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Episode 251

October 23, 2023 /

This episode of Sword and Scale discusses the tragic case of Diane Stoudy, who poisoned her family members, leading to the deaths of her husband and son, and the near-fatal illness of her daughter Sarah. Key topics include family dynamics, mental health, and the investigation that revealed the murders.

The episode begins with a brief introduction to the Stoudy family, highlighting Diane's role as the breadwinner and her husband's struggles with health and employment. It details the family's history of tragedy, including the deaths of Diane's husband Mark and son Sean, both of whom died under suspicious circumstances.

As Sarah becomes gravely ill, the police are alerted to the situation, prompting an investigation. Detective McCamus interviews family members, uncovering a pattern of illness and death that raises suspicions about Diane's involvement.

Eventually, Diane confesses to poisoning her family with antifreeze, revealing her motives rooted in resentment and financial concerns. The episode explores the psychological aspects of her actions and the impact on surviving family members.

In a shocking twist, it is revealed that Diane's daughter Rachel was complicit in the murders, leading to their joint arrest. The episode concludes with reflections on the case's implications for understanding family dynamics and the nature of evil.

TLDR

Diane Stoudy poisoned her family, killing her husband and son, while nearly killing her daughter Sarah, with her daughter Rachel as an accomplice.

Episode

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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. I didn't want another one to die in the house. And why is that?
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Because houses are nasty after somebody's died in it. welcome this is season 10 episode 251 of sword and scale a show that reveals that the worst monsters
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are real well most of you know that we have an app and that we've been working on updating it now for
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quite a while almost almost two years now unfortunately but it will be ready in 2024
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early 2024, January, in fact. So we're working towards that. We have a bunch of other surprises coming in January.
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You will not be disappointed, guys. See you soon. Family is not an important thing.
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It's everything. Michael J. Fox said that. And many of you listening right now would probably agree that your family is, indeed, everything.
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For those of you that have actually created a family of your own, you probably also agree that your everything didn't come easy.
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When it comes to marriage, kids, and everything that goes along with that, well, it can be a lot to handle.
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It requires serious dedication and a lot of sacrifices to make it all work. If you have created, maintained, and continue to maintain a happy, functioning family, you deserve a lot of credit.
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It's hard work, as you know. Not everyone has what it takes to do that. Oftentimes, marriages fail.
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Oftentimes, families fail. One common problem, it seems, is that many people start off thinking
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they want the typical spouse and children lifestyle. But after they get it, and maybe after they experience it for a few years,
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they start to realize it's just not for them. Unfortunately, after someone creates a family, they are kind of locked into it.
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kind of permanently. Sure, anyone could get a divorce and abandon their kids, but societal, legal, financial, and even religious pressures
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can make it seem impossible. When this happens, it can spell disaster. Sometimes the pressure of an unwanted and seemingly inescapable life
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can lead someone to do something truly horrific. We've seen this before with the likes of Chris Watts and Casey Anthony
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But there are lesser known cases where someone has made the terrible and selfish choice
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To end their family in order to obtain personal freedom Ultimately, they decided that the life they truly want
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Supersedes the lives of their spouse and their kin June 9th, 2013 was a Sunday That morning, a middle-aged mom in Missouri
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Woke up and did what she would normally do on a Sunday She took her kids to church
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But she wasn't able to bring along all of her children Because her oldest daughter wasn't feeling well
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And then you woke up Sunday morning She was asleep Then what happened? Me and the other girls went to church and we left her sleeping.
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Okay. And then I came home and she was still sleeping. And then maybe a couple hours later, I went to check on her and we just couldn't get her to respond or answer anything.
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49-year-old Diane Stoudy returned home from church and discovered something that most people would consider to be a worst nightmare situation for any mother.
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Her 26-year-old daughter, Sarah, was sick, in bed, and completely unresponsive. Thankfully, though, Sarah was still breathing.
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So Diane and one of her other daughters picked Sarah up, put her in the family car, and rushed her to the hospital.
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Strangely, when doctors examined Sarah, they couldn't figure out what had caused her to become so ill.
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This ultimately led to the local police getting involved. The lead investigator assigned to the case was Detective McCamus Diane Stouty was a wife and mother of four children She was the breadwinner of the family She worked handling insurance adjustment claims for the medical field
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She was heavily involved in church. She was active in choir and orchestra and spent a lot of time at church during her downtime.
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And from what I understand, you're in the medical field? I'm a nurse. You're a nurse, okay.
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But I'm a cardiology nurse. I know hearts. Yeah. Have you always been, like, in the claims business like you are now,
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or were you ever, like, in? I used to work in the hospital. Okay. How long ago was that?
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Oh, gosh, 15 years ago. Okay. Which hospital did you work in? Oh, gosh. St. John's, Cox.
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I worked up in Kansas City. Okay. And what company do you work for now? You know, I'm in healthcare.
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Okay. And you've worked for them for 12 years? Mm-hmm. Very successful. Okay. Diane and her children lived in Springfield, Missouri, a serene college city that is mostly
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known for being the headquarters for the sporting goods retailer Bass Pro. Others may know of Springfield because of its proximity to Branson, Missouri, which is
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a popular tourist destination for a variety of reasons. The Price is Right was filmed there,
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so was the Beverly Hillbillies, if you remember that. And who can forget Yakov Smirnoff and his
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weird little theme park performance theater thing. He was a personality during the 80s
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and achieved a moniker of success. But I digress. As a successful nurse and health insurance claims person,
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Diane Stoughty was able to support her children, all of whom remained living with Diane well into adulthood.
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As a whole, the Stoughty family wasn't known for being particularly social, but they were considered to be especially devout churchgoers.
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What church do you go to? Redeemer Lutheran Is that here in town? Uh-huh Okay Are you pretty active in church?
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Sure Are you? Okay I'm their organist Oh, okay, wow How long have you been doing that?
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Oh, gosh 30 plus years Oh, why? As the long-time church organist, Diane was well-respected inside the halls of her preferred place of worship
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Redeemer Lutheran And when Diane was there, she often had her children with her But on June 9, 2013, Diane's oldest daughter, Sarah, didn't make it to church.
