Sandra Birchmore’s Injuries, Christa Pike 911 Calls, and Virginia Man Tried for Murder of Wife, with Vinnie Politan: The MK True Crime Show

As you know, I love true crime. And here on the MK Show, we like to bring you the latest law and crime stories whenever we can. If you enjoy these stories as much as I do, I feel like we're crime solvers, don't you? I feel like we might be doing good. And I also feel like it helps you when a new crime gets committed in helping to figure it out. A lot of the true crime community actually does participate by sending tips into law enforcement and in some cases, they have been integral in solving cases, even some of these true crime podcasts at times have been helpful, at times not helpful, but at times helpful. So in any event, look, you got to check out MK True Crime if you are into this kind of content. MK True Crime is a channel featuring three shows where you can listen to some of your favorite legal experts from the Megan Kelly show. Kelly's court regulars like Mark Garagos, Matt Murphy, Dave Ehrenberg, Phil Holloway, Ashley Merchant, Mark Eiglarge, and John Aspelborg. Those are two of the OGs back with me 20 plus years ago doing these segments believe it or not, discussing all the latest true crime news and stories. You can't get enough of three shows, one feed, new episodes every week. They cover the headlines, the legal strategy, and the people who live it. Enjoy this episode and follow MK True Crime. Go ahead and subscribe right now. Just wherever you get your podcasts, go to that little purple button on your phone, type in MK True Crime, hit subscribe, you're good to go and you can do the same over on YouTube. That's MK True Crime on all podcast platforms. Welcome to the MK True Crime Show. I'm Phil Holloway. I'm a criminal lawyer. I'm a former prosecutor and I'm a former police officer. I believe I know a great true crime show when I see one and we've got one for you on tap today. I'm very pleased to be joined by my friend and colleague and my co-host Ashley Merchant. Ashley is also a criminal lawyer from the Atlanta Georgia area. Ashley, great to be with you today, as always. Hey Phil, it's good to see you. Let's talk about what we've got on the docket today. Lots of cases. We've got some updates in the Cornell story, including the defences request to limit public statements regarding the case and also some changes to Cornell's campus policies. Things about the gag orders these days, but we will get into that. We have a little bit later on in the program. We have award-winning journalist, my friend, Ashley's friend and the lead anchor over at court TV, our pal, Vinnie Polyton. He'll be here to discuss updates in the failed execution of the Tennessee Convict, Christa Pike. He's also going to introduce us to a murder trial that's currently underway in Virginia. Rich Bot is accused of killing and dismembering, Ashley, his wife, Muntabot, who was a nurse. This was back in 2024. Her remains have never been found. Yeah, so first up, though, we're going to get some updates in the Sandra Birchmore trial out of Massachusetts. Witness testimony began earlier this week and I actually got to listen to you and John to talk about it with a great update, but just to catch our listeners up back in February of 2021, the 23-year-old Sandra Birchmore was found dead in her apartment in Canton, Massachusetts. And her death was ruled a suicide, but then three years later, the FBI arrested former and I'm probably going to mispronounce this stought and police detective Matthew Farewell. Prosecutors say that Matthew met Sandra back when she was a teenager in a police youth program and he begins sexually abusing her, essentially grooming her, back when she was 15. They say that when she got pregnant and told him that the baby was his, a friend then reported the affair to his police department and then he strangled her, staged it to look like a suicide. But in a very interesting twist, Phil, the DNA that was later found showed that Farewell was not actually the father of her child. So the defense is saying that this was a tragic suicide after he ended the relationship that she was just so distraught. But this is a federal trial and it opened in Boston just last week and he's facing life in prison. So Phil, where do you want to start with this one? Man, there's so many places that we could start. In fact, we could do a whole show, I think, just on this one trial speaking of DNA. So actually the defendant's DNA was found not only on the ligature that was used in the strangulation death of the victim in the case, of course, now the defense is saying it's a suicide, but the defendant's DNA was found on that strap, which is the strap on an army duffel bag. But in addition, his DNA was found on the underwear she was wearing at the time of her death. That's just one of the multitude of places that we could start with in this case. But I guess in terms of the testimony, this is turning out to be a DOJ prosecution, not only of the defendant Farewell, but also of like local law enforcement. This actually grew out of the Karen Reed case, okay? So the Department of Justice is looking into local law enforcement and whether or not that may have been a botched intentional or otherwise investigation and so from the outward appearances, this might look like a murder trial, but it's not. As I said, this grew out of the investigation into Karen Reed. The law enforcement, they're looking at potential federal crimes and so this case, the state authority is elected not to prosecute it as a murder. They said it was a suicide, which nobody at this point is really buying. But this is a federal prosecution. Prosecutors are going to have to prove that the defendant not only killed Birchmore, but they have to prove that he did it actually in order to prevent her from coming forward with evidence that he committed a federal crime. And one of the federal crimes that they are pursuing or they are alleging that he was trying to essentially cover up with her death is wire fraud. So they're saying that he was on the job collecting taxpayer money in a paycheck and he was doing so for time that was actually spent with her and what was largely a criminal relationship that of course began sexually when she was 15 years old. In fact, actually there's text messages that he sent to her where he's bragging about and boasting about it is very happy about having taken her virginity when she was 15 years old. But it goes back to when she was 13 years old and he was grooming her as she was a participant in the police explorer program. The local law enforcement, they put them essentially on trial, they're saying that the local police essentially covered this up and it wouldn't surprise me at all if this doesn't turn out. The evidence seems to be overwhelming that he's guilty at this point in my opinion, but it wouldn't surprise me actually if this doesn't result in some type of subsequent charges to come against police officials and Massachusetts. Oh, yeah. I mean, Phil, this is a can of worms that I think this case is just opening and maybe perhaps Karen read open to begin with, you