Episode 354

Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence and is not intended for all audiences Listener discretion is advised We have a home. Do you have a check on her welfare? And then I'm at her home and then she's vassalai What? She's vassalai It's mid-September 2023 52-year-old Widow Marcia Allen is away from her home in free town, Indiana She's on a trip to Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, with her parents She leaves on Saturday planning to return a week later on the following Saturday Before the trip, she does something she's been wanting to do for a while She installs cameras She buys the system herself from Walmart and keeps it quiet She wants to watch the house while she's away Mostly to keep an eye on her cats and because she feels unsafe since her husband died about a year ago She gets them because she's never left her cats alone that long and She has a bad feeling in the gut of her stomach so she wants to be able to check in on her pets wherever she is I don't want anybody to come up and jump at me You can watch it on your phone because you were actually out of town We went to Tennessee Pigeon Forge, Pigeon's mom died in a nursery and they wanted to go And I knew I was going to restart Walmart and I didn't take them for long because dad's getting eventually so I took them Marsha has already lost her husband and she was in that phase of life where you're not sure how much longer your parents are gonna be around Starting to get there myself It's not a good feeling She notes that her dad has dementia and it was their anniversary She's a good daughter On her parents' couch, she scrolls through the camera app Suddenly there's a ping Then another the AI in the app is able to determine that there's a person in view But no one should be inside her house She nervously taps the first click and the view of the camera pops up on her phone a Shape slides across the frame She pinches to zoom Then another alert lands another clip cues Her thumb keeps moving Save save save she starts counting and she'll end up with 22 videos by the time this is over One of them is nearly five minutes long Obviously, she's in a state of panic As she stares at her phone there are two adult males wearing hoodies and moving towards her safe And in that longer clip of face suddenly turns towards the camera She watches more the time stamps move towards six o'clock A door that should be shut swings open and a view shifts down a hall she knows by heart She studies the intruder's hands and clothing The face flashes again making her stomach drop She recognizes it this time and says the name out loud Her eyes fixed on what she's seeing She calls the sheriff's office and says where she is and what the app is sending Along with how many clips she has of the break in She texts and emails what she can and then keeps the live view open to keep watching Inside the house drawers open and shut In one camera angle she sees the safe and catches her breath She knows the sound that the safe makes when it opens The live feed hiccups then streams again A second figure passes through a doorway She listens for anything footsteps a scrape anything she can tell deputies later Then around 6 p.m. Everything suddenly stops The stream freezes up and drops no more alerts no more clips She refreshes nothing She switches to another camera nothing She knows this means someone must have unplugged the router She stares at the blank screen The safe is massive and she thinks about what's inside Family rings collectibles and dozens of firearms kept for years She starts a list in her head She writes it down She tells herself she can pull serial numbers when she gets home And then she calls the sheriff's office again to make sure they got the videos She tells her parents she needs to go back early Okay, so I'm not sure if I got 22, but I got a lot of I'm not sure that I've been all the way through all of them, but well, the five of them wouldn't chose Steven's face full face Mm-hmm, and what cracks me up is he looked in the bedroom and he saw the camera But yeah, distracting them and she found out about it and You called into the sheriff's apartment. Yes, okay, okay, and So do you think the other guy's in a thing? I do His I can I know his voice and it sounds like his voice She only recognizes the voice of one of the suspects but the other She saw his face and put a name to it Steven white deputies find him outside in the driveway at his parents place in Scott County The officer took Steven away from the house to a garage where his maroon four-door sedan sat Wing a gray T-shirt and dark sweatpants Steven presented as nonchalant Smoking a cigarette and waving his arms as he spoke with an open posture After having his rights read to him he gestured for his dog Hank to move along and Then he took off running Not running with his legs So much as his mouth So do you understand your rights? Yes, sir. Okay. Hey. No, so you have any idea why we're here today. Well They said the show got me on camera last night burglarizing the place Okay, so you know my husband if that's the case you know anything about it? No, okay My husband and I said that last night about four-clock in the morning watching No, he's off work today He works at Jim back. He started the movie a couple weeks ago. I've had time to face it. I personally Think I have a strap or something to run in a fever my tongue is all swollen and sore and my mouth is red light So let y'all know that I've been having diarrhea. Shit's all night Like our kids with school this morning. That was about it. I stood up on the balcony and said buy them a kid so they don't get sick of their school right now Steven may have been sick and his kids may have been at school right now But that didn't account for earlier that morning The officer went on to tell him that he and possibly his husband had been positively ID'd in the video Well, I've been a police officer for a minute. All right And one lie always leads to a second line and then a third line and a fourth line It's gonna make it look a hell of a lot worse, all right And and it'll save in person whenever I show the video or show the pictures and you know, I won't you know, walk and I say to that because I'll just see the video Okay, I do too because I got three. I got a picture here So the officer showed him the picture. I mean, I really do not have I What about the car? What is the car that you're in there? This is my car. Somebody fucking stole it for me on Sunday night And how'd you get it back then? Because I found a police report