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She was apparently very sick and her illness ultimately landed Sarah in a hospital bed.
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Sarah Stouty had just graduated with a degree in French from Missouri State University.
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And she had not gotten a job yet, so she was just, for the most part, she was staying at home and not doing a whole lot after college.
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Does she work anywhere? No. No? She's been supposedly trying to find a job, but I don't think she's been trying that hard.
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What are Sarah's friends like when she... She really doesn't go out much. Doesn't have any friends?
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Not really. No. Like the rest of the family, Sarah usually kept to herself, and aside from deflecting
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her mom's encouragement to find a job, she spent most of her time online. Like many 24-year-olds,
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Sarah loved her social media and watching YouTube videos. But on one particular Sunday afternoon,
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Sarah's lifestyle had seemingly come to an abrupt and unexpected end when her mom found Sarah in bed,
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Completely unresponsive. Is she still unresponsive at that point? Pretty much, yeah.
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Okay. I mean, we literally had to, Rachel and I had to carry her. Oh, wow. We carried her to the car.
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Okay. And what did they say at the hospital? Basically, she was as sick as sick could get.
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But no idea what it was? We had no clue. When Sarah was admitted to the hospital, the doctors and nurses determined that Sarah's kidneys were shutting down.
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Many of her internal organs were failing, and her brain was hemorrhaging blood. Diane was informed that this wasn't a case of if Sarah was going to die.
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It was a matter of when, but nobody could tell Diane or the police exactly what had caused this to happen.
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When Sarah was in the hospital, I went and I spoke with the medical staff that was treating her, nurses, doctors, and everybody was just, they were befuddled.
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They did not know what was going on. They had performed numerous tests on Sarah, and everything was coming back negative.
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As the police continued investigating Sarah's bizarre and unexplainable illness, they soon learned that this wasn't the first time the Stouty family had suffered an unexpected tragedy.
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Are you married? I'm widowed. My husband died last year of a heart attack. Oh, really? How old was he?
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61. Oh, so he was young? He had a lot of medical issues. Did he? Yeah. What kind of stuff did he have?
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Oh, he had liver problems. He was diabetic. He wouldn't quit smoking. Mark and Diane Stoudy met at St John College in Kansas and quickly became longtime sweethearts They eventually got married moved into a modest home in Springfield and had four children
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But sadly, at just 61 years old, Matt Stoudy unexpectedly dropped dead. Mark Stoudy primarily was a stay-at-home father.
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Diane, his wife, was the breadwinner of the family, and Mark took care of the kids.
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Mark was in a band. He wasn't making a lot of money doing that, but that's what he did for a little bit of money on the side and to keep himself busy.
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He was the lead singer in a band. Like his wife, Mark was a musician. Though his genre of music was much different than Diane's church hymns, Mark was the lead singer of a rock band messing with destiny.
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and according to his bandmates, Mark was an especially jovial guy who loved life and loved his family.
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Throughout its existence, Mark's band didn't find any mainstream success, but in the months leading up to his death, Messing with Destiny had been booking larger and more lucrative gigs.
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So much so that it seemed like the band was about to have a breakout year. In fact, on the weekend before Mark died, he and his bandmates were rehearsing in Branson, Missouri and preparing to perform at an especially large venue alongside the Aretha Franklin impersonators.
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You gotta get married to the corporation. Make sure they're number one in the nation.
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sadly mark was never able to perform in that show on april 8th 2012 mark died at home and his body
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was discovered by his wife diane who promptly called 9-1-1 diane was eventually informed that
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Mark had died of natural causes. Did they do any kind of autopsy on Mark? No, they didn't.
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No? No. I can remember them, you know, they tried CPR on him, and they told me that his lungs were just black from the smoke.
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Mm-hmm. You know, he was pretty overweight, and they didn't even, they just said it's a heart attack for sure,
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and it's like, okay. Where's he buried? He was cremated. Oh, he was cremated, okay.
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After Mark was cremated, his ashes were scattered at a nearby lake. So obviously any further examination
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to more narrowly determine his cause of death was improbable. But the police investigation
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into Sarah Stoudy's illness did continue. And during that investigation, the detectives also spoke to one of Mark and Diane's other daughters, 22-year-old Rachel Stoudy.
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Rachel Stoudy was kind of the prized child of the Stoudy family. She was very successful, very intelligent.
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She was going to school at Missouri State University. She, too, was very active and involved in church with singing and choir,
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and she was also a very artistic young person. In speaking with Rachel, detectives were able to gain a little more insight into the stouty family dynamics.
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And more specifically, the kind of relationship that Mark and Diane had. What was mom and dad's relationship like?
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They would fight a little bit. Did they fight a little bit? More than like any other married couple?
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Not really. Okay. So what were most of their arguments over? Money. Like everybody else?
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I know that your father passed, when was it when he passed away? Sometime like last April.
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Last April of last year. Very sudden. Just a very sudden death. As far as a dad goes, a pretty good dad to you and everybody?
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Or what's your opinion? He was nice. He was nice. He let us go to it. Oh, you guys could do anything you wanted to do?
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Has he always kind of been out of a job? Pretty much. I mean, he would get frustrated with whatever job he was in and like, screw this.
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Before they even handle him. Okay, just not his thing. No. He was trying to do the band thing, I guess.
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Yeah. Make it big like any other person has a band. Okay. All right. At this point, police had established that Mark Stouty had unexpectedly died in April of 2012.
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And just over a year later, Sarah Stouty had unexpectedly become very ill and was not expected to survive.
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The police also learned that something equally as tragic had happened between the time of Mark's death and Sarah's illness.
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Do you have a son as well? No, not anymore. He died. He died. He had a seizure disorder.
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When did he die? That was last fall. How old was he? He was 26. He'd had several strokes.
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So was his kind of an unexpected or? It wasn't a complete surprise. That's right.
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In addition to Mark's untimely death and Sarah's unexplainable illness, another member of the Stouty family had also died.