know, when we're done with this and Lindsey Clancy and Karen read, I wonder if any juror in Massachusetts will ever believe the police again. But the things that have really struck me when I was catching up on this case on the Sandra Birchmore case, there's a couple things that really make this impossible for the defense. I mean, beyond the fact that the evidence is, like you said, pretty much overwhelming, there's so many other aspects of the case that make this defendant just completely unlikeable. And all of that evidence it sounds like is going to slowly creep in. One of the things you mentioned is perhaps he was engaged in some wire fraud. So we've got that, you know, we've got that other scheme going on. So, you know, people think he's a creep because of that. But then the other issue that we've been having going back and forth and again, nobody can watch. So we're having to listen to reports of people who are, you know, in the courtroom, but it's a federal trial so we can't actually play the footage, unfortunately. But what's happening inside the courtroom is there's been a lot of back and forth between the government and the defense. The defense has now filed a motion accusing the government of a bad faith, you know, and that's a buzz word everybody likes to throw out and they get really, really, really mad at the other side, you know, bad faith. That's the buzz word, but a bad faith conduct regarding their efforts to get his mistresses to testify. And I can tell you as a defense lawyer, anytime you've got a client accused of any crime and you hear mistresses testifying, you're like, oh, shoot because nobody likes a cheater. Nobody likes a liar. Nobody likes a cheater. And so it makes it harder to get a jury to believe your defense if you've got someone who's a cheater, but it gets even worse fill. So not only is there testimony that he has mistresses and he's a cheater, you gotta remember, this is Massachusetts. So now they're talking about him wearing a mask and whether or not back in the height of COVID, he liked to wear masks or not. And again, you gotta think about your jury pool. So I can't help but think that they want to get in some evidence that he was an anti-masker to this jury. Yeah, he totally was. But think about it. Think about the jury pool and think about how they're gonna feel about that. That's gonna signal something in the back of their heads. So we've got this argument now where the prosecutors are saying that the defense actually opened the door to evidence of his affairs with these other women because they said, and they probably did, they said in opening statements that his behavior was about hiding his infidelity rather than the criminal nature of his relationship. And so they're saying that that is opening the door and it probably is because he never wore a mask or disguise otherwise. And so why was he wearing a mask? when this happened. So I think that is yet another nail in this man's coffin, Phil. Well, and we've got that video and we can play it for those of our audience who are watching on YouTube. And by the way, if you're not subscribed on YouTube, you should check us out on YouTube, in addition to listening to us on the podcast because we have good video like this video that shows the man entering into and leaving her apartment wearing a hoodie and mask. I think it was to hide his face. Prosecutors think he was to hide his face. That's why they want to call the other adult women with whom he was having extra marital affairs because they would say, according to prosecutors, that he never went to such links to try to hide his relationship with them. And so that would implicate him in the murder because they're saying he did it in this particular instance, not to hide the affair, but to hide his identity as the killer because, by the way, while he was in her home, that was the very last activity on her phone. And it showed eight steps. And then her phone went down and what silent went inactive forever. And it showed eight steps three minutes before he left. But if all that's not enough to get your attention, it also appears in this case that this defendant has a twin brother, okay? And the twin brother and an assistant chief of police at the time apparently were also themselves in an inappropriate relationship with Sandra Birchmore, along with a military recruiter who, as it turns out, is now alleged to be the father of her unborn child and who also is on the witness list and is presumably going to testify in this trial. Many observers, actually, myself included were not buying the defense claim of suicide. For starters, the original medical examiner who did determine it was suicide appears to have done so only after what I think was an inappropriate sort of commentary from the Canton police and state police who told that medical examiner's office that this appeared to be a suicide and never never did follow up with any information that it was, perhaps suspicious. It's now been revised and the ME is calling it undetermined, which brings us to sought one, actually. So the victim in this case had notable and obvious injuries to the front of her face. And here we have in sought one is reporter Michelle McFee who is in court and saw the crime scene photos for herself. I just took in brutally rapid photos taken at Sandra Birchmore's apartment after she died and the first thing I noticed in this very rapid photos of her death was that it is a plant that Sandra Birchmore's nose was broken. It was definitely bruised in the shape of it. He had plotted blood around her mouth and I just looked back at some of the old state police reports, many of them written by John Fanning and Matthew Dyn and none of these reports know the damage to Sandra Birchmore's face. Wow Phil, so it sounds like this just keeps getting worse for the defense, which you know it probably should, but I've got a question before we move on to the Cornell case. Tell me about your theory on January 20th, 2021 and how that plays into this case. I'm very curious. Well, you know January 20th was a big day and I think it signaled sort of the dreadful end of the beginning of the end of of Sandra Birchmore's life. And I don't know that I was supposed to call it a theory, but what I'm taking from the evidence is this. So on January 20th, 2021, a friend of Birchmore's called Stoughton PD, police to report the relationship. In fact, the call was about some money that was owed for doing some nails, but it really was about a report of the relationship, the illegal criminal relationship, I should say, between the defendant and the victim. Birchmore apparently owed this person some money, but the caller also mentioned the affair. So the dispatcher who took the call told far well about it, he sent a text to Birchmore Ashley and it said, dude, your effing friend just called my job Sandra WTF. And then he followed up with your friend just called my effing work to complain about me WTF. And then he says in text messages, by the way, there were tens of thousands of text messages that were found between these individuals over the last number of years. But he also sent a text message saying