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foreign [Music] foreign foreign garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks for listening I'm your host
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Nick and with me this week is Abe Froman The Sausage King of Chicago no it's not
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it's the captain well they called me the Sausage King in high school so it's good
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to be seen and it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a friend
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[Music] foreign this week we are drinking all struck dry Apple Oak cider from all struck ciders
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experience the beauty and complexity of fermentation with this sessionable cider
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it's smooth baby garage grade three and three quarter bottle caps out of five and today we opened the fridge and we
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didn't have to break down and cry because of these good buddies right here first up a big big thanks to you chin
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from CC Central New York and the big cheers to Josephine and Brisbane Australia next up a cheers and many many
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Thanks goes out to Diane R in San Francisco and a big nice jib to Lisa Lou in Camarillo California and Captain here's
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check out our weekly show off the Record and that is enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a
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chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime thank you [Music] on the morning of June 30th 2011 police
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located the body of Lauren Giddings they located horror her torso and we talked about the events that took
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place that morning we talked about the initial stages of the investigation it was once
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a missing person's case and then unfortunately they found her torso yeah I believe they were able to do a DNA
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tests with her mom to determine that the body was actually Lauren's at 2 15 PM a
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Handler and two cadaver dogs arrived on the scene and started their search of the area now forgive me Captain for
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being graphic but all they have found so far is a torso and they are looking for the remaining
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parts and also looking to see where some of the remains may have been concealed moved
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and so on right and like I said uh we know that half of the trash was actually picked up so they started thinking that
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maybe if her if her torso was found in one trash bin that maybe other parts would be found on
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in different bins two dogs the two dogs this is Cinco and chance they hit on eight locations and there
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these locations are as follows they hit twice at Lauren's apartment this was just outside of the front door and in
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her bathroom they hit twice and the vacant apartment which was located immediately below
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Lauren's apartment alerting in the living room and in the bathroom the dogs alerted at Stephen McDaniel's
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front door and in his bedroom they alerted at the apartment complex's laundry room in two places once at the
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front door and then again inside this laundry room as well so they walked these dogs all over the property for the
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apartment complex they only hit in eight locations and of importance obviously they hit in her
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apartment but they hit in Steven's apartment they hit in the apartment below her which was vacant nobody was
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living in there and then they hit in the apartment complex laundry room now police because of this
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they want to seriously interview Stephen McDaniel he is now coming to into the spotlight let's say and emerging as a
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interesting suspect at this time if anybody wants to you can go to YouTube and there is a what is it
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Captain about a two hour long video yeah where it's very grainy and the audio quality is very poor yeah we thought
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about playing some of it here but the audio is not great uh you know it's it's an interesting
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video to watch because it is Stephen McDaniel being interviewed or interrogated question whatever you want
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to call it by detectives at the detective Bureau one of the first things that said by the detective is Stephen
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put your hands on the table so let's just call it an interrogation well and you know what and I I love
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um I love the South I love how people talk in the South and he says uh I don't know the detective's name so forgive me
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he says now put your hands on the table for me son and he calls him son a few times and he says uh now look at me when
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I'm talking to you boy yeah yeah I like to use the the boy term and where I might sound aggressive there he doesn't
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come off to me as being aggressive he comes off as being authoritative but he also
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kind of like he's trying to be Steven's friend at times he even says to him at one point we are friends you and Lauren
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are friends we need to know what happened to your friend I'm asking you for help can you help me right and this