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he was Mark and Diane 26 year old autistic son Sean Sean Stoudy was the only boy in the Stoudy family He had autism and a couple other medical issues that he dealt with but he was the only son
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of the Stoudys and he kept to himself a lot with the medical issues. He was involved in a work activity for special needs children, which he did well at, but primarily
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just stayed at home as well. When asked about her brother's death, Rachel Stouty recalled that Sean was very ill before he died.
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She described his symptoms as flu-like and claimed that her mom took the entire situation pretty hard.
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I remember he was throwing up. Okay. And then all of a sudden. How did, obviously, mom had to take that, I mean, pretty hard, too.
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First dad and then short time later, you know, it's your brother. did she seem to
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how did she seem to handle that I can only imagine but she wishes there was more she could have done
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she told me like when we talk at night it's like she feels like a failure as a mom because it's like it's one thing
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to lose your dad or husband your dad or husband well that's a lot of sudden deaths in a short amount of time
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Sean Stoudy died in September of 2012 after experiencing severe flu-like symptoms.
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Rightfully so, the detectives found it highly suspicious that less than a year later,
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24-year-old Sarah Stouty was experiencing those same symptoms and was likely to die as well.
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So as far as Sarah goes, when did she come down sick? I mean, how long did she have, was she thrown up or sick?
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She was thrown up because, like, the toilet's, like, right across from my room. I hear it and it's like, are you okay in there?
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How many days is she throwing out? Not very many either. A couple of days? Would you describe it as flu-like, kind of like your brother?
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I don't know, because it was really odd. I mean, lack of appetite as well, because I was trying to get her to eat, but she didn't want to.
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The similarities between Sean's death and Sarah's illness were glaring. But there was one important difference.
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Sarah made it to the hospital before the worst happened. Unfortunately, even though Sarah was receiving much-needed medical attention,
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the doctors had their doubts, and they didn't think Sarah was going to pull through.
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From what we understood from the hospital so far, we really haven't been able to determine how your sister gets us sick from the hospital standpoint.
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Okay. The doctors hadn't been able to confirm anything. As of yet, they're still working on it.
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But they basically told us that what they were leaning towards and what they were thinking was the case is that your sister had been poisoned.
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We were told that she's probably gone to die. Within 15 months, two members of the Stouty family had unexpectedly died and a third member of the family was deathly ill.
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For the police, this didn't seem like a situation where a family was dealing with some of the worst coincidences imaginable.
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It was pretty obvious that something malicious was happening here. And as the investigation continued, the unbelievable and horrible truth finally came out.
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Someone was slowly, methodically and systematically killing off everyone in the Stouty family.
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In April of 2012, 61-year-old father of four and lead singer of the rock band Messing with Destiny, Mark Stoudy, was planning to perform a show with his band in Branson, Missouri.
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But Mark never made it to that show. Just a few days before he was set to take the stage, Mark's wife, Diane Stouty, found Mark dead in their bedroom.
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When Mark Stouty died, the initial cause of death was believed to be just natural causes.
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Mark had had some health issues. It was also said that Mark would drink on occasion and smoked.
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and so it was just a situation where they thought some of his lifestyle choices and
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things like that led to him dying of natural causes. Leading up to his death, Mark's bandmates noticed that Mark's health had been deteriorating.
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His skin was pale, he was weak on his feet, and he didn't seem to have the same pep that
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Mark was known to carry himself with. Another person that took note of Mark's declining health was his 26-year-old son, Sean Stoughty.
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On his Facebook page, Sean wrote the following. My father is slowly getting sicker.
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His voice is slurred. His walking is wobbly. His body is more tired than normal.
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He is sleeping in bed longer than us. he may collapse under his weight at any time.
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Just one day later after writing this post Sean announced on Facebook that his dad
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was dead. My father died. He lived a full life. The cause of his death is a stroke.
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His funeral is this week. Tragically, what Sean didn't know is that his father hadn't died of a stroke.
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Mark Stouty was murdered. And even more horrifying, the person that killed him was plotting to kill Sean as well.
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which they eventually did. Five months after Mark died, Sean Stouty suddenly became very ill.
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According to his sister Rachel, Sean was vomiting and had flu-like symptoms. A few days later, Sean was found dead on the floor of his home.
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Like his father, Sean was also cremated, but in his case, an autopsy had been performed.
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The initial cause of death for Sean Stouty was also ruled to be natural. He had epilepsy as a child, and they found lesions on his brain during the performance of the autopsy.
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And without anything else to go on, it was believed that he died of a seizure. Both Mark and Sean had presumably died of natural causes.
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So the police were never called in to take a closer look at the situation. But that all changed about a year later.
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In June of 2013, yet another member of the Stouty family became very sick and ended up in the hospital.
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This time it was 24-year-old, recent college graduate, Sarah Stouty. Sarah was seemingly dealing with the same flu-like symptoms that had affected both her father and her brother just before they died.
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after Sarah was examined by a doctor it was determined that her kidneys were shutting down
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her other organs were failing her brain was hemorrhaging blood yet none of the hospital's tests could determine
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what caused Sarah's illness in the first place interestingly it wasn't Sarah's illness
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and her admittance to the hospital that alerted police and prompted an investigation
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in the Stoudy family. Instead, it was an anonymous phone call that sprang homicide detectives into action.
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Upon viewing the initial report, it seemed pretty bizarre. The report talked about someone calling in
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saying that we needed to look at the Stoudy family because of a couple deaths. And now a young woman, Sarah,
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was hospitalized and appeared that she was not going to survive. After this anonymous call came in
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and a police report was made, the investigators decided to speak with Sarah's doctor.
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The doctor explained that even though the exact cause of Sarah's illness could not be determined,