and we found it over here But I had three keys for this and I had my One sort of keys in there the other key is in my six, okay, so listen I have my second, so listen as once you want you to know, okay But there's more than just that picture. All right You went on to explain that the most important thing was to return the stolen items to the owner And if the owner was happy, Steven might avoid charges Steven was ready to talk Some more. That is. >> It's like another city, it's like the whole thing, it's ugly. Because that lady is the lady who told me to go get the shit. Her name is Marcia Buckson. And she asked me to go get the shit because her husband, Harold Allen, passed away in December and according to her, she needed that life insurance money. She did not get that life insurance money because the policy was set to go to her brother. >> How old is it? >> A lady that you're talking about. Marcia Buckson? >> 50. >> 50? >> 50 then? >> Does she live there? >> Yeah. And now how? >> She got it because whenever she married the man, she gave me an address. She said, hey, how many of you go up in here and grab someone and go up in here and just kind of make this weird up there. >> Mm-hm. >> And I did. And I went over there, she wanted us to get rid of it and this woman has hated me for years, but I'm best friends with her daughter. >> She needed the life insurance money but Harold's death certificate said he died of natural causes. He'd had a heart condition that was getting worse in the weeks before he died. It happened at about two in the afternoon on December 20th, the previous year. >> 9-1-1. >> Yeah. This is 32-87-0-state road 135 miles ahead of the end of our Beijing 40s non-resolved 7-18 minutes. I believe. >> Okay. What's your address again? >> 32-87-0-state road 135. >> Okay. >> How old are you? >> 15-2. >> 15-2. >> Okay. Did you find him like that? >> Yeah. I worked at home and I went back there to shake having to feed him a sick and right there he just leaned the floor like he was trying to get back to recess and he was not breathing. >> Okay. Do you want to start CPR if I help you? >> Yeah. I can do it. >> You just do your CPR and you keep me on speaker, okay? >> Yeah. >> Marsha called for a medical emergency. Her husband was dying or likely already dead. But this was anything but a natural death. After the medical report read cardiovascular disease, calcifying constructive pericarditis, severe coronary atherosclerosis of the left anterior descending artery. But his death was way more complicated than all of those big complicated fancy words. It was murder, someone had murdered Harold Allen. >> 52-year-old Marsha Allen was out of town in Gatlinburg, Tennessee with her parents while cameras monitoring her home in free-town Indiana started sending alerts about motion inside her house that shouldn't have existed. She saved 22 clips and around 6 o'clock the feed suddenly went dead. She called police, turned the videos over and gave a name. It was someone she recognized, a friend of her daughter Ashley. When officers tracked the burglar down, he gave them far more information than they were ready for, accusing Marsha herself of staging the burglary while she was out of town. He claimed that she directed him to pick up a guy named Richard on that very date and carry out the heist. According to Stephen, she was upset that she didn't receive the life insurance money she was entitled to after her husband died. She was upset that it went to her brother-in-law instead. Now she was afraid her brother-in-law was going to take the only inheritance she had left. A safe full of jewelry and expensive guns, so instead she would have her daughter's friend Stephen, who already had a criminal history, steal them, sell them, and give her the proceeds while taking a cut for himself. But the story was growing a bit out of control as you'll soon learn. I'm not a fucking. I got two kids. My husband is getting my dad's runaway. We got a lot of shit going on. I'm not about to drive and run across this town. If you have shit to say, it's so big. I don't want no bulls or no fucking weapons in my car and she took everything apart and she said everything exactly where it was supposed to fucking go. And I got what I could do, she told me to go on Monday night and Tuesday night and it sounds to me like she set me up real quick. Stephen being the sassy ass bitch that he is was a felon and couldn't be caught with weapons. Also, he had a lot going on, clearly. A lot of problems, issues. Kind of a fucked up life already, it sounds like. But in the same breath, he said he did it anyway. Stephen already admitted that Marsha hated him. Apparently she was a racist who didn't like him and blamed him in some way for coming between her and her daughter. Allegedly, that is. So was she setting him up or did she just want the inheritance she felt she deserved and knew he could get it for her? Or was it even Marsha that texted him in the first place? Are you sure that Ashley's meant the one that message you to go do that? I'm not. Because the information that we have or that we're getting could be a little bit conflicting on that part. Like Ashley. And if it is Ashley, just tell me. No, I'm not. I'm really not sure if it's Ashley or Marsha, that's the thing. They've been like this all the fucking lives. But do you have, your phone is it labeled as Ashley if she was to text you? No. It's not at all. Is it a person that texted this is Marsha? You must be calling me on my text now number. Sign in your favor so who is this? And I got a call from a text now number. This has been, not getting a couple of months ago. And then it was supposed to go down on this list. Yes. Pretty sure. Because it was text now. The call was on text now. But to be honest with you, Marsha and Ashley looked just alike. Sound just alike. Just just alike. They're the same kind of psychopath. Now, in case you don't know, text now is an app that allows you to text people from an anonymous number. It wasn't sure if it was Marsha or Ashley. But whoever was on the other end of the phone, wasn't finished, giving orders. And tonight, I was supposed to go back and completely didn't swim that far in the house down because apparently, when she was young, she burnt her house down, epi, um, she burnt her house down, definitely. Yeah. She took her five-year-old daughter to a grandparents' bunk house now in Kentucky. But you were supposed to go back tonight and burn the house down? Yeah. I was supposed to go back and burn the house down. I'm not doing that. I was like, look, I'm