that you also told me that no one knew about us yet she claimed that we were effing, okay? And then he says, I literally can't believe this is even real life. Like what else do I have to worry about now? Which other friend will do something tomorrow? So prosecutors are saying that this was sort of his motive and this sent him off because within days actually of that phone call to the dispatcher, he asked for a key to her apartment and the evidence is that he began casing the place and 12 days later she was dead. And the last person to see her alive was the hooded up and masked up defendant in the case. And it appears that this is sort of the culmination of all the circumstantial evidence. And so when I say it's overwhelming evidence, that's just the piece of what I'm I want to move to the Cornell 7, Cornell 8, whatever that name is. If I say Cornell, I think everyone knows what I'm talking about. We've got a couple updates. It seems like every few days some new texts come out, you know, text that I'm not quite sure why they weren't coming out in the first place, but people are discovering more texts. And every time that they come out, we get another statement, we get another response. And so there's a couple things we want to update everyone on and then talk about. One of them is these new texts that are coming out, you know, the lawyer for Jane Doe has come out because these texts were, you know, 48 hours later and basically talking about why his client had this delayed response, which to me was really interesting. And I want to spend some time talking about it. One of the things he said was the exchange was a textbook response to sexual assault and said that the messages showed classic symptoms of delayed recognition. He actually, yeah, so, you know, I don't want to talk too much about what he has to say, but I thought this was really interesting when he had this statement about this classic symptoms of delayed recognition. If we could take a listen to sought for and then I want to talk about this delayed recognition and how this actually plays into the law. Cut on nine years, they're not putting anybody in jail, but what they can do is throw people out. And as I've said many times, I'm not saying all seven of these guys are rapists. Four of them definitely work. And in the evidence that came up and that's in my opinion, and I've looked at the testimony, I've listened to my client and I, my opinion is they raped and intoxicated woman, that's my opinion. And what happens? Only two of them get kicked out, two of them get suspended, but they can come back and they can live with their wife and they can have their Ivy League degree and she's stuck with nothing. Well, actually, I've handled, I don't know about you. So you mentioned that this was, he's claiming this is sort of the classic response or some delay recognition as well. I've handled, I know you have to, but in my capacity as a law enforcement officer, as a prosecutor and even doing defense work, I've handled many cases involving sexual assault or claims of sexual assault. And what I can tell you is there's no classic response. I mean, each one has been very, very different from the other. And so I just, his statement to that effect is a little bit of a head scratcher, but I don't know about you. Well, I do know about you, actually, because we've handled some of these together. But we have seen cases, you and I, in our own practices where there have been false allegations of a sexual assault that were precipitated by individuals who, I guess, feel a little bit of guilt. They feel shame or maybe a parent or a loved one or friends find out that there was a sexual relationship. And then what happens is they, you know, they adopt the label of being a victim. And it's a lot easier, I guess, to be, to claim that you're a victim than to admit that certain things sometimes are consensual and voluntary. Rape is a horrible offense. I mean, it's the worst crime, one of the worst crimes that I can even imagine. Okay, it's, it's maybe arguably worse than a murder. But equally as bad is a false allegation of a sexual assault or a rape because the consequences to people are, or their life shattering. I mean, their life ending in some cases because they get life in prison are sometimes that even parole. So it's very important that the prosecutors, police and lawyers and courts are able to look at all these things objectively, look at each case critically and say, okay, is this something that can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt? Or am I just left with the way it makes me feel? We can't prosecute people on how we feel. We have to prosecute based on what can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. Yeah, and I wanted to talk about this delayed recognition that he's talking about because in my practice, and I do have quite a few of these cases. I have a lot of active cases that are very similar, not obviously multiple gang, you know this business. this term, I hate this term gang rape, gang bang, you know, that's obviously a little bit different, but a lot of what I would consider is mostly regret type cases, and we always say regret is not rape, but one of the things that we always are looking at and talking about is this delayed recognition. And so, you know, this lawyer is saying, this is classic delayed recognition, but I think that it's really important to sort of dissect that for a minute. What he is saying is that misdough, she didn't think it was raped when it happened, because if it's delayed recognition, that means you did not think it was rape when it happened. Right, right. Exactly. Yeah, so she didn't think it was rape until the next day, 48 hours later, something like that. It necessarily means that she came to that conclusion later after people had talked to her. Exactly, after reflecting on what happened. So, and he thinks that that actually helps her case, but the problem is delayed recognition explains why someone might wait, but it doesn't tell you whether the consent was real at the time, and a real victim and someone who's regretting a night can look exactly the same as someone who actually was raped. So, regret and rape can look the same if it's delayed recognition, but the issue is this fits both. Okay, so the delayed actually fits both, but think about it. If the woman in the room did not experience it at the time as non-concentral sex, how was the young man supposed to perceive it in that exact moment? Because consent is judged at the time. It's actually happening. It's not judged when it's reconstructed weeks later after you have conversations, after you have group chats, after you have protests. When we let this, you know, I've thought about it, and now I think it was rape, that's not the standard. If that becomes the standard, then we're stopped. We've stopped caring about what happened in that room, and we've started caring only about how someone feels about it now. That's not justice. That is classic regret. I think his statements are classic regret. Think about our rules of evidence that we use in court all the time. Just in any other context, the rules of