You know, I thought about it and I never told you any different.
01:25:31
You had all the motive. I didn't see what his motive is. But now I'm seeing a motive for him.
01:25:36
And I'm seeing a motive that's actually getting a little more twofold. It's not just about you and Shannon.
01:25:43
about other things too. What did Anthony do for money? Apparently Arturo had this M.O.
01:25:53
where he would use women to support himself. Judging by a current peripheral look at society,
01:26:00
he doesn't appear to be the only one. He did it with Shannon and countless women before her,
01:26:08
including Katrina. Katrina liked him even though. I think she was just cool. She was so hungry for love, you know?
01:26:15
So she wanted somebody to love her. Where did she come from? She met him at the fucking bus station downtown.
01:26:23
Okay. But, you know, he was homeless or something. Just got out of jail or something.
01:26:27
I don't even know. But he ended up living at her house on Tremble. Okay. They were dating and not dating, dating and not dating.
01:26:33
And to me, when he wanted something, that they were dating. Then when he didn't want something, they weren't dating.
01:26:38
Whenever there was income tax time, he was up her ass. She's a single mom. She's already struggling. She's working two jobs.
01:26:46
And you come in and you have no problem taking money. Taking her money. Taking her from her.
01:26:53
Arturo was a taker and a user. Oh, and also a liar. During the time he was dating Shannon, he was still sleeping with Katrina.
01:27:05
When cops looked over his phone records and emails, they also discovered that he was carrying on sexual relationships with at least three other women
01:27:14
where do these people even find the time to do this shit i guess it must be a lot easier when
01:27:21
you don't have a job in any case it didn't take shannon long to recognize the kind of guy
01:27:28
that arturo was so during the investigation it became apparent that shannon was on kind of a
01:27:36
last chance agreement with Arturo. And given the history of their relationship and Katrina's,
01:27:43
eventually this was going to end. So the best motive I could come up with was that Arturo's
01:27:50
use of Shannon to help himself was eventually going to run out. And this was his last chance
01:27:57
to get what he could from her. As mentioned before, Shannon Graves worked as a stripper.
01:28:03
But this was a line of work that she wanted to get out of. While dating Arturo, Shannon attended and eventually graduated from cosmetology school,
01:28:15
and she planned to transition from stripper to cosmetologist. Arturo wasn't overly thrilled with this idea because it would temporarily put a stop to the money that Shannon was making as a stripper,
01:28:29
which directly benefited him. Did she ever cause me to call me a license? She didn't
01:28:35
Where'd she cut hair at? She didn't She got her license and that's when she was with him
01:28:41
And I think he was just Didn't really want her to better herself He was just pushing her to keep dancing
01:28:46
According to Shannon's co-workers Who knew her by her nickname Star Shannon was committed to her goals
01:28:55
And she felt that If she was going to achieve them She was going to have to kick her worthless unemployed boyfriend out of her apartment smart girl so she remembers working
01:29:09
with her said they were fighting and uh who was fighting anthony anthony and star yeah
01:29:15
said she was talking about how she needed to get away from him he was no good and the girl said
01:29:20
she just started working there and didn't think nothing of it that it was just another girl
01:29:24
talking about their loser boyfriend. If Katrina killed Shannon Graves, her motive was jealousy.
01:29:31
If Arturo killed Shannon, his motive was a desperation to hold on to the things that Shannon was providing for him.
01:29:40
Maybe an anger that they might be taken away. Again, Arturo was a user and a taker.
01:29:48
And apparently, old habits die hard. While sitting in jail awaiting trial, Arturo was still playing his game with yet another woman
01:30:25
I know it's outside of the city and all that but maybe you need to get away from all that shit tomorrow.
01:30:33
Here's a guy sitting in jail awaiting trial for dismembering his girlfriend and dissolving her body parts in acid.
01:30:42
And this other woman is offering to let him come live with her and her children.
01:30:49
I mean, I don't even have words for this. how desperate can you be? Not a good look.
01:30:59
In any event, Arturo was never able to go live with this other woman. After accepting a plea agreement, he was sentenced to 48 years to life
01:31:11
and currently resides in an Ohio state prison. Thank God. His friend, Andrew Herman, was sentenced to 12 years in prison
01:31:22
for his role in dismembering Shannon's body. Then, there was Katrina Layton. After continuing to lie to prosecutors repeatedly,
01:31:35
her plea agreement was revoked, and she pled guilty to eight felonies, including abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence.
01:31:46
Katrina, and by the way, this was only because she was too stupid to actually go through with the plea deal, was sentenced to 18 years
01:31:57
in prison. Also, if anyone's curious, Shannon's dog Molly was adopted by Shannon's sister, so she's
01:32:06
currently living a very happy life. Good for Molly. I know a lot of you worry about the animals, and so do I, but Molly's fine, just so you
01:32:15
know. She probably misses her mom, though, very much. I don't know that there is a moral to this story, but what stands out to me is that what these three people were going to prior to Shannon's death didn't amount to any reason why Shannon ever had to die.
01:32:34
this wasn't a marital situation where anybody was going to lose anything of any real value
01:32:42
it wasn't a situation where somebody was going to discover that somebody had been doing anything
01:32:49
that everybody didn't already know about so shannon's death was just pointless it didn't
01:32:57
serve to further anything other than keeping things status quo and looking at what that status
01:33:05
quo was. It wasn't anything worth fighting for, but certainly not killing for. Shannon Graves was a
01:33:12
young, hardworking woman that had a difficult upbringing. The death of her mother at a young
01:33:19
age led Shannon to drop out of high school and become a stripper when she was only a teenager.
01:33:26
But, as Shannon got older, she realized she was capable of more. She earned her GED, graduated from cosmetology school, and was working toward the modest goal of becoming a cosmetologist.
01:33:43
Tragically, she never got to see that goal to the end. Instead, Katrina Layton and or Arturo Navoa caved her head in with a claw hammer.
01:33:58
Then, in a drawn-out and gruesome plot to hide the evidence, the two of them did unspeakable things to Shannon's body.
01:34:08
In the end, all they got for their troubles was years behind bars. and a lot to think about if they have the brain cells to do so.
01:34:21
In a world that is saturated with horrific true crime stories, believe me, it has become cliche to use this phrase.
01:34:32
But Shannon's murder can really only be described one way. Completely senseless.
01:34:44
All right, that's going to do it. Excuse me while I go kick some software engineers around for a bit.
01:35:04
It's my life now. Until next time, stay safe. hey mike i just joined patreon or whatever your sword and spell app is so my entire life has been
01:35:41
you and that soccer practice, like listening to horrific murder. But it's something to say that hearing any negative feedback you get and for you just
01:35:52
being like, fuck you, it's my podcast, whatever, gives me a warm, fluffy feeling inside because
01:35:58
fuck you. You are completely right. It is your podcast. You're amazing. We love you.
01:36:04
And thank you for making my two-hour soccer podcast, like, podcast, soccer game twice a week.
01:36:13
It's bearable because people. Love you. Bye.