not going to do that. So if you don't burn it down, you need to make it look like you've broken in there and make it look vandalized so I can get the insurance money. Stephen's accusations were getting wild and he wasn't stopping. This woman has hated me for years, but I'm best friends with her daughter. Okay. What's the daughter's name? Ashley Jones. Okay. I'm just saying, you're being awful truthful. That's what I was saying. I don't really remember. I'm just saying, you're being awful truthful, that's what I was saying. Okay, I know that. I've not gone to nobody and so I don't think I don't have any proof on it. This woman's a psychopath. And I'm telling you guys that right now, her old album was her husband. So I think it's her own policy for him. Went and married him. I don't know when she married him because since I've left, I've been away from this woman straight, came to my house one day and sat me across the face and told me, at 26 years old and told me if I ever talked to her daughter again, this she was going to kill me. I better watch her. Better watch her fucking foot. Now I was right up there at the house. How the hell was that? What the fuck? So was there a nut in her little car and she dipped off and left? Well, that was a fun little story. The kind of lifetime movie someone of Harold's demographic would just eat right up. It's important to state that as far as we know, and as far as the police know, Harold Allen died of natural causes and all this verbosity about murder was just nonsense. What they did know was that this very vocal character was caught in the act of burglarizing Marsha's home on camera. And now he's got a whole lot of stories about what other people did instead. What about is them? They call it the machine not stupid. Here's what I do know because she's unkilled her husband and her mother-in-law and gone away with that shit. So here's what I do know and if you know how that happens, you need me to ask these guys to go move to like inside or go somewhere else. But what I do know is that we need that stuff back. Now it was Marsha who not only killed her husband but also her mother-in-law as well. Right. If it were only that easy. They recovered the property and interviewed Marsha the next day so detectives could pin down the how and who behind the heist. I'll tell you that we need recovered the X-rays. We make to the rest in this case. That would be Stephen White, the other guy. Marsha only recognized Stephen because according to Marsha he was too stupid to cover his face and he ran his mouth the whole time. She recognized the other man's voice and would later learn that he was a long-time friend of Stevens. If you could get his phone, I guarantee it's going to be my daughter and he takes him the combination of that safe. So I was going to ask you a little bit more about that. Three people in the world knew that safe is me, my husband and my daughter. Only one name was linked to both the family and the suspect. And that was Marsha's daughter, Ashley Jones, a friend of Stephen White. She knew the players. She knew the layout and she knew the safe's code. Plus she was smart. Well, relatively logic solved the mystery. It was actually no mystery at all. The real mystery was connected to Harold's death. This is the detective who led that case. My name is Adam Nicholson and I have two decades of experience in law enforcement at least and all that's been right here in Indiana at the Jackson County Sheriff's Department. I've worked, you know, patrol for most of my career and then in 2019 was promoted to lieutenant. And if the detective division would receive a big case, it's as this one that we're talking about, then I would step over to kind of help them guide them with it. And this one just kind of worked out the way I ended up being the lead investigator on it because we had had another murder within the price six months of this one. So this kind of was up my alley. You know of what things I like to do. The putting pieces together facts patterns, the human behavior. Adam, remember that Harold Allen was someone that everyone seemed to like through the investigation of talking to family and friends and co-workers. I mean, everybody basically said the exact same thing like he was a very caring, loving man. He was a good, good husband, loved his wife, everybody at his work, you know, enjoyed being around him and nobody had any complaints about him at all. Everybody was really just sad for him, you know, because they could only imagine what he had been through. But yeah, no ill words or anything about the guy. Everybody thought he was super. And here's what a friend said about Harold on his memory page. I'm heartbroken by Harold's passing. He was a wise mentor and very skilled teacher to me, although he was too humble to admit it. Harold was always giving me advice both professionally and about life in general. I continue to follow his guidance to this day. He could be rough around the edges, but you'd quickly realize that he was the most kind and most caring person you would ever meet. I find comfort knowing that he found love and met his wife, Marsha, who he spoke often and fondly of. My deepest condolences to you and your family. Everyone who knew Harold praised him and believed he died of a heart condition. But back in the interview room, the detective was about to rip that apart with Stephen's accusations, starting with Marsha's alleged involvement in the burglary. And this is where it gets interesting. I won't go ahead and make sure you understand this. Some of this is going to be accusatory towards you because this is what he said. You're not under arrest. You are free of leave anytime you want, but I just want to make sure you understand what he's accusing you of some stuff too. So here's what he says. And I may have, it was a lot. So if I get some of it wrong, if I get some of it wrong, I apologize. But so he says that he received a call from a text now number. And he says that it was back in. I think he said like in May or June. So it'd been a couple of months ago. And that basically it was a female on the other side. He thought of the other one. He said he thought it was you. But I think he may have said something to the fact that you actually sound alike. So it could have been actually. And he said that basically something to the fact and I could get some of the fact from on this, but something to the fact that all these guns. Something about when you're when your husband passed away, that all these guns, maybe some family members were wanting them or