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whole time you heard Stephen talk in those interviews he's not talking like that when he's at the detective Bureau
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when he's being questioned he no ask me a question I'll answer it like him okay uh when was the last time you saw Lauren
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I don't know have you ever seen Lauren wearing this dress I'm showing you a picture of her
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in a dress no does Lauren have a boyfriend yes did you think you were Lauren's boyfriend
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no what are you doing with guns in your apartment Stephen I don't know why do you have them
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I don't know yeah his answer was to have them because they kept yeah they kept asking him they're like have you ever
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fired a gun and he's like no I've never never fired a gun they're like well then
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why why do you have three firearms yeah and he doesn't say like protection or anything like that that like he's kind
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of talking about in his on camera interview with the local news he just simply says to have them yeah if you
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have a sword and you said to me did you have you ever used a sword no I haven't why do you have it to have it that makes
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sense yes why do you have a gun uh to have it have you ever shot a gun no but I decided to buy three of them he did
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say at one time he was a collector of Swords yeah um so that so for the samurai sword
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which it's it's a it's like a cheap knockoff it's not one of these five six hundred seven hundred dollar jobs but
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right right but that's why I don't find it that odd no because people collect people collect swords yeah and people
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call select guns as well but that's not the answer he provides regarding the gun
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right but most people that collect guns actually shoot those guns yes they do use those guys they usually shoot them
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um the important thing here in it throughout the course of these he's doing multiple interviews multiple
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questioning periods with the police and detectives throughout the day and well into the night the the what we
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were just referencing I believe takes place at about 11 pm or just before midnight yeah and as said the video that
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you can find online is two hours long I don't know if that's the entirety of the
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actual questioning I I think there's probably more out there but right and I just want to point out again here's
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here's a individual Stephen where he's Cooperative with the police initially then hesitant to let them in his
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apartment and then obviously I'm guessing that they obviously once they found the body that they got
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um the rights to search apartments and that's that's when they brought in the cadaver dogs but now you're down at the
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station and you're a law student and they're asking you these questions where you should assume you're a suspect
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and he's not asking for a lawyer yeah yeah to be clear regarding the the cadaver dogs I don't think that that's
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technically the Handler's term for these dogs but that's what the state documents
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would refer to these dogs as is cadaver dogs okay and in the in in the documents
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they say for a lack of a better term that's what they're going to call them to just keep it simple and that's what I
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refer to them as here with the cadaver dogs and regarding these earlier searches these are all
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permission was granted by the residents in each situation so they weren't they they haven't you know got the the the
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legal channels involved yet for uh search warrants into just really scour the area well these are like but like
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you said it goes along with now he's at the detective Bureau Stephen McDaniel 26
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years old and he's not asking for an attorney he was very helpful and very vocal to the local news when he did the
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interview but now when he's at the detective Bureau he there's a transformation there and it's it's
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physical and it's audible it's you can he looks like a damn Zombie by the time that he's being questioned at the
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detective Bureau and he sounds like or is trying to sound like a scared little boy yeah I mean I think this is him
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acting again or or pretending again yeah at some point during this interview the detective notices a red mark on
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Stephen's face this is near his nose and he asked Stephen if he has any other marks on him and Stephen shows him that
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he has two scratches on his abdomen that is troublesome for Stephen and it's interesting to detectives because now we
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have this guy who looks like he might have been in some kind of physical altercation yeah and this is a guy
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that's pretty much for the most part holed up in his apartment staying in there according to him he's studying and