evidence favor, like someone who takes notes on a case like police or whatever, they favor the notes that were written contemporaneously with an event or shortly thereafter over a report or something that was generated days or weeks or even months or sometimes like in this case, years later, memory is malleable. We know that. Scientifically, we know that memory is malleable. We also know that individuals are subject to, I guess, being impressionable. They're subject to the power of suggestion. I've had a prosecutor before tell me upon the dismissal of a sexual assault case that this prosecutor believed that some family and therapists who got involved later in the case convinced the person that she was a victim of a sexual assault when the evidence didn't otherwise suggest it. I'm not saying that's what definitely happened in this case. I'm saying it's a possibility. I think it's a plausible possibility based on the text messages, the things that we know. After all, she has literally texted these people in the days, like immediately following this event that none of the sexual stuff was illegal. She admits to having very clouded memory and just presents lots of problems that would, I think, make a criminal prosecution just not a viable proposition for any rational prosecutor. I don't know about you, but if I were a prosecutor and I had to look at this case and say, can I or can I not prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, even though I may think that the sexual assault rate did occur, the question for me actually is, can I stand in front of a jury and prove it to the satisfaction of 12 jurors to the satisfaction of those jurors beyond a reasonable doubt and get a conviction, because if I can't, then I don't need to bring the case. It's not just a what you can get a warrant for, because that's just probable cause. A prosecutor needs to make charging decisions based on what they can prove beyond a reasonable doubt. But we'll have to leave it right there because actually coming up next, we have our friend and our pal, lead anchor at court TV, Mr. Vinny Pollinson will join us. He's going to discuss Christophe Pike updates and talk about that botched execution and the murder trial. And this is a very, very interesting story that we'll get into next involving Nuresh bot. So stick around, you won't want to miss it. Welcome back to the MKTree Crime Show. Joining us now is the lead anchor of court TV and a good friend Vinny Pollinson. We have to come back. Vinny, it's so good to see you. Great to be here. Great to see you guys. So Vinny, before we get to updates in Christophe Pike's failed execution, which we all want to talk about, we want to discuss the trial that you've been following Nuresh bot. So that is underway right now in Virginia. And prosecutors are alleging that bot murdered his wife, Mumta bot, dismembered her body and disposed of her remains. Her body has never actually been recovered. He has pled not guilty to the charges. So Vinny, we know you've been covering this case extensively for court TV. Can you bring us up to speed on what's actually been happening in this trial so far? I can't wait to hear about it. Yeah. So you talk about prosecutors building their case. The foundation of this case is just Nuresh bot speaking. And he's talking to everyone and the jury gets to see and hear all of it. It begins with police body cam. Then we go to text messages with friends of Mumta and friends of his. And then he's doing interviews with Nepal TV, a great journalist over there who's won a lot of awards. He went on her show and she basically interrogated him. It was amazing. So what prosecutors are really doing with this type of evidence is saying, look, this guy is telling different stories to different people about the disappearance of his wife. On the one hand, he's telling police that, oh, yeah, she destroyed her phone and then she went off to Texas or New York. And then when he speaks to his Mumta's friend who has sisters in Texas and New York, and she lives in one of those, I think she lives in New York. She's like, no, Mumta never talked to us about any of that. That didn't happen. Then he's telling her a different story, like that she she went to work and then all of a sudden she disappeared. And then he's telling the journalist another story about what happened. So what you say, Ken and we'll be used against you, whether it's to police, to your friends, or to the your local journalist in Nepal. Oh my gosh. This is pretty fascinating, right? Because so back in 2020, for making of work, right? She was a pediatric nurse, right? But nobody, nobody has ever been found. And prosecutors say they have blood evidence that they found in the home, including there was a saw. I think with with some DNA and some other evidence, Vinnie, there was dumpster videos where I think he's seen at various places in the state throwing big bags into various dumpsters. Can you expand on on that part of the prosecutor's case? And is this circumstantial? Is it direct evidence? And when you put it all together, are they saying why he may have done all this? Yeah. All those questions can be answered by the prosecution. Now there is no direct evidence here. He's not admitting to anything. There's no video of him actually doing anything to Mumta. We don't have that. And I say we, you know I'm a former prosecutor. That's the way I look at the world, right? But looking at this case, the videos, this is the interesting part. He is dumping these these big bags into a dumpster at different times. Where is it? It's at the apartment complex of his babysitter for their young daughter, right? So he drops the young daughter off of the babysitter, stops at the dumpster there. As a matter of fact, he made one trip to to that parking lot, dumps stuff off in the dumpster, then left and then came back two hours later to pick up his child. So in all of his interviews, has he explained that? No, no, no, no, not that we've seen yet. The interviews that we've seen are our interviews while Mumta was missing before he was arrested, where he's telling all the various stories of where she could be. So that's part of it. Then you go to his apartment and they find cleaning supplies in his bedroom, right? In one of the bedrooms, which is unusual, but maybe that's just where they keep them, right? But it's a nice house. You don't need to keep them, you can keep them in the bathroom, you can keep them in the laundry room, you can keep them in the kitchen, all different places, they're in the bedroom. But what they do find are what they believe, what they describe as drag marks with the blood. So they kind of put the agent, they sprinkle the agent in the room, turn out the lights, it lights up like a Christmas tree and they believe they see what they describe. And maybe there's an expert for the defense who looks at it differently, obviously, but as drag marks. And that's when they originally charged him with concealing a dead body. That was some of the evidence that investigators that was made public at the time that we knew about. Eventually that transformed into first degree murder charges. So you