something. But he's saying is basically that you said that you were giving $3,000 to go in the house and take the guns and have him take the guns and take them back to his place. He's a liar. I did not do that. And he also said something about something about burning down the house, burning down your house. He bear on. I don't know if he was saying he was going to I don't. I would have to go back and could I record it? The interview. Oh, wow. I have to go back to say exactly what he said. He was a lot that he said. He wasn't exaggerating and she was not prepared for what came next. I'll tell you what else he said. He accused you of murdering your husband. I did not murder my husband. Okay. Something to the effect of some kind of some kind of seeds or something and basically poisoning poison in his drink. That was showing a toxicology part of that happened. Was there an autopsy done? Yes. A toxic autopsy and toxicology. He died because he had a paricaridate that was undetected. Paricaridate is the infomerate. The paricaridate has a paricaridate around it. The line of the heart that protects the heart when it beats. It was undetected. So it went along so long that the paricaridate in the heart hardened and it stopped his heart. And he had a little bit of blocked arteries. That's an autopsy report. Okay. Well, if that's what the autopsy said, that's what it said. But she was still being accused of setting up the burglary. Do you, because I don't know, when I haven't been able to talk to her yet, do you think Ashley would have, I mean, because you said that only three people. Because the events are worth a lot of money. Do you think Ashley would have had something to do with this? She had to. She's all alone, and then me and the combination of it would never be deducting your money ever. Ashley and her fiance had lived with Marsha and Harold for a while. But now Ashley was living in Missouri. The only way to get to the bottom of this was to call her. At the same time, Detective Scoured Stephen White's phone and found some shocking evidence. The messages between Ashley and him that confirmed the burglary conspiracy. This is a montage of some of the things Ashley said. I do have access next week to her home, with a lot to steal and sell. It would be as simple as "I load the truck, you go sell it, we look for more," rinse repeat. I mean, 100K worth of guns, LOL. I already stole my guns to keep. She owes me. I'm about to grab the coins, too. I just get her out of the house. He only has AD&D and it will not pay. out for natural causes. Only thing they can do is say, "Yeah, you don't get it, or where do I send the 200k LOL?" This was enough to bring Ashley in from Missouri for questioning. Meanwhile, detectives had access to Stevens and Marsh's phones. The case went quiet for a few weeks. What surfaced wasn't another clip or a rumor. It was an online order, by Ashley, with a shipping label in the family name Lin Allen, all pointing to the free-town address with dates, size, and price attached. And the item in the center of those records hinted at a much larger cry. Was Steven telling the truth? The burglary thread had become a lead. The paper trail pointed back to Harold and to his murder. When Marsha returned on October 16, the first question was the order. Who bought it? Where was it shipped? And what phone number was on it? The detective shows her the paperwork. So, there's ordered through a place that was called Kim Boys, LLC. The order source was peach pay, so it was paid to peach pay. You have peach pay? I'm not peach pay. Even though the order was sent to Lin Allen, the address is marshes. The next day they sat face to face with Marsha's daughter, Ashley. While Marsha was fairly animated, all expressions, a tone of voice that suggested disbelief or curiosity, Ashley was extremely subdued and poised, almost quietly defiant. That's why we talked about the death of Harold. We had some text messages from your mom's phone. She consented to a download and there were some text messages on there that we had some concern about. The meaning of those text messages. And we have ordered where some ethylene glycol was ordered on December 13th. I think it was December 13th, December 14th. Lethylene glycol arrived at the address of your mom's, Halton Freightown, 3287 North, State Road 135 on December 19th. On December 20th, your arrow ended up passing away. Do you know anything about the ethylene glycol? Ah, ethylene glycol. Otherwise known as antifreeze. It's a sweet tasting substance that you can sneak into your hubby's drink. And the best part is you won't even notice until he's dead. I guess he won't notice when he's dead either. In any case, it's the murder weapon of choice for those who don't like guns. You know, women, for the most part. The detective had screenshots of the ethylene glycol order being sent to that address under the name Lynn Allen. This was Marsha's middle and last name. They also had messages from Ashley to her mother asking for money for this particular order. According to Marsha, she knew nothing about it. It was Christmas time. Ashley, her fiance, who was also named Ashley. And the kids were all living there and packages were just flooding it. Who can keep track? At least 10 packages a day came in that thing, I understand. But there was only one thing that definitely glycol. Right. There were a lot of packages that probably come with Christmas time when you get that. I mean, we do the same thing on the other other shop on live and they go through a busy store. But I would remember a thing of a Bethlehem glycol coming to my house if I got it. The day that it does come, which is the 19th. And we know what day it was delivered. We have the tracking number. There's a message from Ashley saying we have a delivery. The focus closed in on mother and daughter. One bought the poison and used it on Harold. Did the other know? Did the other help? So, you know, part of this stems from also from, you know, talking to somebody who gave some information and saying that Harold, the information we got was Harold did not die of natural causes, basically that he was poisoned. Really? Yes. So, when we follow up on that and we get things, your mom can sense the phone number and we get all these text messages and we start going through these text messages and it's for you and your mom. Right. And I can say one of the things just one. There's a lot of them. One of them is I mean, December 13th, December 14th from that time frame. Ethel and glycol was ordered. I think you text it to your mom if I remember