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he hasn't seen Lauren and I believe he says in this interview one to two weeks okay
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this is where things get very weird [Music] um go down the weird road with me the weird
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path always so holding hands police found in his apartment in Steven's apartment they've
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he found they found four condoms now that doesn't seem like that big of a deal however he has told the detectives
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through the course of his interviews that he is a virgin and that he is happy to be a virgin he's saving himself for
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marriage again you could explain that away you're on campus they're passing them out for
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safe sex and you grab a couple and no big deal but he doesn't do that he went so they push him they push him and
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push him and push him and they want to know if you are saving yourself if you have no intention to have sexual
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intercourse why do you need condoms why do you have them in your possession eventually he explains that the condoms
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he stole from people so two of the condoms he stole from his sister and I don't know when that went down but
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the other two we have a better idea because he tells the police that he stole condoms from two of the
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apartments in his apartment complex so Stephen admits to the officer that he entered two different apartments one
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apartment he entered in December on December 26th of 2008 and the other one on January 31st 2009
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and each time he stole a condom from each of the uh Apartments now as he's saying he's he broke into them or he
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just entered them I'm a little unclear on that um the the wording in the report says
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that he entered now they're going to consider this as a as a breaking and entering I must
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they find a master key in his apartment eventually they've not they've not located that yet right but this master
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key will allow him into a lot of different places throughout that apartment complex creep
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and so when they say entered I'm guessing that he has either told them that he has this key or they've figured
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out that he didn't break into the place he just unlocked the door and went in right and
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the thing here is Captain by this point even before they get this weird information about the condoms
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they believe Stephen knows more than what he's telling them they believe he may have killed Lauren Giddings yeah
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he's their number one suspect once he explains to them that he took condoms from other apartments they go okay cool
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thank you for telling us that we are going to arrest you for burglary we're going to arrest you for burglary
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and now we have a reason a legal reason that we can hold you we need to try to build this murder case
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against you because all we have right now is circumstantial evidence and our suspicions
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now when he is arrested when Stephen is arrested for the burglary and hold on and go ahead and your creepy stare and
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your creepy demand meaner and and all the weirdness about you or you know this adds to it right
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Stephen McDaniel's maternal grandfather this is Hollis Browning who he was very close with Stephen
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he hired an attorney for his grandson to represent him regarding these burglary charges
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Browning was in his 80s at the time he was very close to Stephen as I said this attorney that he hired is Floyd Buford
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who practices both criminal and civil law from my understanding Beaufort is a well-known well-respected attorney in
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these parts yeah so this is not a public defender or this is not someone who does
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not know what they are doing this is considered a high level high-priced good attorney
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Hollis Browning had a lot of hopes for his grandson a lot of high hopes for the boy that he doted on well heck he was in
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law school yes he was hoping that the young man would land a legal job yeah get married someday
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he in fact was planning to pay he'd be able to use those condoms you're right he was in fact planning to pay his
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grandson's first month's rent once Stephen passed the bar exam and found a new place to live right now you had
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mentioned search warrants um it was after all of this this questioning that goes down that they did
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in fact get the proper warrants so it was on July 1st it's they're questioning him late into the night
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after midnight from June 30th now we're into July 1st at 1 50 at 150 a.m in the morning police obtained signed warrants
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from Judge Enos for yeah not to be mistaken with judge penis well it might be Ennis I I'm having
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trouble reading my own writing um the warrants that they got that they received from the judge were