put these trips to the dumpster, the drag marks of the blood, and then we've got a saw and you put those together and two plus two can equal four. But again, how exactly did she die? I don't know if they're ever going to be able to answer that question. For me, it comes to, all right, what does the jury demand of this prosecution? Will they be like that jury down in central Florida, who's been haunting me for years, who wanted to know, they wanted everything proved beyond a reasonable doubt, not just the elements of the crime, they wanted every fact beyond a reasonable doubt, because that's what we sort of learned from the jury afterwards. So you've got a lot of people in prison throughout the country who are convicted on the strength of circumstantial evidence alone. Oh, yeah. Very powerful. Yeah, but there's no body. No, but what we do, but we have a spike in the water usage right there at the time she disappeared at his home, and we have incriminating searches around 4 a.m., Vinnie, what's up with those? Yeah. Again, you're putting all of these things together, and he doesn't, and he takes his time, and if you watch these videos, and to me, that's the most compelling part of this, is that everyone, her coworkers, her friends, her family, everyone is just worried, and he is like, it's no big deal. She took off. She takes off all the time. She leaves the baby all the time, really, really a woman who decided that her profession should be as a pediatric nurse and has a young daughter. Just takes off all the time like she's some, you know, wild and crazy gal who's out on the town. No. Yeah. The reason she's leaving the house is because there is allegations of some physical abuse taking place as well. He admits to just one incident where she accidentally got hit in the head with a plate. So what's the motive, Vinnie? I mean, is it just he's just a violent guy who hates his wife? I mean, normally we'd have some cheating spouse, we'd have some life insurance, we'd have something. Like, what's the motive? Okay. Gurs want motives. I know they don't have to, but they want motives. Right. You have to dive into the culture. So the culture is a little bit different. This was an arranged marriage. And I think he wanted to be arranged with someone else. So apparently there's another woman. Maybe rearranged, he wanted a rearranged marriage. But they want a rearranged marriage. There's another woman in Nepal and this is someone he's been, you know, it's culturally different, right? I get it. Apparently, the divorce is not necessarily an option in this culture. Although she had spoken to a divorce attorney, you know, she's in the United States, she comes to the United States. He's much more familiar with the way the United States works. She's very limited. She doesn't have a car. She doesn't have transportation. She doesn't have access to money. She's working, but apparently she doesn't have access to the money the same way he does. And she's kind of put in this position where she's not, she doesn't have equal footing to be able to do things. And she's trying to figure it out, and this is like in the late winter where she's trying to figure out how to do it. And she does leave him for a week or so. Eventually, they're back under the same roof, but she's not happy. And he's got a girlfriend. And I think that's part of why she's not happy is that he's communicating with this other woman. And apparently there may be more than one, but there was one in particular that he and his family perhaps wanted to rearrange the marriage with that it wasn't quite working out. So a rearranged, arranged marriage, right, because there is the daughter. There is the daughter. He has this connection to his daughter. You've got, we always have, what you said earlier is something I'll always repeat too. You know, what you say can and will be used against you in court. And when you make any kind of statement, whether it's to the police or even to the media, if you make inconsistent statements, it really does make someone look very guilty. In fact, we have some of that. We have an interview where he's the defendant, Noresh is telling some local news, what happened the day his wife went missing and he might get caught in some discrepancies. Let's take a listen to Sock 13. It was the last time you saw her, a witness day in the evening, okay, and then what happened after that? Did she leave? Did you leave? No, just like, you know, she was like, you know, working on the kitchen, you know, like after like, you know, eating these things and then instead of like that, I just went upstairs with my baby. Okay. And you went to sleep or, okay, and then what happened next when was she supposed to go to work that night? Yeah, we work early in the morning, yeah, you know, like, it's about like, you know, five, thirty, like around six, we're supposed to leave from the home. But she left the night before? No, like, custody's supposed to see at work, on custody, she's supposed to at work. So Wednesday night, though, what happened there? You went to sleep? Where was she? Oh, so she was like working on the kitchen and then right there, you know, like usually, you know, if I have to work, you know, like, I go there and then sometimes, you know, in the morning, we do not disturb because of the baby, you know, like, we're not working. We do not disturb to, you know, another person. So, you know, keep taking care of the baby and then, you know, slightly left the home and then go for work. That's what that's what that is. So what's the defense? She ran away. You know, she's hiding in Nepal. Yeah, but she wasn't working the next day. She was. Yeah. So she had a problem in a, in a, in a discussion with the detective. He talks about her going to work. And then the detective points out, well, she doesn't work that day and then the story slightly changes. None of it makes sense. When he's first approached, when there's a wellness check being done that he didn't ask for, the folks at work, she didn't show up for work two days in a row. I mean, mom, to never miss his work. I mean, she takes it very seriously. She hadn't contacted anyone. They couldn't contact her. And police did the wellness check. His story to police initially is, oh, she destroyed her phone and he went to text. She went to Texas. No, hang on. I don't want to interrupt you. We actually have that. We, we have the video of the welfare check. Let's go ahead and share that with our audience. And then we can finish talking about it. Hello, Sarah. Are you almost a two men as part, please? We're looking for a miss month of coffee. Yeah. We see like on Tuesday, Wednesday, she left and then she said she's going to go either New York or Texas and then she left like I said, had the phone and then she destroyed that phone and then she left. Did she say why she left? Yeah, because, you know, like, we are about to separate and then the homing inspection come here to, I'm about to sell the home. So, you know, like, see, you want to say like, okay, I want to go, you know, with my sister. When she left, was she, did you say anything about herding herself or anything concerning? No, because, you