correctly. And that tracking number matches the same tracking number that he was, our other detective was able to get of the Ethel and glycol that arrived at the house on December 19th. The information we received was that there was river floats that were made is put into the river float and that Harold drinks it. And obviously the end result was that he died. Marsha denied having any involvement in the poisoning. She denied everything while her own daughter continued to point the finger at her in her calm, unbothered tone of voice. I don't know what she did, but I mean, she's very diligent. She's very diligent. I'm not, if Marsha was intelligent, Ashley was a genius and being somewhat facetious here. Detectives had already confirmed that Marsha had nothing to do with the burglary. Ashley felt cheated out of her share of Harold's life insurance and she was going to recoup in whatever way she could. Still, Detectives pressed on with Marsha. This is a word in the same day that this is delivered their river floats and then the very next day Harold's dead. How did it not kill him? How did we get that? As far as I know, he has heart condition, did. Okay. We get results back. Yeah. And it says there's definitely Michael in his system. How did that get there? If you didn't know anything about it, how did that happen? We both made the river floats. So I did not put anything in any one's dream. I didn't even know yet anything like that there. Is there ever a chance when Ashley could have put something in there? I have not yet. Marsha was aware that Ashley was growing marijuana in the house. Okay, no big deal in 2026, I guess. But that wasn't the only botany Ashley was experimenting with. She was also in all sorts of new age domestic white woman horse shit like saging and cleansing, amulets and crystals, demons and things that would attach themselves to people, even convincing Marsha that something evil had attached itself to Harold. Not because he was unkind, abusive or controlling, but because he was sick a lot. Surely that many had some sort of demon attached to him. And it was no wonder Harold was sick a lot. He did have a heart condition after all. But was it natural or was it because he was slowly being poisoned from the time Ashley temporarily moved in months before his death? Marsha remembered Ashley asking strange questions about poison plants under the umbrella of good parenting. According to Ashley, she wanted to know which poisonous plants surrounded the house. you know, so she could tell her little girl what to avoid. So, looking back on, on, on, on. It's really still like, what a planet you know, I'll watch out for, because about what's outside playing, I don't want to be hurt. She tries to eat something, because about six, everything in her mouth still. So, I'll say that again to you, it's what I like. I want to know what the poisons plants were around the region. So, she would make sure Violet didn't get into it this time. Violet has an army of problems, issues of pre-means, her kidneys didn't develop properly. And Violet gets around certain things, she gets sick, or she breaks up positive. And she can't hand in merch, she does it with steroids, because her body doesn't produce the response to five things. And she never gotten anything like that before. She has, and she had an epithetia, and she ended up on a mass steroids. Hmm, Fox Club seeds? Is she a witch? Does she float? I'm starting to think the Salem witch trials weren't such a bad idea. The Fox Club plant is native to North America and grows in shady, damp areas. If ingested, it causes dangerous heart arrhythmias. It could lead to death. But maybe she did think about it. She just had the treatment face and so on out. Well, same thing, you know, they could lead to a blood draw. Is there any, is there, is there going to be a good chance that that blood is going to have Fox 11? Probably Sonya. Okay. Why do you think for sure? And just be honest again, just be honest with you. Because she was ordered in plainance. Fox Club plants? I think so. I know that she's trying to get a hold of some other word, which I didn't know what that was. Okay. Tell me about the Fox Club and where it was ordered from. I think that she found someone Etsy. This was Marsha's response. You said I need Fox Club seeds. And she says, I think, are you said I think I can live in the Walmart? They're pretty farmers. And then she said, I thank you. We are watching a new movie on Netflix with the kids and those are traceable. The entire Fox Club plant is poisonous. So it could have been easy enough to believe that Marsha wanted seeds to plant because of the pretty flowers. Still, when Ashley followed up in a message saying, those are traceable detectives knew this was bigger than they originally thought. The rest of the messages gave plenty of clues, but that was just it. They were clues. What became clear was that Harold had been sick for weeks. And the reason was becoming a parent. Neither Marsha nor Ashley seemed to care about his misery either. All they cared about was their own. Marsha messages Ashley saying she's irritated and she can't sleep. She needs for this to be over. She says, it's hanging on by threats. It's so long because he's big, meaning something is taking too long because of his size and weight. Marsha and Ashley often referred to Harold as it, by the way. So that gives you a clue, another character. Ashley answers, Marsha, it moves slow and has to build. Marsha then says she wished it would, quote, reach its climax and be done LOL. He's snoring on and off. And if he moved around, it would go faster and pop. Then Ashley responds, yes, if he got moving, it would be faster, but we know he won't. Marsha went on to explain that Harold's stomach was hurting, but his face was better. Yet he wasn't presenting like the stories, just vomiting and diarrhea. Ashley answers, we also have God knows how many that aren't reported or know how it grows. Only the stories of the self inflicted and we will see. If not, we will do something else, but I think it's slowly doing it. The detectives were shocked by what they found. And when they questioned Marsha, she had an explanation for everything, even if it didn't make sense. Ashley, on the other hand, just kept pointing the finger at her own mother, even though they were clearly both involved. Probably the most shocking thing of all was the possibility that this wasn't the first time one of them had poisoned someone. Ashley was currently engaged to a woman and her previous partner was also a woman. But the father of her