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for Stephen's apartment for his car for his body for his DNA for his hair for his fingerprints for his finger nails
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and for full body photographs so what do they find during these searches okay so let's get the photographs out of
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the way that is simply to document these potential injuries the scratch marks that they had already observed right
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okay regarding what they find in his apartment we already talked about the one master key
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they find two keys that are of concern one is a master key to the apartment complex the second one is a key to
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Lauren getting's apartment wow great they find a shirt that remember we said the Torso was
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found with pink jogging shorts on I want to be very clear the Torso is wearing these shorts the
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that's the only thing only clothing on the Torso there's nothing under the shorts
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the shirt that they found they can't 100 percent State this in in 100 you know it's not a
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confirmed fact but it matches the jogging shorts right so it's believed that it's it's the pair
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it's it's one of the pair to this jogging short very suspicious thing to find in his apartment yeah
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in Lauren's apartment they determine that on some of the walls there somebody had applied fresh paint
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to some of the walls and it's believed that whoever did this was painting over blood
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or other types of evidence yeah the police discovered a large bloody sheet in a washing machine at the
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apartment complex's laundry room they found a hacksaw with human flesh on it it was found in a
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locked storage closet in the laundry room now this apartment complex like many of them have a laundry room a
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laundry facility to be clear everybody that lives there has access to this room right
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what everyone does not have access to is this locked storage closet the master key found in Stephen's
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apartment will open that closet but the master key that he has would be the same as you would expect to find on
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the landlord's keychain or the maintenance man's keychain so a few people do have access to this
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storage closet it's a limited view and we can prove that Stephen Giddings or Stephen
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uh McDaniel I apologize has access to that closet because of the key they also found a large cooler near the front door
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of Steven's apartment they don't go into detail with this cooler I'm guessing they may suspect that
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remains may have been in this cooler at one point they found a foam cup with the name
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Lauren written on it inside his apartment now Stephen owned a geoprism that's like
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a small vehicle small car the police found what they believed to be blood stains on the front and rear
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seats of this car now on the Torso itself when the Torso was located inside the trash bag inside that trash can on the
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apartment complex's property they found some hairs on the Torso some of them would have
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been consistent with Laura Lauren getting's hair she had long blonde hair some of these hairs were consistent with
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Stephen McDaniel's hair he has as we described like brown kind of a white boy afro thing going on he's got longer hair
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um they also found hairs similar to this inside his apartment as well we've never
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received confirmation that I could find that those were in fact his hairs right but they do get confirmation that they
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find uh hairs Lauren's hairs on the hacksaw well they determined through DNA testing that that her DNA was on that
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hacksaw right and where do they find her hairs it's her hair was found believed to be
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in the trash bag with the Torso okay um again there's never been confirmation on where those hairs who they came from
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but that's what it states in their reports that they believe them to some of them to be Lawrence and some of them
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to be Stevens we just pointed out her DNA is found on that hacksaw that was found locked in a storage closet in the
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laundry room that Stephen had access to he has access to and then even more damning they find the packaging
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for this Saul in his apartment so it appears that he purchased this saw took it out of the
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package used it for something and we know that her DNA ends up on it he locks it up in this storage closet
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and yet he forgot to throw away the packaging for the saw which is later found in his apartment
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so regarding all this information and and everything that they're working on and working towards in the case that
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they're building against Stephen McDaniel he's arrested as we said for those burglary charges but it wouldn't be
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until 33 days later the prosecutors tacked on a murder charge he was accused of um murdering Lauren Giddings