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there was a good chance that Sarah had been poisoned. So at that time, I really didn't have anything at all to go on
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other than just the discussions with the doctor. But knowing that there's two other children still in the Saudi home, I felt like I needed to do something to try to figure out what was going on.
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If this was, in fact, a malicious act going on by somebody in the Saudi home, then I needed to act as quickly as I possibly could.
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And that is what led me to wanting to interview Diane. From talking with the hospital, it sounds like they're doing a bunch of tests,
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and they're even sending some tests off to labs elsewhere. They mentioned the Mayo Clinic.
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Oh, wow. Do you think there's going to be anything suspicious that they find in all these tests that they're going to be doing?
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I have no clue. Do you think there could be anything maybe malicious or suspicious involved with that?
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I can't think of that. If it would come back that there was something in there like that, how would you explain that?
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I don't know. 49-year-old Diane Stoudy was the widow of Mark Stoudy and the mother of Sean and Sarah Stoudy.
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Given her background in nursing and the fact that she didn't seem overly concerned or emotional that her daughter Sarah was about to die,
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The detective suspected that Diane may know more than she was telling. As crazy as it seemed, she may have even murdered her own husband and her own son.
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What was Mark's life insurance policy like? He only had $20,000. How about Sean?
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Sean only had $15,000. What about Sarah? Sarah only has 15. And you were able to get the money from Mark and Sean's, correct?
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Okay. What did you do with that money? With Mark's, we were able to move into a better neighborhood.
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Right. Just before Mark died, the Stoudy family consisted of six people. Mark and Diane were the parents of three kids in their early to mid-twenties
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That was Sean, Sarah, and Rachel The youngest member of the family was 11-year-old Brianna
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All six of them lived in a small two one house in Springfield Missouri But after Mark died Diane was able to use his life insurance policy to upgrade She and the rest of the family moved into a larger home in a nicer neighborhood
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What was your marriage like? How can I say this? We were still married, but it was not what you call a good marriage.
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Mm-hmm. Have there been any infidelities on either side? He had. Yeah. Mm-hmm. So I'm guessing then just briefly thought he wasn't the best husband?
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Probably not. Not to society, no. What do you mean by that, not to society? Well, he was running around and he would drink and smoke pot.
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So he wasn't a very good guy is what you're saying? Yeah. Was there any physical abuse towards you?
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No. Nothing like that? He just had some extramarital affairs and you said he did some drugs and smoked and drank a lot.
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Okay. For police, if Diane had murdered Mark, his life insurance policy was a possible motive.
00:31:07
But so was the fact that Diane seemed pretty resentful of her husband. Even so, this was all speculation.
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And at this point in the investigation, there wasn't any evidence that Diane had killed Mark and Sean or that she'd poisoned Sarah.
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Going into the interview with Diane, I had nothing other than just a more and more growing suspicion that she was somehow involved.
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It was difficult because when I when I brought Diane in without having any evidence to put out there against her, it was just I wanted to get at her level.
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I wanted to speak with her and come across as being there as almost a friend and understanding her to try to gain as much information as I possibly could.
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And going into the interview, I also understood that maybe this isn't malicious.
00:32:00
There isn't at this time. There's nothing to show that it is. And so I wanted to be very careful if this is just a mother that's gone through some terrible trauma.
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I did not want to add to that. So it was it was quite the fine line of trying to figure out the balance of how far do I push this.
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Ultimately, the detective pushed his interview with Diane to its limit. And without outright saying it, he suggested that Diane was responsible for Sarah's illness, among a lot of other things.
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With some of the stuff involved in these cases from what we've been looking at, I think you're aware of why we're just why we're here.
00:32:42
Maybe. I don't know. I think you know why we're here talking. Because I know that there's a reason, you know, maybe why some of this stuff did happen.
00:32:53
As far as did I do something to her, I didn't do anything to her. I mean, I guess I could have taken her to the ER sooner, but I didn't know.
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If she, I don't know. I know I didn't do anything. And if you do? I'm just telling you I didn't do anything.
00:33:21
And that's what I feel like you're insinuating I did. I may not be the best mother in the world.
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Because I do wait a little longer before I take him to the doctor. Naturally, Diane denied.
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the accusations and after she did the detective focused on the reasons that diane may have wanted
00:33:44
to kill off her husband and children in other words he focused on her motive i think mark
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he's having these infidelities he's not working you've got the whole burden of the family you've
00:34:00
You got to take care of everybody. You have all this stress and pressure on you to raise your kids, to put food on the table.
00:34:11
You're the working one. He's out. He's drinking. He's using drugs. He's doing things he shouldn't be doing.
00:34:18
I think the person just gets pushed to where, you know what? People just can't take it anymore.
00:34:24
I think it's just, you got pushed so far, you had all this weight on your shoulders, because you're not a bad person, are you?
00:34:37
I hope not. No, I don't think you are. The detective played this interrogation smart.
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He took a sympathetic and relatable approach, and his strategy ultimately worked.
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With regard to Sarah and her illness, Diane admitted that she knew a lot more than she'd been telling.
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Diane explained that she had been hounding Sarah for weeks about getting a job. And after one particular argument between them, Sarah did something that was very strange.
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We had been arguing. And she got really mad at me. And I think she went out in the garage.
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and there's antifreeze out there. Because she was commenting, like, well, that kills cats.
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I was like, yeah, it still kills people. And I was so mad at her. Yeah, I waited before I took her to the hospital.
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Diane claimed that in some bizarre act of rebellion, Sarah went into the family garage
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and started drinking antifreeze. yes antifreeze not only that but Diane also claimed that Mark
00:35:53
and Sean had done the same thing what a weird family put it really short and sweet I knew they were drinking antifreeze
00:36:05
And I was so mad at them. I didn't want to take them in. I'm a horrible mother. Diane, you knew that they were drinking antifreeze. You knew that. They didn't. We both know that.
00:36:25
You knew, Diane, that they were drinking antifreeze because you were giving it to them.
00:36:33
The detective quickly shut down Diane's explanation for what happened to Mark, Sean, and Sarah.
00:36:41
And at this point, he had pretty much figured out what had happened. I'm sure a lot of you probably have too.
00:36:48
Diane had poisoned her husband and two of her children with antifreeze to the point where two of them had died and another was about to die.
00:37:02
Eventually, after being unable to maintain her ridiculous explanation, Diane came clean.
00:37:11