know, it is the first time then, you know, like, I can say, okay, where are you going this and that? This is like, you know, multiple times. I don't know, like, you know, who we call you, but like, you know, sometimes she came back. Her employer, her employer called and asked me just, just called us to check if she was okay. So, that's why we're here. We don't mean to bother you. That's fine. She's supposed to be there. Usually, like, I don't know, I cannot check, you know, like, where is she? He's definitely not helping himself. It sounds like, also, that he's changed lawyers a ton of times. So, it sounds like he can't keep his mouth shut. He doesn't listen to his lawyers. I mean, what? But there's a big discrepancy right there, right there. He's saying that she left Wednesday, destroy her phone. Oh, she's going to Texas or New York. She's just left, right? We're getting separated. She left. Then he's saying, in that other interview, we had dinner Wednesday night. She's downstairs preparing dinner, and then Thursday morning, she's going to work. Because he's lying. I mean, that's the thing, though. I think, you know, and if I was the defense lawyer, I'd be like, look, they did a really good job proving that he's a liar. They did a really good job proving that he can't, you know, he should keep his mouth shut. But does that mean that he killed his wife? I mean, where's the evidence of that? Because it sounds like the blood. The blood. The blood. The blood. I bet you that smudge blood. Come on. Well, the circumstantial evidence is, I mean, you probably get convicted, but, look, sorry. When I was a prosecutor of any animal about you, I love circumstantial evidence because it causes jurors to imagine things in their brain. Instead of showing them a picture, you know, they get to invent the image in their mind. And when you have, you know, you know, somebody throwing these bags into dumpsters and things around them all around and you've got the spike in the water meter and you've got the drag marks in the blood and all that. The imagination of the jurors just kind of can take it and run with it. And that's why I say, circumstantial evidence is so powerful because it's the inference that jurors get to make from it. They get to imagine these scenarios in their head and that's what's going to convict him because I tell you when I look at all this stuff and I look at the circumstantial evidence, my imagination is painting a picture that doesn't look very good for the defendant here in this case. No, it doesn't. I'll be, I'll be really curious to see if he can keep his mouth shut when it comes time to testify or not testify. That will be the biggest tell to me if he's going to keep his mouth shut then well, we want him to take the stand. We want him to take the stand. Oh, I know you wanted to take the stand. Oh, I know. And I get the sense if he can't shut up with all these other interviews, he probably wants to take the stand. And if he's fighting with his lawyer, my guess is he's going to take the stand. We'll have to, we'll have to follow back up on that. That'll be really interesting. But Vinnie, we've got to talk about Christopher Pike. Oh my God. So the 911 calls, several of them were released. So we've got some of the 911 calls. I thought this was really interesting. The main 911 call, of course, the government said, oh, we can't exclude that call because, you know, oh, it's all secret. And so we can't God forbid you actually hear. what we said on it, but they did release a transcript. So we've got that. So we know that they basically worked sure if they wanted to have EMT help or not. And they called, I mean, it's just, it's unreal. I'm not gonna lie, reading this 911 transcript is just unreal. It's like, hey, yeah, what's your emergency? Well, we were trying to kill this lady and she just wouldn't die. And so I guess now we have to have the EMTs come and render life-saving results. And then the EMTs show up and they won't let them in. They won't let the EMTs in. And then they're like, do you have the secret code? 'Cause there has to be a secret code to get into the super secret prison. And they're like, there's a lady that needs our help and is dying, but you won't let me in without the super secret code. And then her lawyer, her lawyer literally calls 911. And it's like, the state is trying to kill my client, which yeah, we know they're trying to kill your client, but like, they're not doing a good job at it. And so now we need EMTs. I mean, this is just such a mind, you know, I don't wanna say the effort. Like, like, it's insane. So what did you think when you were listening to these? And we've got one, I wanna play in a minute. But like, what, when you see these 911 calls, what are you thinking? - Well, there's a couple of parts of this. Like, I always try to keep perspective on this story and what we're talking about, right? Like, if this was, like, what you're describing almost sounds like, you know, it's a malpractice claim, right? Like if she died, it would be wrongful death. But if she died, it would be like execution, right? It's an execution. So that was like the whole point of it to begin with. So I'm trying to put, and I did some research and I'm trying to figure out, well, what should, to me, it's all about what should happen next. Like, it's obvious that this was all, it was botched. It was botched from the beginning to the end. But what's the, what is the remedy for that? What is the remedy for botching in execution? And I think that's where we are. We're in a very bizarre place. Now I know, and I appreciate what the defense is going to say about it and how they will attempt to use that as a basis for there to be no re-execution, right? A second attempt to take her life. Like, understand that, that's their job. They have to test the system that way. But I don't know if it's a legal basis to do that. - Well, it's hard to have a whole lot of sympathy for Christopak and any suffering she may have gone through considering the suffering that she caused with her victim. But, you know, that issue to the side. The legal question that you present, Vinny, is a very interesting one. We are in uncharted territory here, although in, I think it was the 1940s, the Supreme Court of the United States said that, you know, you don't exactly get like amnesty if the government botches their first attempt at executing someone. It's not the double jeopardy or anything of that nature. But it's the irony here that they're trying to literally kill this woman. It's legal and it's sanctioned. It's lawful, but they're trying to cause someone to die. And how are they trying to cause her to die? They're trying to cause her to die by poisoning her to the point that her body is unable to breathe. So what are the first responders responding to? They are responding to someone who is suffocating and can't breathe. That's literally the irony here. But I want to get your reaction, Vinny. We have sought number eight for our producers. This is emergency responders who thought that this 911 call because it's so crazy in the irony of it all. They thought it might be a prank