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now because of this murder charge there they they're still building this case against him because they don't have a
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slam dunk case against Stephen McDaniel well it's never a slam dunk right but what further investigation would
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determine they are pouring through his computer now mind you this man spent a lot of time on his computer and he had a
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lot of flash drives he had a lot of uh flicky flicky drives he had a lot of tech uh let's say
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he's accused of of having a computer flash drive with child pornography on it because they say that they found 54
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images of child pornography to the scumbag and then on top of that Captain they said that they found
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a pair of Lauren Giddings panties in a drawer in his bedroom now the very strange thing here
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I I mean we're already in a weird space yeah he and I take great pause before I say apparently somebody took these
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panties and and made them into a mask okay that's that's how I I've not seen pictures
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but that's how the detective describes it when he's asking Stephen about these panties I mean I wear my underwear on my
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head every now and then when I get really drunk but that's just to be funny so but I don't make masks out of
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underwear yeah and they determined that these came from Lauren they were Lauren's and as said
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the only clothing found on the Torso was just a pair of of shorts right so they're they're
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thinking is that after whatever happened that he kept these as a souvenir and then he turned
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these into a mask yeah yeah and then I I've also thought maybe if he did have access to her apartment maybe these yeah
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maybe he stole them prior to June of 2011. well like we said there was that email where she was saying that
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she thought maybe somebody broke into her apartment but would later find out that you know she she mentioned to
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people multiple times that you know she would come home and she felt like maybe somebody had been there or or something
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had been moved yeah or that something was missing but she just thought well maybe I misplaced it but it was
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happening enough where she thought somebody was entering her apartment and messing with things that's very Golden
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State killer-ish you know the Golden State killer is reported to have entered people's homes
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when they weren't there and moved things to later help him perpetrate the crimes
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later that night or the next day yeah which is different than some this to me you know we know Steven has access to
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her apartment so how many times was he going in there and taking things uh it seems like his how often was he going
00:27:06
into everybody else's apartment at least two times that he's admitted to police yeah and a lot of this stuff to
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me Captain is because a lot of people have said look this dude was he had finished law school you can hear him
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talk he's an intelligent individual but people question why would he have all these weird things in all this evidence
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that they would later collect if he in fact did kill her these are people that say well maybe he didn't do it and maybe
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some of this evidence was planted evidence to plan well and on top of that I really think that if I think it was
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just stuff he had not got around to yet I think there were things that he would have discarded keep in mind he would
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have been moving out at some point right I think it was just things he had not got around to yet and when pushed when
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he was pushed by police by detectives who he he may have thought at one point that he was smarter than them we know
00:28:04
that he interned at the prosecutor's office at one point so maybe he felt that he could outsmart police if he had
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to but to me it's when he's pushed when he's pushed back in a corner it's almost
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like well I better give them access to something if if I don't I'll look guilty [Music]
00:28:48
all right cheers mates cheers to you Captain so Stephen McDaniel is going to claim he is innocent of this he's now
00:28:58
being charged with murder right can you imagine we have his his grandfather who probably had the best of
00:29:05
intentions by hiring an attorney for his grandson he hired this attorney for his
00:29:11
grandson when his grandson was charged with burglary after hiring the attorney you find out that okay he's now going to
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be charged with possession of child pornography and for murder so this attorney is going to continue to
00:29:27
represent Stephen and as said Stephen is going to claim that he is innocent of these charges
00:29:36
it takes quite some time for this thing to get to trial because as said the police are going to continue to build a
00:29:45
case against him the prosecutor is going to continue to build a case against him
00:29:50
one thing that happens is we have a former roommate of Stevens who comes forward to law enforcement and
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he's got a story to tell law enforcement yeah once upon a time there was a creepy
00:30:04