She admitted to what she had done and explained how she did it. How much would you put in?
00:37:18
Just a little bit. And what were you putting it in? Coca-Cola. So you were putting it in Mark's Gatorade.
00:37:29
You were putting it in Sean's Coke. Just regular Coke? And what about Sarah? Coke.
00:37:35
Regular Coke? Okay. She loved Coke. Okay. And you were only doing it once a day?
00:37:42
Because you thought that's all you needed? Okay. When they weren't passing right away,
00:37:48
Did you eventually start to give them more and more? I may have. And I regret doing it.
00:37:55
I really do. I've screwed up everybody. I've screwed up my whole family. Why did you decide that you were going to use antifreeze to do it?
00:38:10
Why not some other means? Because I read online it was pretty easy to do. From what I understand, it almost tastes good. Is that correct?
00:38:22
That's what they say. Okay. The deadly ingredient in antifreeze is a chemical compound known as ethylene glycol.
00:38:32
Some of you true crime nerds may already know that. It is colorless, odorless, and has kind of a sweet taste.
00:38:39
Don't try it. Don't try it. I know you want to. I know some of you are a little dumber than others,
00:38:47
but don't do it, please. You're going to get me in trouble. It's also not typically detected when an autopsy is performed.
00:38:57
In order to find ethylene glycol, a medical examiner has to specifically look for it,
00:39:03
which is another reason it's commonly used as a poison. Ingesting this compound can quickly cause several fatal health problems,
00:39:13
including dysrhythmias and heart failure. In case this isn't obvious, ethylene glycol poisoning is a pretty awful way to die.
00:39:23
You wouldn't want to try it at all anyway. There's much easier ways. When your internal organs start shutting down, it's not a fun time.
00:39:33
It's not going to be good. It's actually quite, quite painful. According to Diane, for several weeks
00:39:41
She'd been slipping small doses of antifreeze into her husband's Gatorade After he died from the poisoning, she did the same thing to her son Sean
00:39:51
The only difference was that Sean preferred Coca-Cola over Gatorade After Sean was dead, Diane then began poisoning her oldest daughter, Sarah
00:40:04
by slipping antifreeze into her soda as well. What kind of a mother would harm her own kids for her own benefit?
00:40:14
Oh, I don't know. Lots of them. Just going to let that sit there for a minute. As far as motive was concerned,
00:40:24
Diane had a different reason for each of her three victims. In the case of her husband, Diane explained she simply hated his guts.
00:40:34
Why didn't you call an ambulance or bring him to the hospital at that point? Because by then I hated his guts.
00:40:40
Hated his guts. I understand. I mean, I hated his guts. And how much was his life insurance policy?
00:40:51
It was only $20,000. $20,000, and you were able to use that money to get into your new house?
00:40:57
Okay. I didn't need the money. As for her son, Diane explained that Sean had become too much of a pest, and she simply couldn't deal with him anymore.
00:41:11
Sean would be interfering with whatever I would do to the point where he was getting into my work.
00:41:21
You get to the point where you just pull out your hair, because I didn't know what else to do with him.
00:41:27
finally diane explained that she decided to also murder her oldest daughter because
00:41:34
sarah refused to get a job and diane didn't want to pay off sarah's college loans
00:41:40
i mean not wanting to pay her college loans makes you do all kinds of stupid things doesn't it
00:41:47
sarah's a difficult child to deal with i understand and I been kind of putting pressure on her to you know you need to get out and get a job Your college bills are coming due
00:42:05
I don't want to pay for them, you know. Pretty relatable, right? If your kid has college loans and you don't want to pay them, just slip a little antifreeze into their soda.
00:42:18
Problem solved. Diane's motives for the killings were just as strange and bizarre as just the epitome of this entire case.
00:42:30
When talking about Mark, she said it got to the point that she hated him. And where it really got strange and bizarre was with the children.
00:42:40
She said Sean was a huge burden, and I even asked if he was a pest, and she said, well, he was worse than that.
00:42:48
He was worse than a pest. and then when discussing Sarah, she had college loans that she needed to pay,
00:42:56
but she wouldn't get a job, and so that's what led to her poisoning Sarah. It was really stunning to hear her discuss what led her to killing off and poisoning the family members.
00:43:08
Diane admitted to what she had done and explained why she did it, but even so, there were still a few questions.
00:43:16
First being, if Diane wanted to kill Sarah, why did she eventually bring her to a hospital?
00:43:24
And second, why did Diane spare her other two daughters? What was the reason for bringing her when she was, because you even said she was so bad, you thought she was going to die and you had to carry her.
00:43:39
Did Rachel, was she the one that said, hey, let's take her to the hospital? Actually, both of us thought the same thing at the same time.
00:43:46
It's like, let's take her in. Had you been giving any to her? No. What about Brianna?
00:43:51
No. Why not those two? Because I love them. And I wish I hadn't done it ever. Because I'm stupid.
00:44:03
Diane claimed that it was Rachel who prompted Diane to take Sarah to the hospital.
00:44:08
Speaking of Rachel, after Diane confessed, the detectives were given the awful task of breaking all of this bad news to her.
00:44:19
I brought your mom in today and interviewed her at length for quite a long time.
00:44:26
And basically what has happened is your mom has admitted to killing your dad and your brother and trying to kill your sister.
00:44:34
She had been giving your father a small dose of antifreeze in his drinks. Same thing with your brother and same thing with your sister Sarah.
00:44:49
Take some time. It's a lot to process. I don't even know how you actually process that, to be honest with you, Rachel.
00:45:04
Did you think there was anything going on there with mom at all? I mean, did that thought ever even cross your mind?
00:45:12
She never gave any kind of indication that she was just at her wit's end with the three of them?
00:45:17
I think one time that you couldn't remember her? I know she was frustrated. Right.
00:45:21
Yeah. Rachel Stoudy was a 22-year-old unemployed college student. In a matter of months, she had lost her father, her brother, and her oldest sister.
00:45:33
and now her mom was being locked up for murder. Can you fucking imagine what that's like?
00:45:44
As a result, the responsibility of caring for 11-year-old Brianna Stouty fell on Rachel's 22-year-old shoulders.
00:45:55
Somebody from the Child Advocacy Center will talk to her briefly and then after they talk to her a moment,
00:46:00
if it's okay with you, we'll just release her to you. Okay. She needs to be with you.
00:46:05
She doesn't need to be anywhere else. She needs to be with you. After Rachel was made aware of this horrific situation,
00:46:13
the detective left the interview room and Rachel broke down, understandably. Dear God.
00:46:33
Oh my God. sadly the bad news that Rachel had just gotten was only going to get worse
00:47:03
because there was yet another horrible twist in this story not only had Rachel's mom
00:47:10
poisoned Rachel's dad brother and sister but it turned out that Diane hadn't done this
00:47:17
all on her own as the investigation continued The police learned that Diane Stoudy had an accomplice.
00:47:53
In June of 2019, 13, 49-year-old Diane Stouty was interviewed by a Springfield, Missouri homicide detective.
00:48:07
During that interview, Diane confessed to murdering her 61-year-old husband, Mark, and her 26-year-old son, Sean.
00:48:16
Diane also admitted that she had tried to murder her oldest daughter, 24-year-old Sarah Stouty, as well.
00:48:24
Diane explained that for several weeks, she'd been slipping small doses of antifreeze into her husband's drinks.
00:48:32
After he died from the poisoning, she did the same thing to her son. After her son died, she began doing the same thing to her daughter.
00:48:43
After Sarah became deathly ill and was taken to the hospital, an anonymous phone call was placed to police about what was going on in the Stoudy family.
00:48:54
This prompted detectives to open an investigation. At the start of that investigation, homicide
00:49:01
detectives didn't have much to go on. There wasn't any actual evidence of foul play, but
00:49:08
when Diane was interrogated, it didn't take long for her to crack. She admitted to what she had
00:49:15
done and explained how she did it. Even so, the investigation wasn't quite over. The lead
00:49:22
investigator suspected that Diane hadn't told police the whole truth and that she may not have
00:49:29
acted alone. He believed that Diane had an accomplice. After Diane had made her confession
00:49:38
to poisoning her family. There was this time where she would talk about her daughter, Rachel,
00:49:47
and it just seemed, you could just see her, it was almost as if she lit up when discussing Rachel.
00:49:52
So when she was discussing her other family members, you could see just the hatred or disdain and animosity that she had towards them.
00:50:03
But she talked so, it was a complete 180 when she talked about Rachel. And so much so that during my time speaking with her, I began to become suspicious as, gosh, was this, was Rachel involved with her?
00:50:20
In addition to Sarah, Diane had two other daughters, 22-year-old Rachel and 11-year-old Brianna, both of whom had not been poisoned.