only child was a man. Well, obviously, because you know, biology. Anyway, guess what? He died in his early 30s from a supposed stroke. His name was Ty. Now, ain't that a coenky dink? And then you wonder why people can't find a date in 2026. So there's something, and it's something along the lines, like talking about how much he weighs, and it's taken longer for the weighs certain amount. And Ty's brought it up and how much Ty weighed. And he said, "Love you too. I just want it done." She said, "Me too, like beyond overlap allowed, but we got it." You said, "Like what's taking so long?" He's off-balance, said he had trouble getting out of the car. She said, "The weight. It takes 12 hours for a woman at 180 to fill anything. You do the math. Wipe out loud." It's slow. And previously, Ty was only 120 LL, so it's the weight. He said, "So it's going to take a while?" She said, "48 max. We will know." Also, he's high still. I give him a lot of weed butter. Yeah, he should be brownies. You don't know what he has because of that. Well, it could be nausea, happening, and everything. It's about how loud he's making him mad. He gets stupid when he's high. In case you didn't hear, Marsha says he gets stupid when he's high. So it looked like Marsha and Ashley were slowly poisoning herald. And they couldn't really track his so-called symptoms because they were giving him weed-infused food to help with the pain and nausea. How kind? But then she mocks him for being stupidly high. While Marsha deflected, played dumb, and spun the texts in her favor with detectives for hours, Ashley very simply maintained that this was all her mother's doing. I mean, it was going to kind of get to the nods, okay? I mean, we, I mean, we, we know what happened to herald. We've got evidence of that. And your mom coming yesterday, she told us a lot. We've got months and months and months of text messages from your mom's phone. And I mean, it's obvious that, you know, something happened to him. And, you know, I mean, basically, now is your chance to tell us what you know about what happened there. Because, I mean, like I said, these text messages or what, where the stuff came from the confirmation numbers. I think at some point, she probably dragged you into something where you didn't want to be in. Or there was something to do with those demons or something, you know, with that. But we just, we just want to know the truth. I mean, what's your relationship with your mom good? Yes, I know. I kind of just put up with what she does. She's always trying to drag me into whatever she gets into. She's always trying to drag you into something. Anytime I get any type of financial gain or mail, you know, like I saw my house, she wants it. This was a complete lie told by someone who had taken a large amount of money from her mother. Not once, but twice. And like he said, we didn't go into detail in there what we make of those messages. I mean, we have have more than just the messages. We have some of the results in the hospital when he went to the hospital back in November and the symptoms that he was experiencing, which remind you of the same day within the same time frame when I say Mac Day that the Fox gloves are mentioned and the symptoms of Fox gloves, see what happens is the bleeding and the stomach and the face that you guys are talking about and then one thing he didn't get to all the way down was on the 19th whenever the the Eveline bike hall gets there is the conversations then you know like it's there then there were some pictures you know like set the room here and things like that detectives gave Marsha every opportunity to point the finger back at Ashley or just come clean but she refused. I'm not going to be shocked at this point. So be shocked you would have to not believe any of the messages between you and Ashley to be shocked that it wouldn't be in a system or you wouldn't believe any of the the stuff on the Google search that was never Google. I mean what Steven tells us I mean he says repair foot and that's what we find right you know not long after at the Lynn Greikler's order sent to your house and the name is addressed to his Lynn Alan what's your middle name is Lynn and it's your address and so I mean I don't know well you'll be part of told you all this and you already know all this but that's why we are all right I mean and I know you're smart and let me say you already you know how this looks I mean this stuff doesn't look good and then I have this on top of it and I mean there there was enough that you know that the courts and the judge and prosecutors have issued Mars for the phones and during the interviews detectives went back to the phone copy they saw gaps Marsha had deleted a lot of texts this is Detective Adam Nicholson again and after she submitted to the phone downloader or consented she actually deleted the messages in the interview room between her and Ashley because Clint had to step out of the interview room for a second and grab the consent form for her to sign so any he couldn't just like take her phone with him because you know she hadn't she hadn't signed it yet but she had considered and while he's gone she's going through her phone she's deleting things she told him that she was just deleting like pictures from her security camera like of her in the house or you know where she was like in her underwear and stuff and she didn't necessarily want us to see that which was understandable you know but when she gave us the phone I thought there's no way that there's anything on that phone shoot there's no way she would have it to us so I think that she thought by deleting those messages that she was probably free and clear and then she didn't hear back from us until October that was September 20th we showed up early in the morning on the 16th of October this would have been 2023 and we had search once for her house for all electronic devices like laptops computers old cell phones memory sticks or flash drives hard drives things like that she didn't she didn't know we were coming until we knocked on the door yeah we knocked on the door early in the morning she had just got out of bed it appeared she was like in her still like we jaced and you can tell then she was shocked and uh I read the warrants to her and the war actually mentions like to seize the property for evidence of murder for the crime of murder and I remember like her face is like you know if you if you watch that video yeah you can tell like she knows then like and she agreed so she um me and Clint took her back to the sheriff's department