man that liked to play flicky flicky well I'll read from the court documents what you don't have to I just wait he'll
00:30:12
do the story statement was so it says this individual shared a dorm room with McDaniel during the fall of 2007 while
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the two were students at Mercer pursuing their undergraduate degrees the roommate
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related the following information regarding conversations he had with McDaniel during that time
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he is a self-proclaimed psychopath he proclaimed often that he has no conscience and was incapable of feeling
00:30:38
emotion he talked almost nightly about how he would go about the perfect murder he would wear shoes that were too small
00:30:46
he would do something to make him appear bald so that people wouldn't Point him out because of his big hair
00:30:54
he detailed different scenarios all of the time in fact I was scared sometimes that said Stephen
00:31:01
liked and trusted me and I knew that that's why I felt safe enough to stay where I was
00:31:09
I couldn't pick my own lock in my room I tried several times just to see if I could do it Stephen could do it in under
00:31:16
10 seconds he demonstrated it to me once just to show how easily he could get to
00:31:21
me if he wanted and then he grinned when I responded that I was twice his size he told me he would use chloroform
00:31:29
so that it would not matter how big I was what Stephen relishes is power he'll tell you
00:31:37
you don't have to ask him everything he does is the result of a power play he is
00:31:43
in odd duckling who looks weak but has one of the sharpest Minds I've ever seen Stephen said if he killed someone he'd
00:31:51
do it in a way to establish dominance over them he always said he wanted to feel the power of having someone's life
00:31:59
In His Hands he said he wanted them to beg and then to take it I'm not sure what he did here but he once said if he
00:32:08
did kill someone he'd dismember them soak them somehow then scatter the parts through the woods so that no one would
00:32:16
ever find them he was convinced he was smarter than everyone else and often bragged that if he did murder someone
00:32:22
that he'd never get caught yeah and now we're seeing this play out in real life the doc yeah the document goes on to say
00:32:31
when I heard the news about the murder in Macon and heard that Stephen was somehow involved I watched the
00:32:37
interviews he gave to the news media at the scene while watching one particular interview it struck me that Steven's
00:32:44
tone of voice demeanor and hand movements were not Steven's normal mannerisms but instead nearly mirrored
00:32:52
dialogue which he gave during a theater performance when we were both undergraduates at Mercer University I
00:33:00
also recalled when seeing this he informed me that he had no interest in the theater but wanted to test himself
00:33:07
to see if he was believable when telling a story yeah what I told you it was bad
00:33:13
acting right but now we're seeing that it's probably practiced right that he has schooled himself and educated
00:33:22
himself in a way to to fool some people to fool some people but but probably to eventually carry out his
00:33:32
family his Mark yeah his murderous fantasy that he has now look this is this is where it gets a little tricky
00:33:40
though because you have this individual and we have some evidence against him right yeah and it's piling up
00:33:48
and but we all know some friends of ours that were maybe picked on in school maybe bullied
00:33:58
that maybe you're just a little strange and instead of being nice and trying to get people to
00:34:06
like them they they push back by being weirder well if I'm just even more weird than then they're not disliking me
00:34:15
they're disliking this weird character that I'm presenting to them so when you're looking at this case this
00:34:22
is at the point to me where you go well all signs are pointing to this guy's guilty
00:34:28
but as we're researching I said let me hold back a little bit you know maybe maybe some of this stuff was planted
00:34:38
but this is where it gets a little strange and it's the icing on the cake let's say
00:34:45
they find a USB drive and his apartment the cops believed that it was a USB drive from Lauren it was hers that she
00:34:58
it was a bunch of photos of her um I actually don't believe it was Lauren's thumb drive
00:35:06
I think it was actually Stevens and when he was going into her apartment to mess
00:35:13
around with things that he went onto her computer and pulled off whatever pictures he could find some of these
00:35:21
pictures were posted online but most of these were just private pictures on her own computer
00:35:28
what is weird is that they were able to do search history so as he was looking at violent porn
00:35:36
he wouldn't they were able to determine that he would watch these violent porn things
00:35:42
and then go look at these pictures of her and then go back to the porn and then go back to the pictures of her
00:35:51
well and a lot of this stuff is coming out at his trial you know they they've put together a case against Stephen they
00:35:57
carry it Forward one other thing that came out in court uh well actually we'll get to two but first
00:36:04
this is from district attorney Greg Winters he read this in court out loud this is a graphic and profane Post in
00:36:14
which McDaniel allegedly wrote about an encounter with an attractive acquaintance
00:36:21
it says um here okay party hard by drinking alone in front of my computer see my sexy
00:36:30
neighbor classmate come home late she has talked to me occasionally in the past has wanted and this is removed and
00:36:38
replaced with a certain piece of my anatomy for three years invite her up for a night cap make her a
00:36:46
special drink called a Mickey Finn she is out cold I finally lose my v card oh no she OD'd and died I barbecue her
00:36:59
legs and arms to celebrate losing my v card not into organ meat but throw her torso out lose it on TV while the cops
00:37:09
are discovering her remains new Mad virgins after the D.A read this by the time he
00:37:17
was finished reading this again this is a online post right that is believed to have been from McDaniel and the reason
00:37:26
why they think that it was from McDaniel was he would often use a moniker and I think it was something like the Sons of
00:37:33
Liberty or son of Liberty something like that and that moniker was used with this
00:37:37
post and also a lot of what it's describing is his situation you know lose it on TV