00:50:31
Not yet, anyway. after Diane confessed and was arrested Rachel was made aware of the situation and sent home
00:50:40
but the following day Rachel was invited back to the police station for yet another interview
00:50:47
when Detective Shipley told you yesterday about what your mom did what do you think about that
00:50:53
confusion, shock I mean that's nobody expects to have something that they know would do that.
00:51:05
Were you ever suspicious of your mom? No. So you didn't think that she would be capable of doing something like this?
00:51:13
I mean, if anything, she'd been helping me with setting up, like, things for school.
00:51:20
It sounds like you and her, from talking to her, that you and her were pretty good buddies.
00:51:24
Is that right? You guys were real close. Almost best friend, kind of. Again, when Rachel's mom was interviewed, the cops didn't have much to go on.
00:51:35
They didn't have any evidence to confront her with, which in the end didn't matter because Diane confessed.
00:51:43
In Rachel's case, however, things were a little different. After my interrogation with Diane was over, one of our crime scene detectives got a hold of me and said that he had a piece of evidence down in our evidence room
00:51:57
that he thought I should look at. So I went down there, and he had a journal. And the journal appeared to be that of Rachel's.
00:52:05
And a couple of the entries were extremely odd and bizarre. And after reading them, it just kind of cemented my suspicion of Rachel.
00:52:15
The cops had found Rachel's personal journal. And in that journal, Rachel wrote the following.
00:52:23
It's sad when I realize how my father will pass on in the next two months Sean, my brother, will move on shortly after
00:52:31
It will be tough getting used to the changes, but everything will work out This journal entry pretty much confirmed the detective's suspicions
00:52:42
At the very least, it verified that Rachel knew what her mom was doing and Rachel may have even helped Diane commit the murders.
00:52:54
Do you recognize this? Yeah, I remember this. Okay. What is that? A little journal thing.
00:53:06
A journal thing? Whose journal? Mine. Your journal? You wrote this? Mm-hmm. And you remember writing it?
00:53:13
Yeah. Okay. Got some questions for you, Rachel. Okay. Some questions that you need to be honest with me about.
00:53:20
Now's the time to be completely truthful with everything. After Rachel was confronted with her journal, she came clean and admitted that with the help of her mom, Rachel poisoned her father, her brother, and her older sister with antifreeze.
00:53:40
Like mother, like daughter. When did you guys come up with this plan? I can think of exact dates but I mean we talked about it like Christmas before Rachel whose idea was this Mom brought it up I mean we discussed
00:54:07
What did she say to you? Basically, went through different options. We had a book on poisonous plants.
00:54:17
I mean, she would talk about cyanide. She mentioned once how hard it would be to find.
00:54:22
was trying to find things that wouldn't be traceable or at least would be hard to trace.
00:54:31
According to Rachel, she and Diane had thought long and hard about how they were going to go about murdering the rest of the family.
00:54:41
I can only imagine that conversation. After many discussions, they eventually settled on using antifreeze, which, again, is not easily detected when an autopsy is performed.
00:54:56
More than likely, Diane's background in nursing made her well aware of that fact.
00:55:02
How many times a day were you doing this, putting the antifreeze in your dad's drinks?
00:55:06
How many times on average per day were you doing it? Twice. it was a trade-off she would do it
00:55:15
then I would for how long several weeks several weeks how many bottles of antifreeze
00:55:25
did you guys go through upwards of five so for your dad yeah you went through about five bottles
00:55:34
and how big were the bottles can you kind of give me a visual about how big you think they were
00:55:41
So probably around a gallon or so. Something like that. Okay. Over the course of several weeks, Rachel and Diane slipped about five gallons of antifreeze
00:55:51
into Mark Stouty's drinks, which ultimately led to his death. While Diane's motives were rooted in hatred for her husband,
00:56:03
Rachel had a different reason for wanting to kill her father. my dad I couldn't really see him ever like doing anything to help us he had no concept of money
00:56:15
he was always just blowing money he would always be out of the house wouldn't really help around
00:56:27
the house was basically a drain on her, on us. Basically, Rachel saw her dad as a deadbeat.
00:56:38
She considered him to be a worthless burden on the family. As for her brother, Rachel claimed that she wasn't immediately on board with the idea
00:56:48
of killing Sean. But after her mom kept pressing the idea, Rachel eventually agreed to go along with the plan.
00:56:57
Sean, I accepted that she wanted him gone but I really didn't think he was necessary. Sean we argued on a lot because I still think we could have put
00:57:15
him in a dump like assisted living but she wanted him out. She would just go on on and on about him just being a burden basically.
00:57:29
After Mark and Sean were dead, Rachel and her mom then decided they were going to also go after Rachel's older sister, Sarah.
00:57:40
So how are you guys getting her the drinks without her knowing about it? She's on the computer a lot, on YouTube a lot, on sites like that a lot.
00:57:51
and she's easily distracted. It wouldn't take much to, like, get whatever drink she did have
00:58:01
and just slip it real quick. According to Rachel, the plot to kill Sarah was her mother's idea,
00:58:09
but again, Rachel had her own reasons for wanting her sister dead. Did you and your mother discuss killing Sarah?
00:58:19
I'm almost thinking about it what'd she say about it? other than the fact that she basically lived in the back bedroom
00:58:30
and didn't like have any junction to get a job more or less that she wasn't going anywhere with her life
00:58:39
and that she really had no purpose she was very adamant on that Sarah was just a burden
00:58:46
that Sarah needed be taken care of. By taken care of, I mean... She means... Killed.
00:58:56
Yeah. Mom probably has her own issues with her. What about you? Did you guys find a woman?
00:59:05
Yeah. Why did you want Sarah dead? I mean, she grew up later when she got on the medicine,
00:59:13
but she still argues. She still... has really inappropriate jokes. Inappropriate jokes.
00:59:25
That was Rachel's rationalization for killing her sister. Did you hear that? What is going on?
00:59:36
What is wrong with the world right now? Does anybody know? I'd like to find out.
00:59:43
What is wrong with people in their 20s specifically which makes someone like this think that murder is appropriate if their sensibilities are offended Holy fuck Also the depravity didn end there If you remember from Diane earlier police interview
01:00:07
it was Rachel who prompted Diane to take Sarah to the hospital. This decision didn't come about because of some sort of sympathy for Sarah,
01:00:18
or because Rachel was having second thoughts. the decision was rooted entirely in selfishness i'd like to know why you guys eventually took you
01:00:30
know when sarah got so bad i know you guys said you thought that she was pretty much dead but why
01:00:35
did you take her to the hospital i didn't want another one to die in the house and why is that
01:00:41
because houses are nasty after somebody's died in it okay and what does that mean what do you mean
01:00:48
And what do you mean by that? I get a lot of nightmares. Like after Sean died, I moved into his room and it was awful, awful, awful in there.
01:00:59
Were you surprised when you found out that Sarah was going to live? Very. Very surprised?
01:01:06
Were there any more discussions of finishing wrong? Didn't really get to. You never got to those discussions?
01:01:16
According to Rachel, if her sister survived the hospital stay, Diane and Rachel would still have carried out the murder.
01:01:26
Though they never got around to discussing how they would actually do it. At the same time, they were also planning to commit yet another murder.
01:01:36
It really is scary to think of what would have happened if our attention was not brought to what was going on in the Saudi family.
01:01:45
And it came straight from Rachel's mouth to me that their plan was to kill the youngest child of the family,
01:01:52
who at the time was only 11 years old. So it's one of those situations of thank God we were able to stop this when we did.
01:02:03
Otherwise, the small child would have possibly succumbed to the same outcome as what the others did.
01:02:12
Again, it wasn't Sarah going to the hospital that caught the attention of the police.
01:02:19
It was an anonymous phone call that alerted the authorities. Eventually, the detectives figured out where that call came from.
01:02:29
The caller was Diane and Rachel's church pastor. Who did you tell what happened?
01:02:37
I mean, I hinted a little with Sippy, but I didn't get very... What did you tell Pastor Sidney?
01:02:46
I mainly wanted help because I didn't want to get so far. Rachel partially confided in her church pastor,
01:02:58
and after he learned that Sarah was in the hospital, he called police. Had this call not been made,
01:03:07
11 year old Brianna would likely have suffered the same fate as Mark, Sean and Sarah
01:03:16
did you think that eventually after everybody dying off in similar ways that we might show up to talk
01:03:22
to you guys didn't really think I would get caught stupid now that I think on it