while the other officers and detectives um completed the search warrant and so I think that was probably her first moment of like no one like yeah big there's there's they know something they knew Ashley and her mother had discussed how long it would stay in someone's body how no one would notice and how to make it ready for use by saying I need something that crushes this into powder they also had testimony of Ashley's partner recalling that Ashley was grinding up something she put in Harold's brownies throwing the grinder away afterwards and telling her lover not to say anything about it on October 17th Ashley interviewed with detectives from jail after being arrested for the burglary they were surprised she said anything at all because when they picked her up in Missouri for the burglary she immediately asked for an attorney I'm proud of detective birchum and the job he did and and myself and you know it was just one of those though that it couldn't be at our best because our our hands were tied you know like we we knew with marcia because we were told the prosecutor told us if we didn't get a confession we couldn't arrest her well maybe we kind of went you know like I wanted to know that if if she told me to you know go screw off that you know I could arrest her but I didn't have that in my back pocket you know so I had to sit there and play dumb play nice you know try to go along with what she was saying try to act like I was believing what I mean because if I the moment I started pushing on her she got a very upset and I could tell that she was close to probably saying you know like I want an attorney and if she would have said you know I wanted an attorney then game over that's the law and we respect that you can't you can't keep questioning somebody once they say that so we had to be very very careful on how we approach that interview you know knowing how hard it is and having that happen to me before like how easy it is for somebody to say I wanted an attorney like you're done and we'd already been told like you can't arrest her if she doesn't confess so we didn't get her arrested and it was the same thing with Ashley except we already had that experience with Ashley once because she was was when she got arrested in Missouri me and Clint Bertram the detective had also went out there and they brought her back to their cherished apartment we went in to talk to her just about the burglary not about the murder at all like we were just there to talk about the burglary and didn't want her to even know that we knew about the murder and she requested an attorney like almost immediately like said you know she wanted an attorney so when she got brought back to Jackson County you know we we had hopes that they weren't very high like we thought you know as soon as we go in there and tell her you know hey we don't want to talk to you about the burglary we don't we can't talk to you about that you requested an attorney but we want to talk to you about the death of Harold like I thought 100% she was going to say I don't want to talk to you but but she did during that interview Ashley talked but her words mainly implicated her mother which was no surprise but the detectives had an unfortunate surprise for her so I'm here to talk about something completely different right it's not gonna be any conversation okay um after your moments here yesterday and so for this we got a call you have check on her welfare and the matter home and she's passed away what she's she passed away what happened without going into a lot of detail uh she didn't tell me she prepared there was something ingested possibly um passed away you're serious I'm one other person serious yes she killed herself that was really the one you think you're waiting for that's what we believe happened yes come and talk I'm sorry I'm sorry no please there's nothing to apologize for um I felt it was necessary to let you know that um I'm very sorry for the loss in hours of tape Ashley stayed flat measured careful clinical almost the only crack comes when detectives tell her Marsha her mother is dead that's when the mask suddenly slips her voice wobbles her breath catches and for one minute the room feels human again it's a strange tragedy mother and daughter so tightly bound together that they eliminate the person they feel is getting in the way herald they talked of plans to sell the place and move in together But then, the pressure begins mounting. Marsha knows that Ashley will likely be in prison for a very long time, and they're coming for her next. So, she takes an easy exit. If her daughter could betray her so easily, she would do the same. But Marsha couldn't have known was what Ashley would do next. 57-year-old Harold Allen died at home in Free Town, Indiana on December 20, 2022, five days before Christmas. His death was first certified as natural. But later, a September 19, 2023, burglary at the same house, drew detectives back. Marsha Allen, Harold's wife, had been out of town when home cameras captured Stephen White, who was happy to spill all the tea in the world, with plenty of dramatic flair I might add. And phone messages tied the break-in to Marsha's daughter and friend of Stephen, Ashley Jones. She was then shifted from burglary to death. Records showed an online order shipped under the family name to the Free Town address. An interview on October 16, 17, 2023 focused on whether that chemical ended up in Harold's drink, a root beer float. Marsha had denied the order. Ashley had pointed to Marsha. But soon, evidence tied them both to the murder. Just before detectives would have arrested Marsha, they found her at home, dead in her bed of suicide. As for Harold, toxicology later reported ethylene glycol, and the death certificate was amended. Review of Marsha and Ashley's text messages alluded to an even bigger mystery. Was this Ashley's first attempt at poisoning? Doctors found it beyond strange that, get this, Ashley's ex-husband also died of supposed heart conditions, or a stroke. Hmm, suspicious, wouldn't you say? He died at a very young age, just days after he received an inheritance. Could that be a coincidence? Ashley Jones was arrested and charged in October of 2023 with murder, conspiracy to commit murder, attempted murder, and burglary tied to Harold Allen's death, and the September 2023 break-in. She later pleaded guilty in 2025 to Level 1 felony conspiracy to commit murder and attempted murder, and was sentenced to 50 years in Jackson Circuit Court. But Ashley, being the wonderful, well-adjusted human that she was, wasn't