00:37:44
while the cops are discovering her remains uh talks about having this sexy neighbor that lives next door to him by
00:37:52
the time that that Greg Winters is done reading this McDaniels eyes are shut in court yeah he he doesn't he's it's it's
00:38:02
almost like he's trying to mentally get himself out of that room as this is being read well I'm going to the other
00:38:09
thing the the even more icing on the cake or if you want to say the cherry on top
00:38:15
so the authorities they did find something else and this was through a lot of um computer forensic work yeah I've seen
00:38:25
it reported two different ways that this was either on his uh [Music] they found this from a camera or that
00:38:33
they found this on his computer well you should know regardless of what it was it
00:38:38
had been deleted and they needed that's why they needed the forensics to locate this so they called in crispy Colonel
00:38:46
yeah well studied computer what they found and this is going to really he's at trial
00:38:56
now but this is really going to break the whole damn thing wide open it's basically video clips and I've
00:39:03
watched some that have been released there's not really any audio for them and and even with the audio you wouldn't
00:39:11
understand what you what what we're looking at the video clips you can find them online you can see them for
00:39:17
yourselves they were obtained and released by the make and Telegraph of it eventually
00:39:24
they say that these videos were taken by Stephen McDaniel the night he killed Lauren Giddings the videos are of
00:39:31
Lauren's apartment and were taken between the hours of 9 30 pm and 12 30 a.m in court they described this as
00:39:39
Stephen using a camera attached to a six foot long wooden stick standing beneath
00:39:45
her second floor apartment and videoing her and he they will go on to say once they release
00:39:52
this information and show this video in court they're going to go on and say he spied on Lauren for months prosecutors
00:40:00
said that Stephen McDaniel had become obsessed with Lauren his next door neighbor at barristers Hall Apartments
00:40:06
across the street from Mercer University law school where they had been classmates and that Stephen became
00:40:12
devastated because they were both graduating and they would never see each other again now court documents State a
00:40:20
possible motive as Lauren was beautiful and outgoing Stephen was a loner had no girlfriend and because Lauren was nice
00:40:27
to him he became fixated on her and at some point he believed she should die and he went to Great Lengths to try to
00:40:35
cover it up the showing of the video of Stephen spying on Lauren peeking through the
00:40:41
blinds into her apartment was going to be Steven's undoing and because of this he now wants a plea deal
00:40:53
he's going to confess to murdering his fellow classmate and next door neighbor a full confession was part of the deal
00:41:01
they were able to work out a deal unfortunately her family was in court and had to hear the confession
00:41:09
Stephen's story was this this is according to the the Macon Telegraph he said that at 4 30 a.m
00:41:17
on Sunday he broke into this is June 26. he broke into her apartment dressed all in black
00:41:25
he used the master key to get into the apartment he stood there watching her sleep before he startled her awake she
00:41:35
saw him and said very calmly get the [ __ ] out Stephen said he leaped across the bed
00:41:41
onto her and grabbed her around the throat they struggled and tumbled out of the bed to the floor her legs and lower
00:41:49
body went under her bed this preventing her from getting away or from kicking him during the struggle Lauren managed
00:41:57
to rip the mask off of McDaniel's face he said she recoiled in horror when she recognized him she pleaded Stephen
00:42:06
please stop McDaniel clenched his hands around her throat for 15 minutes until she stopped moving and then dragged her
00:42:14
into the bathroom and placed her in the bathtub according to his confession he then returned to his apartment next door
00:42:22
and spent the entire day on his computer then in the evening he returned with a hacksaw and cut up her body
00:42:31
said I removed her Limbs and head wrapped them in several black trash bags separately and discarded them in the
00:42:38
Mercer law school dumpster he said he put Lauren's torso into the apartment trash can on June 28th two
00:42:46
days before it was found McDaniel has denied raping Lauren he says in his writing quote she was
00:42:53
wearing the pink running shorts when she died and I never removed them they were
00:42:58
found on her torso just as I had left them in the days after the murder McDaniel attended classes and even
00:43:05
joined the search party Lauren's father Billy Giddings told the Macon Telegraph that he believes only
00:43:12
one-third of McDaniel's account saying quote he's had a long time to put it together that's about as good as he
00:43:19
could get it and that's pretty horrible he goes on to say quote we just don't want him in our thoughts anymore I hope
00:43:27
he lives a long life in the worst possible way during the course of his confession
00:43:32
McDaniel attempted to justify his or the murder yeah he described himself as a divided mind unable to account for how
00:43:43
he could have committed these horrible acts and that at the same time he was also able to carry on daily routines
00:43:50
he went on to say quote it's difficult for me to explain why I killed Lauren and attempted to conceal my deed the way
00:43:57
I did I know that it was very wrong I'm not delusional or without all morals or decency something in my makeup my
00:44:06
psychology my neuropathy my own particular pathology perhaps must explain it he expressed remorse
00:44:14
regarding according to the newspaper saying he Grieves Giddings daily but doesn't expect forgiveness from her
00:44:22
family he said if I could take it back I would so since he is pleading guilty and confessing then what is his
00:44:32
sentencing well he ends up getting life with the possibility of parole um he is eligible for to request parole
00:44:45
in 2041 but district attorney David Cook said quote I fully expect Stephen McDaniel will spend the rest of his life
00:44:53
behind bars now just a little over a year ago Captain there was a habeas corpus proceeding this was not whether
00:45:02
McDaniel murdered or dismembered Miss Giddings this was asking the judge if McDaniel's
00:45:08
rights were violated whether his guilty plea was voluntary and whether his lawyers according to this article a pair
00:45:15