call, sought eight. - So we have a medical call for service at the River Bend Prison, (beep) saying that they carried out the execution, the subject didn't have to wait and they needed ambulance 'cause she's not breathing normally. We are trying to find out if that is an actual thing that is happening and we need to send an ambulance and/or if you need police assistance or if this is someone that is just basically prank calling or like swatting us. - We have been informed that it is a false call. There is no medical assistance needed at River Bend Prison. - We've got a call about if failed execution at your best facility and we just call into verify. - Who called you or is it like a sergeant that I could speak with or a supervisor? - Who called you, you know? No, we don't, exactly, no. I'm being told that nobody from our facility calls you so there's not really anything to speak of at the moment. - The Central Control just called us and it is actually real so we're gonna have FD in her. - This is just, this is literally exhibit one for why the government cannot execute people and not violate the constitution. They cannot even figure out whether or not to call EMTs or 911 or if someone can get in the prison or not. They're not competent. I mean, that's what this call says. They don't know what they're doing. They don't even know if they're killing someone or they're not killing someone or someone called. I mean, that's insane to me, the fact that this happened when they're trying to execute a human being. I just, I don't understand it at all. But we also know that Christa's lawyer actually called EMTs. We've got that. We've got, if we want to play that, it's not nine. - What's going on is my client, Christa Bill Pike, is undergoing a state execution. She has completed the stages of the protocol and lastly made from the attorney who's present. She's still alive and breathing and needs immediate life savings here. She's received two doses, at least three doses, it's hit a bar with all through IVs. - So Vinnie, we want to talk about that. - Vinnie, put it all together. - Yes. - Yeah, Vinnie put it all together. What do we make of all this and what's next? - So she's got the two doses. That's what I want to hear. - Right. - Like she got, they followed the protocol. So the state protocol was followed. She just didn't die. So what's next? - But let's start here. The protocol, they need to revisit. And obviously they've stopped all executions and they're revisiting all that. There's a couple aspects of this. Like everything that's happened to her at the execution, to me falls in the column of, oh, she may have a civil case for damages, okay? For whatever that's worth when you're on death row, right? I go back to what Phil mentioned, which was the 1940s, the case of Willie Francis. He survived electrocution in the electric chair. His ordeal, my guess is, was probably more traumatic, more painful than hers because the reports were, at one point she was snoring during hers. So I'm not minimizing whatever pain she went through. I'm just saying, I think what Willie Francis went through back in the '40s was worse. So for what happened to her, to be a basis for her not to be eligible for a second trip to the death chamber, I think the Supreme Court would have to overturn what they decided back in the '40s in the Willie Francis case. And they could do that, but they would have to do that. I don't think there's any lower court that could say, no, you can't go forward with the execution if the state wants to. And finally, when it comes to the defendant, and this is where I'm gonna pick a little bit of a fight with the defense and the way they went about all this. There are two means of execution that she was eligible for in this case, right? Because of the murder that she committed was before 1998. So in Tennessee, if it's before 1998, you have the choice. The default is lethal injection, but you have the choice for electrocution, right? And the big issue that was brought up by the defense to fight this execution that they keep screaming about is she has this blood disorder. So it's gonna be hard to find her veins, okay? It's a common argument for lethal injection because a lot of these inmates, and I'm not saying she did, but a lot of these inmates will dehydrate themselves. So their veins shrink and you can't get them. I get blood drawn four times a year. I know what it's like, I'm diabetic. So, but if she was concerned about, you know, all my veins, she could have checked the box for electrocution. But she said, I think she said that's against her religion or something. So they had a choice going in. They chose lethal injection over electrocution. I know it's, it's not a great choice either. One of them. - Well, no, she actually asked for hanging. So they had a quote. - She asked for hanging, but they can't do that. - She asked for hanging. - Yeah, they said that. - It's not approved. She asked for hanging, knowing that she's not gonna get it. It's like a false choice. - They could have proved it clearly not that hard to approve it, you know? - It's a false. - I disagree, actually. I think it's pretty hard to get the legislature to add another method of execution because it's so complicated as it is, most states are trying to make it less complicated and adding another method in there, I think would, certainly be a tall order to get a legislature to put through in my life. - Well, the prison is the one that actually does that. So the prison has the protocol and they set up the protocol and it's an administrative rule so they can do that within their own protocol. They could have actually changed this protocol. They could have changed the lethal injection protocol. They could have mandated a central line. One of the big issues why this was so botched was they actually removed about 60 pages of the protocol right before this where the people who were doing the central line were supposed to practice on other people and they removed the practice requirement. So that's why that gentleman who was the one that enacted the protocol quit because he's the one that removed that practice requirement. So, I mean, there's a lot of things that went wrong in this case, but, you know, Vinnie, thank you so much for being here and can you tell our audience where to find you particularly So they can keep up with the bot. all because that case is just wow. I'm very curious what happens in that case, Benny. - Absolutely. Now, Vinny Palatin investigates us the show. They call it VPI. It's on every night at 8 o'clock on court TV wherever you get your court TV. It's available all different ways. But also on YouTube, on the court TV channel, every night we post the show there as well. So you can keep up with all the latest and the rush bot and everything else that's happening in our court rooms. - Awesome. Thank you so much, Vinny. It's great to see you. Next up, we've got, we've got a legal mail bag question that we're gonna answer. - Welcome back to the MK True Crime Show. I'm Phil Holloway along with my co-host, Ashley Merchant. It's now time for one of our favorites. We haven't been able to do it a