01:03:32
but did you want it to just be you and your mother yeah and why is that because she understands me she doesn't annoy me
01:03:47
given what had happened in the stouty home a logical question is why rachel why did diane
01:03:57
choose rachel to be the accomplice and not any one of her other children and also why would rachel
01:04:05
agree to follow her mother and go along with such an evil plan. Why indeed would a child want to please her parents and do what they say?
01:04:19
I believe the reason Diane chose Rachel or those two acted together is just because of
01:04:26
this very strange mother-daughter relationship they had. And both of them discussed that.
01:04:32
I mean, it was obvious that Rachel was the favorite of Diane, that she was kind of the chosen child.
01:04:38
Rachel was very artistic and was talented musically, which was one of Diane's passions.
01:04:44
And they spent a lot of time together in church. And, you know, Rachel talked about the same things.
01:04:50
Rachel talked about her and her mother were the only ones that really understood each other that nobody else did.
01:04:56
But it was almost like a best friend relationship as opposed to a mother daughter.
01:05:02
Miraculously, after Diane and Rachel confessed and were both arrested, Sarah Stouty pulled through and was eventually released from the hospital.
01:05:15
Unfortunately, some of the physical effects of the antifreeze poisoning were irreversible.
01:05:22
Sarah survived the antifreeze poisoning her sister Rachel and her mother Diane Stouty put in her drink.
01:05:28
but she now has brain damage and requires round-the-clock care. Her brother and father died from the poisoning.
01:05:36
Sarah was kind of a medical miracle because, by all accounts, it was believed that she was going to pass,
01:05:43
but she ended up surviving. She did sustain some pretty heavy brain damage from the incident,
01:05:50
so Sarah now lives in an assisted living home full-time. Following Sarah release from the hospital Both Diane and Rachel were charged With several crimes including two counts of first murder for the deaths of Mark and Sean Stouty and attempted murder for the near death of Sarah Stouty
01:06:10
When Rachel went to court, and obviously this was a death penalty case, but Rachel ended up taking a plea deal that she would testify against her mother during the death penalty hearing for Diane.
01:06:25
And Rachel pled to murder, and she was offered part of her plea deal that she could be eligible for parole after I believe it was 40 or 42 years.
01:06:39
Prior to Diane's case actually going to trial, Diane agreed to take a plea deal to take the death penalty off the table.
01:06:49
So both Diane and Rachel are currently incarcerated in the Missouri Department of Corrections.
01:06:56
Rachel will be eligible for parole when she's in her 60s. Diane will serve her entire life in prison.
01:07:04
During the sentencing phase, Rachel read a brief statement in court and apologized to her sister, Sarah.
01:07:12
I'm sorry that I couldn't find the courage to stab what was right, to go for help, to protect you, our siblings.
01:07:19
I was scared. The thing's scared is no excuse. In response to Rachel's statement, Sarah addressed the apology in a few media interviews.
01:07:31
Sarah claimed that she has forgiven both her mom and her sister for what they have done.
01:07:37
I forgive her for what she did to me. Was your forgiveness something that was really hard to come to over time?
01:07:45
How does that process work? Well, I am a Christian, and I believe forgiveness is the only way to go.
01:07:57
Was that something you were able to do right away? Yes. While you might be inclined to commend Sarah for taking the high road here,
01:08:06
she might not be as deserving of that commendation as you think. believe it or not there was yet another bizarre twist in this really really crazy tale
01:08:19
during one of her police interviews rachel stouty told investigators that sarah knew about the plan to murder both mark and sean it's very possible she could have overheard
01:08:35
Did Sarah know yes or no? Yes. She obviously just didn't realize that she was going to get it also.
01:08:46
Sarah more or less overheard. She really didn't plan. She was just more there. But Sarah knew.
01:08:55
But Sarah knew. Okay. So did Sarah ever become suspicious when she started to get sick?
01:09:05
She did mention, oh, am I going to die? She never mentioned anything about, are you guys poisoning me too?
01:09:12
No. But she asked if she was going to die? Who did she ask that? Mom. What did your mom say?
01:09:21
I don't know. Granted, it's entirely possible that Rachel was lying. But when she was first asked about Sarah's knowledge of the crimes,
01:09:34
Rachel said that Sarah knew nothing. It was only after the detectives pressed her that Rachel changed her story.
01:09:41
If Rachel was lying and just wanted to throw Sarah under the bus, why would she initially deny that Sarah knew?
01:09:50
If you're wondering, the police did investigate the possibility that Sarah knew about the murder plot,
01:09:56
but ultimately, conspiracy charges were never filed against her. so who knows during rachel's interview she talked about sarah having knowledge of the poisonings of
01:10:11
both mark and sean i did look into that and there there were some things that uh that might have
01:10:21
indicated that sarah was in fact knowledgeable and i have spoken with her about that and she
01:10:27
has said things to me that were alarming and disturbing, but based on Sarah's mental capacity
01:10:35
and the effects from the antifreeze from her being poisoned, there was never a case that was brought against Sarah.
01:10:43
If Sarah knew that Diane and Rachel had killed Mark and Sean Stouty, it means that justice was not fully carried out for either victim.
01:10:53
It's been over a decade since both men were murdered. so the likelihood of prosecutors bringing up charges against Sarah is pretty much non-existent.
01:11:05
She's free to go. But at least we can say that the mastermind behind it all got her comeuppance.
01:11:15
In terms of Diane, I have never seen one bit of remorse from Diane about any of it.
01:11:22
And I think the only remorse that she might have is that Rachel got caught with her and that now that Rachel is going to spend decades and decades in prison.
01:11:32
I believe this whole case really just centered around Diane's narcissism, her selfishness and how she wanted it her way.
01:11:41
And it was only going to be her way. it was a situation it seemed that these people that she did not like she was eliminating she
01:11:50
was getting rid of just so she could have it to what she wanted which was her and Rachel
01:11:55
it was a situation where I believe that Diane was just a pure narcissist, and it's cliche, but in my career, I don't know that I can say that I've sat across from somebody that was truly more evil than Diane.
01:12:12
What's especially mind-boggling about Diane Stoudy is that there was almost nothing forcing her to remain in or maintain the life and family that she no longer wanted.
01:12:27
She could have walked away at any point. She was the breadwinner of the family. She was the only one with a real job.
01:12:36
She had all the money, all the power. And all but one of her kids was well into their 20s.
01:12:44
If she wanted to, she could have just left. If she wanted to, she could have just taken Rachel and her youngest daughter with her.
01:12:52
Left everyone else to fend for themselves. There was no reason at all for any of this.
01:13:02
Sure, that would have been kind of a shitty thing to do and people would have looked at her a little differently,
01:13:08
but they're doing that now. And they doing that a lot more harshly And at the same time I imagine that Mark Sean and Sarah all of them would have preferred that Diane had just left
01:13:23
instead of, you know, poisoning them. But as the detective explained, none of that mattered to Diane.
01:13:33
The pain she caused didn't matter and neither did the other options that were available to her.
01:13:40
Those options just weren't good enough for Diane. Diane was going to have things her way.
01:13:52
Because Diane is a narcissist. Diane is selfish. Diane is evil. Diane is a monster.
01:14:10
Whoa. Felt like I was talking about someone else for a second there All right guys Thank you for joining us We see you next time Stay safe
01:15:01
Hey, Sergeant Hale. I just wanted to thank you for doing all of the child murder podcasts.
01:15:09
I know it must be really hard. I work in child care, and it's so important for people to understand
01:15:16
if you see something, you say something. And every time, like, I've cried from all of the stories with the kids.
01:15:23
But it's so important because people hear it, and you don't want to keep hearing it.
01:15:28
well, then someone needs to do something instead of someone thinking that somebody else is going to do it.
01:15:32
So I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for doing the child story so that there is awareness.
01:15:38
Thank you so much. Have a good day. Bye. Hey Mike I sorry for my voice right now because I completely devastated over episode 246 Um I not asking anything of you Mike I don want you to change Mike
01:15:59
But podcasts will never die. They'll never say that to me again. And also, fuck Austin Robinson,
01:16:11
that little pussy. That little girl did not ever ask for anything but love. The way you made that episode look so beautiful and scary.
01:16:26
And I loved how long it was and I loved all the information and I loved that audio.
01:16:32
Freaking shit every time. And now I'm going to go cry myself to sleep. I really like it.
01:16:49
Outro Music