of the brightest criminal defense Minds in the region if they somehow failed him
00:45:21
one thing that that was pointed out during this whole situation and I think it's very funny but it's very accurate
00:45:29
many people have stated this was a chance for Stephen McDaniel to step into a courtroom and play lawyer
00:45:37
McDaniel claims in part the searches of his apartment were improper and that he was despondent catatonic even and in no
00:45:46
state to allow searches or provide statements to law enforcement many have said that his appeal efforts afford
00:45:53
McDaniel something he truly craves which is attention and the spotlight but the truly magical moment during this
00:46:02
whole Court proceeding thing here Captain came late in the trial when McDaniel put his defense attorney his
00:46:10
one-time defense attorney Floyd Buford on the stand yeah McDaniel asked Buford if he
00:46:18
recalled his demeanor in their first visit at the county jail and Buford simply replies weird
00:46:25
uh Stephen tried to call in a question buford's representation of him Buford said McDaniel tried to help in his own
00:46:34
defense but McDaniel's efforts quote were from a law student's perspective as the article puts it then Buford took off
00:46:43
the gloves saying now keep in mind he is addressing Stephen McDaniel who put him
00:46:50
on the stand and is questioning him Beaufort says quote you've never been in a courtroom in your life we called the
00:46:58
shots not you you started off facing the death penalty you ended up receiving a life sentence with the possibility of
00:47:05
parole you didn't want to go to trial you wanted to plead guilty Buford revealed that after being
00:47:13
confronted with the finding of the video showing McDaniel spying on Lauren on the
00:47:18
night that she was murdered McDaniel broke down and confessed The Killing to his attorneys right Buford with the
00:47:25
judge's blessing recalled the moment from the stand how McDaniel described the murder in full
00:47:32
saying quote up until the last couple of weeks of your case I was strongly in your corner believing you were innocent
00:47:39
I felt you were innocent but this evidence that came in that was very important Buford went on to tell the
00:47:48
graphic and detailed jailhouse confession that McDaniel gave to him and co-counsel Franklin Hugh about how you
00:47:57
killed Lauren Giddings and how you went about decapitating her or carving up her
00:48:02
body how you even sat down and cut off every finger and bone in appendage on her hands and then threw them all in the
00:48:10
toilet and flushed it all at one time Beaufort said that coupled with the information authorities discovered on
00:48:18
McDaniel's computer including what he says is quote the most horrific child pornography as well as internet searches
00:48:26
for sex with dead people all of this prompted what was very much in McDaniel's best interest requesting and
00:48:34
taking a plea deal that the whole appeal thing does not make McDaniel look any better it does
00:48:43
not clean anything up for him in fact McDaniel went on to lose this appeal and it's it's awful because here's this
00:48:51
monster of a person living almost this hermit life having these fantasies and people not seeing the warning signs
00:49:02
or or seeing some warning signs but not not speaking up about them and then you have on the other hand
00:49:12
Lauren which is a beautiful person a smart person very driven was actually nice to Stephen
00:49:22
this guy that a lot of people found odd and and for him to want to sit there and try
00:49:30
to play the system and at the end of the day her family um they were never able to find
00:49:39
um other parts of her her of her remains to have a a proper you know a proper burial yeah I don't know what he was
00:49:46
hoping to achieve with this appeal but I I think what these people suspect is probably accurate he's what he's hoping
00:49:56
to achieve is is attention and to put himself in the spotlight right but he also thinks he's smarter than everybody
00:50:02
so you know he sits there and brags years before if I do this I won't get caught and I'll do this and well the
00:50:09
thing is you try to live out your fantasy and and you got caught well and that's why I went through buford's
00:50:16
quotes of things that he said to Stephen while he was forced to be on the stand because Stephen called him to the stand
00:50:25
and I loved hearing his former defense attorney really just call the shots and say look man you
00:50:34
what what are you appealing here we did everything for you we did things that were in your best interest whether you
00:50:41
understood them at the time or not it doesn't matter right is it he's kind of it's a it's a very lengthy and
00:50:48
um roundabout way of telling Stephen you're not the you're not smarter than me you're not smarter
00:50:56
than the court you're you're not the smartest guy in the room you're well right in fact you're very dumb and you
00:51:01
in a very dumb situation and what happened right and what happened was they caught that they caught this
00:51:07
evidence like I said it was the the cherry on on the top of the pile of of a mountain of evidence and when that
00:51:15
happened and you realized when you had to realize yourself Stephen had to realize himself I'm not that smart I'm
00:51:23
not all these things that I thought I was you know whether you say there's two sides of you even the evil side of you
00:51:30
realized you ain't that smart and and then that's when you confess to your lawyers
00:51:38
so you know and well and he's 100 a complete psychopath and 100 percent piece of [ __ ] and unfortunately Lauren
00:51:50
Giddings live next door to him was his neighbor and was nice to him and it's just really truly a sad sad
00:52:00
story in the past there have been walks there have been softball tournaments uh all of these events are in Lauren's name
00:52:07
and in her memory there is a scholarship fund set up in Lauren's name as well and
00:52:13
the third annual Lauren Giddings 5K walk is Saturday October 19th from 8 30 a.m to 12 30 at Central City
00:52:24
Park in Macon Georgia [Music] you can go to True Crime garage.com and check out our recommended page we have
00:52:41
all kinds of recommendations there for you this week a little recommended reading we are recommending hello
00:52:46
Charlie letters from A Serial Killer by Charlie Hess you'll want to check that out and while you're at our website make
00:52:55
sure you check out the store page as well thanks everybody for listening this week join us back here in the garage
00:53:01
next week until then be good be kind and don't litter thank you [Music]