while. We have a legal mail bag segment. Listener Kelly writes as follows. Long time listener here and the Cornell 7 case has left me with a legal question. If a woman is so intoxicated that the law considers her incapable of consenting to sex, what happens when the man involved is also extremely intoxicated? If both people are profoundly intoxicated, what is the legal mechanism that distinguishes the person incapable of giving consent from the person who is still legally responsible for recognizing that the other person cannot give it? - I think that's a great question, Ashley. And a lot of us have lots of legal questions that have sort of erupted in the wake of these allegations in the Cornell 7 case. And in fact, we have a site that we can get to in a minute where the lawyer for the accuser is referring to what's called a loophole in New York law as it pertains to voluntary intoxication. But before we get to that site, Ashley, can you take a crack at answering that question? - Yes, I'm happy to. So there's a lot of ways to answer it. There's a lot of things that are implicated. And I think it really gets to the heart of this issue. But basically voluntarily and to be voluntarily intoxicated. And that means you took it yourself, you know? You weren't drugged. You actually made yourself intoxicated on your own free will. Most states, it is somewhat of a defense. It's not a complete defense. So and what I mean by that is it wouldn't negate what's called specific intent. So when you hear like a murder case, that's probably the best and easiest example. When you hear someone did something with premeditation, being drunk could negate that premeditation. So it doesn't mean you're not guilty of killing someone. It just means that your mind was not able to actually form that specific intent to kill. So it doesn't excuse a crime. It just can actually be admissible to sort of give you a lower level of that crime. But the minority of states, and I'll tell you, there's some minority states and Georgia happens to be one. So I know this minority, unfortunately, all too well. It is barred entirely. It cannot even negate, you know, your act at all. So you could be completely incapacitated from drinking alcohol. Let's say that you were in the Cornell case in Georgia. If you were completely incapacitated and you as a man, we're still having sex with Jane Doe, but you were drunk and she was drunk. I mean, obviously the physics of that, you know, maybe a little funky, but you could still be held accountable even if you were to the point that you were passed out drunk. So that's in Georgia, Montana, Arizona, Florida, Illinois. Ohio, Texas, Delaware, Missouri, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Indiana. - So, you know, I think this, it's obviously, it's very complicated because I think most people, certainly people who have found themselves at some point in their life have been, say, overserved, okay, with alcohol. It's entirely possible. And in fact, I know for a fact it's possible because I've seen it in real life, more than a handful of times, actually, where, you know, someone is very intoxicated. They, and maybe the next day they, their memory is clouded or maybe they have no memory at all. Maybe they're blacked out, but in the moment, you know, they're, they're walking, they're talking, perhaps with slurred speech, but nevertheless they, they give like actual consent. And then, you know, later, maybe they don't remember, okay, giving actual consent. So that is a real problem, okay, it's a real issue. And what the law hates more than almost anything is the concept of a wrongful conviction, or at least it's supposed to, right? And so a lot of these laws are written in a way to sort of minimize the chance of a wrongful conviction for sort of the circumstances that I just let out, where someone is, they actually maybe consent, but then later, you know, have a different memory of it or don't remember it at all. So that's where voluntary intoxication comes in. And, you know, this New York law, the way it's written, I mean, it's 20 states, I think, have it written that way and people call it a loophole. Well, I call it a feature rather than a bug, but I mentioned we had the attorney for the accuser, we had him some of his video from media interviews up at the beginning of the program. Let's go ahead and run sought six, which is Geofra speaking about what he calls the New York loophole. I'm aware of the loophole in New York state law, but hopefully something good will come out of this. And a law that's been pending to change this idea that if a woman is drunk and you rape her and she was voluntarily drunk, you're not guilty of rape, that'll get finally get corrected. And New York will be in alignment with the majority of states that are out there that don't, you know, buy into that. Let's know what the law says, right? Because, you know, incapacitation is incapacitation, and it's right, this has to do with, you know, presumptions. People who are, who voluntarily are intoxicated, you know, there's no presumption that they were incapacitated, right? So, but if you, if you spike somebody's drink and you involuntarily intoxicate them, then it's a different story. So, the New York law is designed to prevent wrongful convictions, and what I would say is it's not a loophole, it was designed that way on purpose, and it was designed that way to prevent wrongful convictions, actually. I think you're right, but I also think there's another part of this. I actually, it's ironic because a lot of people who are super feminists are calling this a loophole and calling it for being changed. And to me, as a woman, I think that women should be allowed to take their own responsibility for their actions, and if they choose to drink and then choose to consent, I don't think that they should later on be able to say, "Oh, I changed my mind because I was drunk. I need protection as a woman. I need to be protected because I don't have free will and can't make my own decisions to go out and have alcohol and lower my inhibitions." So, I, you know, I think this issue is a whole lot bigger, Phil. And, you know, we won't, we won't solve it today, obviously, but I think our country is talking about it a whole lot right now. - No, that's certainly not going to be the end of the discussion. And, of course, we're going to be following this case and all the other ones from today's program as they work their way through the legal system. So, go ahead and, by way of reminder, if you're listening to the sound of my voice and you haven't subscribed anywhere, please subscribe. Anywhere you get your podcast, but also on YouTube, because I think it's important sometimes to get the video, in addition to the audio that we cover here on the program. But, we'll leave it there. I want to say a special thanks to our guest, Vinnie Paulton. Thanks to you, actually, for as always, being a great co-host. And a special thanks to our producers for making us look and sound better than we deserve. And finally, to you, our audience, who makes this program possible. We'll see you back here next time on the MK True Crime Show.