finished getting rid of people. After only a few months of incarceration, she hatched a plan. It involved a jailmate named Anita. Detective Nicholson just happened to know Anita. "I worked in the jail for like five years prior to becoming a deputy in 2005, so from 2000 to 2005, I was a jail officer. So I'm familiar with a lot of the inmates that are in and out. And this case had been in the news a few times, so I'm sure that Anita probably knew that I was the officer that was working it, and she reached out to a jail officer to let her know that she wanted to talk to me. Ashley knew that Anita was going to be getting released pretty soon. She wasn't on any real serious charges, and Anita and Ashley were in that cell together. Well, word traveled pretty quick when Anita came in, because Ashley had already been in jail, and when Anita came in, word traveled pretty quick about who she was and who her connections were. And there's a, I hate to even call it a gang, because it's really not a gang, and if they were a gang, they're not into like killing people. It's not that kind of gang, but I think Ashley started, you know, seeing, like she's never been in jail. She didn't, she didn't know, you know, Anita, she didn't know what this gang was about, and she just heard the word gang and thought, like, you know, sweet talk her and, you know, befriend her and jail here, and then get her to have these people that she's friends with in this gang, go and kill the people that are mentioned in my case and going to testify against me. Yep. She was going to have someone in this so-called gang go and kill them all. She basically wrote a letter that was going to go out in Anita's mail, and she gave, you know, Anita the letter to put in with her mail, and instead of sealing it, Anita took that part of the letter out and hid it, and then waited till she could see me and she provided me with the letter that Ashley wrote. And it was the letter that she wrote to the so-called Hitman, you know, that she thought was a Hitman, and the driver was wanting him to go all the way to Massachusetts and kill her fiancee and kill Stephen and Nathan that were in jail, and there were some other people, and I can't remember exactly who else, but she was just trying to get people taken out before they'd have a chance to testify on her. If you thought the text between Marsha and Ashley were cryptic, wait until you hear about this hit letter. She pretended it was a list of people she wanted prayers for, a prayer list, how spiritual over. She then lists out all the people with their first, middle, and last names, as well as exact locations, and what they had done to her, saying that prayer knows no bounds. I mean, you gotta give God GPS coordinates for each person you're praying for, right? Here's just a snippet of the Inmate's interview. That one did you know that we heard, or we thought we heard, and I just want to make sure that there was a high-pronged rifle mentioned in maybe two shots to the neck. Right here. She said your people would be at Spins, the Stubbs, high-pronged rifle. Right here, Sever's, every nerve includes you instantly, right here, okay? She points to the base of her skull and to her forehead, saying those are the two places Ashley said would cause instant death when struck with a bullet. But I don't know if you guys heard that. Ashley told Anita to take out Ashley her fiance, and her fiance's little girl. That would be the same little girl who lived with both Ashley's. You see, Ashley Jones hated, hated her fiance's little girl. So why not take her out, too, while you're at it? In some of the text messages with Martia, Ashley said let her starve, I hate the kid. She just sits and just does nothing, looking fat, ugly, and stupid. Remember when they used to make fun of family values and the bigots that promoted them? Ah, those were the days. That's all just hope Ashley sits in prison for the next 50 years, doing nothing but looking fat, ugly, and stupid. In the meantime, Detective Adam Nicholson is writing a book on this murder, and who knows if he digs harder, he might find even more bodies, full of poison, left in Ashley's wake. There's already speculation that she may have killed her ex-husband, as well. Yeah, he's dead. Detective Nicholson told SwordScale that this was one of the most bizarre cases he'd ever been involved with. murder case at all that would have never found out it like if it wouldn't have been for Ashley's greed and if Ashley wouldn't have you know had to have set up this burglary at her mom's house and Stephen didn't caught and we so what led me to Stephen was the burglary it was Ashley's greed Ashley wanted this burglary to take place and she trusted that Stephen would do it she had no idea her mom had installed a security system and you know Marsha would have never reported that the burglary had she known that Stephen knew about the murder if she knew that Stephen had been told by Ashley about the murder there's no way that Marsha would have called in on Stephen and turned him in Ashley's genius knew no bounds the strong independent woman that she was her master plan from inside the prison higher total strangers to cross state lines and kill people for her for free smart real smart you know what else is smart ordering your murder weapons off Amazon you know what else is smart telling your flamboyant and loudmouth gay friend that you and your mom murdered someone you know what else is smart staging a fake robbery with that same friend who can't stop talking to steal from your own mother and murder accomplice because you're a greedy narcissistic and self-centered piece of shit how's that saying go again there is no honor amongst cold-hearted cunts I forget oh and before some Karen out there sends me an angry email lecturing me and calling me a sexist for using that forbidden word realize that words are meant to describe the universe we perceive around us so we can effectively communicate even the four letter ones and I can't think of a better word to describe Ashley she's what that word was made for hope you like that and by the way last week we put up a video explaining how I fucked up all the pricing for a sword-scale television well YouTube demonetized us so there's only one place on earth you can find sword-scale television now and that's sword-scale.com or our app and we lowered pricing to ten dollars to get access to it which means that you can now get the audio only version of sword-scale the podcast on Apple podcasts for just eight bucks how do you like them apples [Music] [Music]