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 95
    Most shocking
  • 95
    Biggest twist
  • 90
    Most dramatic
  • 90
    Most intense

Episode Highlights

  • A Mother's Nightmare
    Diane Stoudy discovers her daughter Sarah unresponsive, leading to a hospital visit.
    “Her 26-year-old daughter, Sarah, was sick, in bed, and completely unresponsive.”
    @ 05m 31s
    October 23, 2023
  • The Stouty Family's Tragedy
    The Stouty family faces a series of unexpected deaths and illnesses, raising suspicions.
    “Less than a year later, 24-year-old Sarah Stouty was experiencing those same symptoms.”
    @ 19m 30s
    October 23, 2023
  • The Investigation Begins
    An anonymous tip leads police to investigate the Stouty family's tragic circumstances.
    “It was an anonymous phone call that sprang homicide detectives into action.”
    @ 26m 29s
    October 23, 2023
  • Diane Stoudy's Confession
    Diane confessed to poisoning her husband and two children with antifreeze, revealing her motives.
    “I may have... and I regret doing it. I really do.”
    @ 37m 54s
    October 23, 2023
  • The Horrific Twist
    Rachel learns her mother poisoned her family, leading to a devastating revelation.
    “Can you fucking imagine what that's like?”
    @ 45m 33s
    October 23, 2023
  • Rachel's Involvement
    Rachel admitted to helping her mother poison the family, revealing a chilling plan.
    “Like mother, like daughter.”
    @ 53m 40s
    October 23, 2023
  • Rachel's Confession
    Rachel Stouty apologizes to her sister Sarah in court, expressing her fear and regret.
    “I'm sorry that I couldn't find the courage to stab what was right.”
    @ 01h 07m 12s
    October 23, 2023
  • Diane's True Nature
    The narrative reveals Diane as a narcissist and selfish individual, causing pain to her family.
    “Diane is evil.”
    @ 01h 14m 00s
    October 23, 2023

Episode Quotes

  • Family is not an important thing. It's everything.
    Episode 251
  • Someone was slowly, methodically and systematically killing off everyone in the Stouty family.
    Episode 251
  • I may not be the best mother in the world.
    Episode 251
  • What kind of a mother would harm her own kids for her own benefit?
    Episode 251
  • I was scared.
    Episode 251
  • Diane is a monster.
    Episode 251

Key Moments

  • Unexplainable Illness05:31
  • Tragic Deaths12:06
  • Murder Revealed24:14
  • Diane's Confession48:07
  • Rachel's Journal52:02
  • Mother-Daughter Plan54:41
  • Sarah's Survival1:05:22
  • Rachel's Apology1:07:12

Tension Over Time

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown