She Married A TV-Star & Then Wanted Him Dead... The Shocking Aaron Goodwin Case

Hey everyone and welcome back to True Crime with Kendall Rae. Obviously not Kendall Rae and not even in the slightest. Certainly not as beautiful, but it's the next best thing. I'm her husband Josh. If you know me, you've probably seen me on other podcasts like Mile Hire, which I host with Kendall, I also have a paranormal True Crime podcast called Lights Out. But I'm here today to step in for my lovely wife while she continues to enjoy her maternity leave. She's soaking up all the goodness of our beautiful baby boy, Truman. And she was like, Hey, you want to jump on the show again and do another episode? And obviously I'm not going to say no. I was actually three years ago. The last time I appeared on her show, I did an episode for her on her last maternity leave. So here I am three years later. And I'm excited because I've got an absolutely mind blowing case for you. You probably heard about it. It was all over the news. And it was actually involving one of my favorite paranormal investigators, Aaron Goodwin and his wife Victoria Goodwin. This case just completely rocked me when it happened because I was like, there is no way he is dealing with this. I mean, this is a case with lots of twists and turns, many that you would never see coming. But if you're not familiar with Aaron Goodwin, he is the famed paranormal investigator and cast member of the show Ghost Adventures. If you are a paranormal lover, like I am, you've probably watched a few episodes at the very least or like be watched seasons over the years. I mean, there's almost 30 seasons at this point, or I think there is 30 seasons. And Aaron Goodwin has been a staple on that show. He's actually been one of my favorite members of that show because I feel like he just brings so much good positive energy to the show. He's super funny, super entertaining. I think he honestly makes that show great. Obviously, I love Zach Begins, kind of the host of the show. But Aaron is just, I mean, you can just tell he's such a good guy. He's genuinely passionate about what he's doing, and he's just a ton of fun. So what happens to him is completely out of left field. I mean, talk about a guy who has spent years and years and years looking for evidence of the paranormal dealing with horrors of the unseen. And last thing he probably ever thought was that there was something evil lurking inside of his own bed. And that is what is so insane about this case. So that being said, let's go ahead and jump in to the case of Aaron Goodwin and Victoria Goodwin. So my man, Aaron Goodwin, he's born April 1st, 1971 in Eugene, Oregon. We don't know a ton about his early childhood life, but we know that he eventually ended up in the Portland area before finally moving to the Las Vegas area in 1995 when he was in his early 20s, Las Vegas, you either love it or you hate it. I was actually born in Vegas, live there for some time. So Vegas has sort of a special place in my heart. I mean, for many reasons, what a fun place to live for one. So he moved there with the intentions of going to film school. But one of the issues he had was he could not afford it. And so he had to kind of take it upon himself to learn the production skillsets required to make it on a film set. And before long, he was able to start landing various production gigs. And one of the impressive things about Aaron's because he didn't have any formal film school training or really any classes for that matter is that he is self-taught. So he actually snuck into a film class and asked the professor about how he can get involved in the industry. And what's crazy is that this move forever changed the course of his career because this professor that he met with actually introduced him to filmmaker Nick Groff. And if you've ever watched Ghost Adventures, especially the early seasons, you know that Nick Groff was a huge part of the show. And so what a connection to be made. Nick and Aaron became fast friends after that initial meeting. And over the years, you know, that relationship really blossomed. And it was eight years later that Nick actually reached out to Aaron and let him know about a potential opportunity because Nick was working on a documentary that was going to feature paranormal investigations of haunted locations in Las Vegas. And Nick asked Aaron if he wanted to be a camera operator on it. And Aaron, you know, no formal film training, you know, self-taught, he's like absolutely what a great opportunity to get a lot of good experience and really put his skills to the test. Of course he agreed to join them. And what's interesting is that walking into this documentary, it sounds like Aaron really was kind of a skeptic when it came to the paranormal. It seems like he was like, yeah, okay, Ghost, are they real? Maybe, maybe not. You know, I don't necessarily believe in it, but you know what, I'm open-minded. I'll go into this and, you know, I'll work this gig and we'll see what happens. And that's exactly what they did. And this documentary ended up being an absolute hit. In fact, it won awards at film festivals. It aired on sci-fi channel in 2007, which because of this documentary and the success and, you know, how much people seem to really enjoy it, this led the travel channel to have the team start producing a weekly show, which would become Ghost Adventures, which premiered in 2008. If you haven't seen Ghost Adventures, I highly recommend it. It's a really fun show to watch. They go to a lot of really cool and creepy locations and they attempt to capture paranormal activity. They'll go and do lockdowns and locations and then what I love is when they send, you know, Aaron off on his own and they'll kind of create like a base inside the haunted location and Aaron will go out and he'll start, you know, trying to drum up some activity. When the show first aired, it was just Nick Ruff, Zach Beggins, and Aaron, good one. And the lineup has changed over the years because obviously people are going to come and go. They've got other projects they want to work on. But Aaron has been an absolute staple. Nick Ruff ended up leaving the show in 2014 and that's when Jay Wasley and Billy Toley joined Zach and Aaron as sort of the new Ghost Adventures cast. And they're still the same crew that lead the show in its 30th season today. I mean, they've really become staples, icons and obviously because the show has been so successful, Aaron Goodwin's career is just absolutely flourished. In addition to the show, he worked as a cinematographer on his own independent feature film, which is really cool. So doing some kind of side passion projects. He started a clothing line called Big Steppen. He also launched his own coffee line and he sells his own art. So he's really become a celebrity. I mean, that's really what he is at the end of the day. He's a celebrity. And like I kind of mentioned before, it's no surprise to me that Aaron has been a part of this lineup for so long. I mean, he's immensely funny. He just has a really good vibe to him. Good energy. I wish I could play you some of my favorite clips, but unfortunately they're copyrighted. But I highly recommend even if you just go to YouTube and type in Aaron Goodwin's funniest moments or something like that, you'll get tons of glimpses into his personality and it'll become very obvious to you why he's been such a staple on the show and why he's so beloved by fans. I mean, the guy is just seems super chill. He seems to really love what he does. And he's got great chemistry with Zach in the rest of the team. So it's no wonder the show's been so successful. And with the show being on for 30 seasons, all of us fans have been able to follow him personally, professionally. He's big on social media. And so you kind of have that parasocial relationship where he almost feels like a friend and he's definitely got that sort of inviting nature to him. So we've been able to follow him through the ups and downs of his career to him meeting his future wife, Victoria. Now let's talk a little bit about Victoria because it's important to understand their relationship, how it came to be who Victoria is as a person to really understand what Victoria did. As far as Victoria's early life goes, we really don't have any details or insight on what it was like, what she went through. We can't even pin down her maiden name. It seems that that is just not available on the internet and there's probably good reason for it. As far as we know, she grew up in the San Fernando Valley in California. I also learned that she was a very serious athlete with ambitions to become a professional golfer. She even earned a golf scholarship to Warner Pacific University, located in Portland, Oregon. And it really seemed that her life up into that point was entirely revolving around golf and competing at an extremely high level. So much so that Victoria was training to go pro until she started experiencing some health issues. Victoria ended up being diagnosed with acolygia, I hope I'm pronouncing that right, but it's a degenerative disease that affects the muscles in the esophagus and prevents food from being swallowed properly. And when I looked into what the experience is like having this disease, it sounds very painful and not fun whatsoever. And unfortunately, because of this diagnosis, this really forced Victoria to stop the whole golf thing, which I'm sure a lot of us know at least somebody in her life who was on that athlete track. Maybe they were training their whole life to go pro. You know how dedicated you have to be to be a professional athlete and when it doesn't work out especially when it comes to something like an injury or a disease or something that you have absolutely no control over, you know just how devastating that can be for somebody and what a toll it can take on you physically as well as mentally. So I think this diagnosis was absolutely life changing for her in many ways. Around this same time though, this is when Victoria met Aaron Goodwin. We don't really have the specifics around how the two met. If I had to guess it seems like you know they're from Oregon, they're from maybe they run in the same social circles, maybe they knew each other, or maybe this was a social media connection that was made or not really sure, but it sounds like their paths may have crossed at one point and then they linked up. I did come across an interview with them where Victoria was talking about coming to visit Aaron in Las Vegas, I believe, and so it sounds like the two were long distance for a while. She also mentioned that he sent her gifts while she was recovering from surgery in 2016, so we know that they were in each other's lives by that point. And based on their social media posts, it seems like they were finally in a seemingly committed relationship by 2018. And eventually the two moved in together and by all accounts based on what they posted on social media, it seems like the relationship was going great. In 2019, Aaron showed a photo of the two of them with a caption that read, "I'm so lucky to have her in my life. She helps me when I'm down and she always makes me laugh. I always feel safe when she is next to me holding my hand." And that year they kept building their life together. They got a dog named Moose and two pet rats named Pascal and Rapunzel, which of course, as I know very well these days, are characters from the movie tangled. When anybody names their pets after Disney characters, I think there's a small chance that they could be Disney adults, possibly, and no judgment against Disney adults. I have some good friends that are Disney adults, but Victoria was very much a Disney adult. And from the outside, it really looked like they had the perfect Disney love story going on because in October 2019, Aaron proposed to her in front of Cinderella's castle at Disneyland. They were planning to get married in 2020, but we all know what happened then, COVID, right? Lockdowns happened, everything shut down, and obviously that was not going to work anymore. So it seems like they had a small allotment ceremony instead with friends and family. Then in 2022, when restrictions relaxed and Disneyland reopened, the two went and enjoyed the happiest place on Earth, Disneyland. And at that point, they had a full-blown wedding ceremony and even did a wedding photo shoot in front of the haunted mansion. They did not hold back at all on this wedding ceremony. They went full-blown Disney princess, Victoria had the Disney princess dress with a matching tiara. They had a horse-drawn carriage and even a king and queen style throne chairs at the reception. So hey, live at your fantasy. That's totally cool. But behind all the curated photos and fairy tale photos, something much darker was already forming beneath the surface. Unfortunately for Aaron, the person he loved, he trusted, he thought he knew was plotting something very sinister behind his back. Because just two years later, Victoria would be accused of plotting to have Aaron murdered. What happens next in this story is truly one of the most mind-blowing and yet extremely stupid decisions that Victoria made. And when I heard this, I honestly could not believe my ears. I was like, "Are you kidding me?" Victoria, she watched a true crime documentary series which was made about a convicted murderer, aka Grant Amato. And yeah, she apparently enjoyed this documentary so much and felt some connection to Grant Amato that she decided to start writing him in prison. So here's a married woman now writing to a convicted murderer who killed his family by the way, which I'll talk about more in a minute. So that move right there, I mean, think about it if you found out your partner, your husband, your wife was writing to a convicted murderer. Because not only was she writing to him, but she was quickly falling in love with him. Maybe this is the first time you're hearing the name Grant Amato. His case was infamous, he is a notorious killer, a complete psychopath really, and a real fucking dummy. I actually have an episode over on Lights Out that covers the full Grant Amato case in detail in depth. And so I'm not going to go through his whole case right now because we'd be here for hours. But if you want to hear the full thing start to finish because it is another absolutely insane case, then I'll link that below for you in the show notes or description. I highly recommend if this interests you at all to check it out after this episode. But let me give you the condensed version of the Grant Amato case because it's important that you understand his background and what he did for this case. So in 2018, Grant Amato is 29 years old, he's living with his parents, Chad Amargray as well as his brother Cody down in Florida. And around this time, he was fired from his job as a nurse at the hospital because he kept stealing and improperly administering medication. So big issues there, right? With his schedule suddenly wide open, Grant began spending all of his time online. I mean, this dude really became a basement dweller online 24/7. And that's when he made his way over to a cam model site called myfreecams.com, which I think you thought that meant the cams are free. If you know anything about cam sites, they're not free despite what advertisements they may give you. And with the cam site, you can sort of interact with the cam models kind of depending on the site. It's sort of a way to virtually get entertainment, pleasure, whatever you want to call it. And so, yeah, he started spending a lot of time on the site. And this is where Grant became absolutely infatuated with this cam model, a Bulgarian woman named Sylvia, who went by Sylvia online. And Grant fell hard for Sylvia. I mean, he started spending a lot of time with her, and a lot of money as we'll talk about. But he basically enters this relationship with her. Sylvia's now his girlfriend, but obviously this is just work for her, and she'll say whatever she needs to say in order to keep that money coming. But Grant, he's fully invested at this point. And this interest in her quickly became a very unhealthy obsession. And he convinced himself that Sylvia was his girlfriend, that he was going to end up with her. You know, they're going to have this life. But obviously, that was never going to happen. And Grant starts blowing all of his money on Sylvia in order to keep that relationship going, right? He wants to see her. He wants to take part in the sexual festivities because he feels a connection there. It didn't take long for him to absolutely drain his bank account, all the savings, and run out of money. And without any money, he's not going to be able to see Sylvia anymore. So Grant gets desperate. And he starts stealing from his own family members. And it got so bad that just in a few months, he had taken around $200,000 from his parents in total. 200 grand. So as parents are like, hey, you need to go get some help. Let's send you to rehab for this addiction that you have. And unfortunately, none of that was able to stop Grant from what was about to happen. And once his parents shut down this connection to Sylvia, this really pissed Grant off to the point that he goes on to do the unthinkable. Because once he left rehab, he went right back to seeing Sylvia at all costs. Only now, he no longer had access to his family's money. Which again, this is a shortened version of events when it comes to Grant's case. But you know, for the sake of time, he then on January 24, 2019, Grant proceeds to shoot and kill his parents as well as his brother inside of their family home. Executes them, just absolutely evil. Effectively, he killed his family so that he could continue dating quote unquote this camera. And luckily, Grant is a complete fucking idiot. And he was just so obsessed with Sylvia that he did not try to cover his tracks at all. He did do some pretty brutal things to his parents remains to try to cover that up, which I won't get into right now. But it's pretty insane. I mean, this guy went off the deep end for this Sylvie girl. Today's later, the authorities find Grant staying at a double tree hotel, and he is arrested. At that point, he's charged with three counts of first degree murder. And his trial was highly publicized. Of course, I mean, this is a insane case. And he was ultimately found guilty in August 9, 2019. And he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The case itself is is shocking in every way. Again, highly recommend and you check out my episode on it because if that interests you at all or you wanna know the full story, I've got it all in there. But in April 2024, that's when this three-part documentary series came out on Paramount Plus called Control Alt Desire, which I watched is pretty good. But it's because of this documentary that Victoria watched, that Victoria is like, oh, grand motto. The guy that killed his parents and his brother in cold blood, that's my soulmate. I mean, that says everything you need to know about Victoria, the fact that she watched that documentary was like, I wanna get in contact with this dude. She is clearly not the person that everybody thought she was. Apparently, the two weirdos absolutely hit it off. They started exchanging texts and Facebook messages somehow, which I'm like, he has access to Facebook and prison. I guess so, 'cause they were communicating that way. He had a phone in prison, which obviously was a contraband, but a lot of people have phones, and that's how they were communicating. And Victoria thought, well, I can't go by my real name. I've gotta make a fake profile. So she comes up with an alias for herself. And the brilliant Victoria, her alias is Victoria Candy, which if you're going to communicate with a convicted murderer and prison, and you're gonna try to create an alias to cover your tracks or hide your activity from your husband, or better yet, hide your activity from the authorities. You think you would pick a better name than an alias that has your real name in it. I mean, this just shows how dumb she is. It didn't take long for their messages to turn romantic. And it seems like that was kind of the intention from the jump. I mean, to go that quickly into a romantic relationship with this guy, man. They go on to talk about how in love they are with each other. Their bond got so intense that they got spiritually married, whatever that means, beats me. And then they started referring to Erin Goodwin as Victoria's first husband. And they would actually shorten that to FH in their messages. Victoria even told Grant over messages that she wanted to leave Erin or FH. But unfortunately, she couldn't because Erin would never accept a divorce. Which this doesn't seem to be the case at all in something she clearly made up. Because in September of 2024, about five months into Victoria's bizarre new love of fair, Erin found out that she was cheating on him. And not just with Grant. According to Erin, Victoria was involved with multiple men, including someone saved in her phone with the name Vincent. Which it turns out the name Vincent was actually just a contact name that she saved Grant's number in her phone as. And what's super eerie about all this is that when Erin came across these messages from Vincent, he had no idea that this guy was actually a convicted killer in prison. Even without knowing the true identity of Vincent, just to find out that your wife is cheating on you is devastating. I mean, I can't even imagine what that must have been like to think that this person was your soulmate. This person is that person that loves you unconditionally that you can always trust to find out that they're sneaking around behind your back, having other relationships with other people. I mean, that is going to really, really hurt. And he actually gave her a choice. He said they could stay together and try to work things out or they could get a divorce. So Erin was very open to trying to get the relationship back on track, work through these issues with her, but he did offer her out. So this idea that she's telling Grant, like, hey, dude, there's no way he's going to divorce me. So I'm stuck is just complete bullshit. And what's even worse is that Victoria proceeds to tell Erin, like, oh, I'm so sorry, honey. I want to work through it. We can do this and completely feed some a whole bunch of lies. Because Erin, this entire time, has no idea what conversations she's having behind the scenes and has no idea that she's just flat out lying to him. And what he also doesn't know is that his wife is having conversations with a convicted killer about how they're going to get rid of him. Erin literally gave her an out to the relationship. He said we can get a divorce. And she could have just went that route. But no, Victoria wants to proceed with a plan to kill Erin instead. And this motive for killing him is still a mystery. The only motive that makes sense for Victoria wanting Erin dead is that she wants his money, which we don't really know what the pre-marital agreement might have been. We don't know if they even had one. Don't even know that if she would have gotten life insurance money, we don't know any of those details. But it really just seems like Victoria has descended into absolute madness and is being manipulated by a killer who is ultimately only in this for himself at the end of the day. He's obviously loving all the attention that he's getting from Victoria. So of course, he's going to tell her whatever she wants to hear, which it doesn't even make sense for Victoria to want a pursue relationship with Grant, because obviously, A, he's a killer, but B, he's in prison for the rest of his life. So it's not like they're ever going to have any sort of normal relationship together in person. So it really just makes absolutely no sense why she jumps to such an extreme measure to get rid of Erin. But as all of us know, people will do insane things for money. And with Erin being a successful TV star, he's doing really, really well financially. Victoria seemingly didn't really have any income coming in. That maybe she thought with Erin how the picture she then gets to take over his fortune per se. But Victoria is a dummy, and maybe that's what she was thinking. My guess is that perhaps Grant was manipulating her and asking her for money because Grant's in prison for the rest of his life. And I'm sure his commissary account could use an influx of cash. And so maybe he was trying to manipulate her into taking Erin out because then he's got access to all of Erin's money. And let's remember, the two are well-documented liars. So whatever they've said means absolutely nothing. I don't think they would ever want to reveal the real reasons because the real reasons are just pure evil, let's be honest. But here's the thing. Victoria wanted her husband out of the picture, but she didn't want to get her hands dirty. So according to the arrest report, she decided to hire a hitman to do it. And Grant is obviously surrounded by a lot of convicted felons, a lot of dangerous people in prison. I'm sure it was very easy for him to convince her like, hey, I know all sorts of people. I got the connections because that's exactly what happened. Grant claimed to have found a hitman. That would take care of Erin for her. And at this point, with this case, we still don't know the identity of this alleged hitman. This case is still ongoing. And so there's still details that have been released. But we know that Grant Amato found him. Victoria's got her criminal hat on. And yeah, she was serious enough about this plan that she agreed to send a $2500 payment up front as a deposit. Victoria is like, all right, well, if you do this, I don't want this to come back to me. So have the hitman make it look like an accident. And then once Grant's like, yeah, we're good to go. She then allegedly sent this hitman $2500 deposit. You could say as an upfront payment. And then promise that she would pay them $11,500 once Erin was dead. One of the bright spots in an otherwise very dark sinister case is the fact that Grant and Victoria are not criminal masterminds in the slightest. These two are so stupid, so dumb that they left a big, big trail behind them. Electronic trail, paper trail, whatever you want to call it. There is a clear fucking highway straight to these two, which leads us to October 2nd. And that day Ghost Adventures was actually filming an episode in Barstow, California. Victoria texted Grant the information about the hotel Erin was staying at with the rest of the crew of Ghost Adventures and was using her find my friends app in order to keep tabs on Erin's location. She even got more detailed and sent him photos of Erin, his car, as well as even the coworker that he'd often go outside to have smoke breaks with. At the same time that all this is happening, Victoria is treating this whole situation disturbingly lightly. And while she's waiting on updates for the hitman to go and kill Erin, Victoria is texting Grant. She texted Grant, "I'm so anxious, LOL, LOL." Then said, "I just can't believe this is happening." Like, what the f, how did I get to this point? Like, what are we doing here? What kind of cutesy texts are these? What the f, LOL, come on. I mean, this just is all a game to her. And she's talking about killing her own husband. But to me, the most shocking text was this. Am I a bad person? To which Grant responded, why do you say that? Okay, let's just think about that. this for a second, she's texting Graham Otto, a convicted killer. Am I a bad person? I think that's a good person to ask that question too. Cause the answer's, "Fuck yeah, you are, you're a horrible person." And Victoria followed this up with, "Because I'm choosing to end his existence, not divorce." Yeah, no shit. You're a fucking bad person if you're ending anybody's existence. Especially when Aaron's giving you an out, just take the out. And I think these texts really give us a glimpse of, like, all of the conversations that she had with Grant. Because what is Grant going to say to this? No, Grant's going to tell her whatever she wants to hear. Because Grant just wants what Grant wants. And let's be honest, Grant does not have a moral compass whatsoever. He murdered his parents and his brother in cold blood. He doesn't give a shit. So while Grant sending this message, supporting his girlfriend through this really rough time, he's also giving her alleged updates from the hip man. He sent him, he's asleep right now in the hotel room. I need to know what's going on. Then, can we get an update? Is it done? Then my personal favorite from Grant is, "Brother, can I get an update?" What? At this point in time, we still don't know really what transpired that night with the alleged hip man and, you know, further details about what was going on between the hip man and Grant a motto. But we do know, obviously Aaron is still alive. And then it seems like whoever this hitman was just goes to them. Just bye bye. Thanks for the money, dipshits. Really thought I was going to do that. Talk about a horrible plan. Aaron's with his crew, like, there's a bunch of people, like, how this was never going to happen in the first place is what it sounded like to me. But either way, I'm glad that Grant a motto was not able to find somebody more capable, or somebody who really just didn't care or a professional hitman. And let's be honest, I think any professional hitman is going to charge a lot more than what the 2500 plus the 11,500 bucks. Like, anybody who's going to do it and make it look like an accident, and especially go after a high profile figure like Aaron Goodwin is going to charge way, way more money. And it's probably not going to do it while he's working. So these two got played for fools. Thank God. And Aaron is alive. The text also don't really explain what happened to plan or how it fell apart. But it seems like Victoria was like, oh no. Well, if it didn't work, then, you know, no blood on my hands. I'll be fine. So even after this whole murder for plot hire thing goes down, Aaron is still under the impression that they're working on their marriage, they're working on the relationship that Victoria still wants to be in this with him. And, you know, is completely lying to his face. Because she just goes back to, you know, sweet loving Victoria, the two of them then proceed to adopt a kitten that they named Dodger after their favorite baseball team. Aaron even posted a photo of them with the caption saying that the little stray had snuck into their home and would not leave Victoria alone. So they decided to keep him. He also wrote, we got him shots and now we have a little fur baby. I love cats. So this was a no brainer. I'm so glad he chose us. Which what a wholesome post, right? I mean, Aaron is just seems like a sweet guy, a really loving guy, animal lover, you know, to take in a stray cat. That's a, that's my kind of guy. So he's just live in life, normal things that things are on the up and up with him and Victoria, but that is hardly the case. But things go on sort of as normal for a while on November 18th. Aaron posted a vlog on his YouTube channel about their trip to Hawaii, which showed their tour of Kua Loa Ranch, where obviously tons of shows and movies, Jurassic Park, most famously was filmed, and the show lost. Really cool place, by the way, if you ever get shins, check it out. It's very, very beautiful. I highly recommend, but this vlog was kind of unsettling to watch in retrospect, right? Because the two of them are acting completely normal, happy couple, but they're making jokes, they're giggling, talking about how much they love lost and, you know, geeking out over the different film locations is having a grand old time. And Aaron just seems totally happy with her. I mean, for all you know, she's really trying to make things work and things are getting better in their relationship. And I think the scarier thing is that Victoria is a very too faced individual and to Aaron, she appears to be this loving sweet kind woman. But behind the scenes, she's pure evil. And I can't imagine a more dangerous situation to be in than that. On Valentine's Day, she posted photos from their mini golf date with the caption that read, "Mini golf with my Valentine." And Aaron commented, "I love you even though you crushed me at mini golf." A few days later, they posted another photo stumbling up with their cat, with the caption, "Cuttle puddle with my boys." But just about a week after that cuddle puddle post, everything came crashing down when sweet Victoria was arrested. So let's talk about how that went down because that is a great story. So just a few weeks after that failed murder attempt, the prison where Grant is being incarcerated at does a cell search and lo and behold, they find his contraband phone. And yeah, they're not going to let him keep that. And of course, they're going to go through that phone and bought a being bought a boom when the phone was sent to the Florida Department of Correction cell phone lab in December 19, 2024. That's when analysts finally went through his phone and they discovered all of those text messages and Facebook messages between Grant and Victoria, Candy. And yeah, it took investigators probably about five minutes to figure out who Victoria Candy was. Of course, it's Victoria, good when. And from there, things moved rather quickly. So on March 4, investigators with the Florida Office of the Inspector General, notified the authorities about what they had found on Grant Amato's cell phone, and Las Vegas, the police were then alerted about this alleged murder for higher plot. And just two days later, on March 6, Victoria was put in handcuffs at her home in Las Vegas. I bet she kind of knew that could happen, but I bet she was surprised. And what makes this case even crazier is that Aaron learned about his wife's arrest while filming an episode of Ghost Adventures. He and the crew were down in Downey, California, investigating the Rancho Los Amigos Medical Complex, also known as Holydale. And in the middle of their lockdown, he gets a notification on his phone. And definitely you should watch it because it's pretty shocking. You know, he, this is the last notification call he ever thought he would get. And I wish that I could play it for you here in the show, but unfortunately, it's Ghost Adventures footage. It's copyrighted, but I'll read you sort of the interaction here. So right away, you can tell that something is very wrong. Aaron looks down at his phone and just says, dude, and after being silent for a few moments, he says, bro, the police are at my house. He then walks out of the investigation. And that's when Zach Beggins comes in with a voiceover saying that he will not be showing any more footage, but this was actually the moment that Aaron found out that Victoria was arrested for allegedly trying to have him killed. I mean, talk about devastation on a whole other level. It's one thing to find out that your wife's been arrested, even arrested for trying to kill somebody, but then to find out she's been arrested because she was plotting to kill you. I don't even know how you come back from that, to be honest, that is truly so sad and horrifying all at the same time. The woman that you loved, the woman that you slept next to every night was plotting to murder you. What do you even do? And could those as Zach for not putting in the rest of that call? Because obviously that would have probably made that episode one of the top viewed episodes of Ghost Adventures of all time. But I appreciate that Zach, you know, obviously respected his privacy to travel channel respected Aaron's privacy, because I'm sure the rest of that phone call was very, very difficult and Aaron can imagine was probably very distraught and upset. But when that episode aired in October of 2025, Aaron shared a post saying that he would not be watching it because he did not want to relive that night again, which I think we can all agree is completely understandable. Because yeah, watching that footage back would be incredibly traumatizing and triggering, right? I mean, why would he want to go back and relive that moment he found out his wife tried to kill him? Later on, Aaron shared that the lasting impacts of that whole experience was completely traumatizing to him, but not only him, his animals as well, because he said that his cat dodger after, you know, finding out about this alleged murder for a higher plot became skittish and fearful of loud noises after the arrest, because one of the things they did after they arrested is they obviously executed a search warrant of his house to continue gathering evidence on Victoria. And when they do that, they don't necessarily care about the animals inside. And so as you can imagine, lots of loud noises, you know, bus and doors down is going to be a very frightening experience for any creature. But even with Victoria arrested, just knowing that she was trying to hire a hitman to kill him is going to completely shatter your sense of safety. Because not only is this person you thought you loved, wanting to kill you, but she's also been in contact. contact with a legit hitman, and you don't know. You don't know if you're still at danger. You don't know what else is going on. You don't know who in prison she might have been in contact with. So I can imagine this was extremely scary for Aaron to have to live in fear, not knowing if somebody else was coming for him. With Victoria now in police custody, of course, they started interviewing her. And Victoria does the classic, I don't know. I'm clueless. I had nothing to do with this. And the police were like, okay, well, we know that you're communicating with this convicted killer, Gran Amato. So what's this alias about this Victoria candy name? Like, is that you? What is this? And so she ultimately meant it's like, yeah, that's me, but I haven't used that name for years. And I haven't used it recently or anything like that, which obviously no, it was just a bunch of bullshit. And after a little more questioning, she finally meant that, yes, that was my phone number. As Victoria candy, that was being used to contact Gran Amato. She then proceeded to talk about how she found out about Gran Amato from that documentary. And then afterwards felt compelled to start communicating with him. And she kind of stopped staring. She's like, we're just pen pals, nothing more. She also told investigators that she'd been feeling lonely at the time and started connecting with Gran. And that made her feel better. Police then started pressing her on the content of the messages with Gran. And she continues to play dumb and be like, well, I don't remember sending all of them, but then she kind of walks that back immediately. And she's like, oh, yeah, well, here's my explanation for those messages. She then proceeds to tell the police that her and Erin were having problems in their marriage and that she was daydreaming about being in a different situation. And by daydreaming about a different situation if that's prison, that's what she should have been daydreaming about, 'cause come on, most people daydream about a vacation about buying a home or something they've wanted for a long time. I don't know anybody who sits around daydreaming about hiring a hitman to kill their husband/wife. That's very, very strange. And I think it just tells us Victoria's mind is in a very dark place and has been for a while. Or she's just insane. But then she tries to sort of spin this like, oh, I'm daydreaming about killing him, but it's just a fantasy. Nothing was gonna ever happen, which come on. This is the police, they know. They're not buying any of this bullshit. One of the things that investigators find out is that she had sent thousands of dollars to Grant. And who's gonna send thousands of dollars to an inmate to just talk about a fantasy, this daydream that she has? And so they're pressing her on that and she tries to spin this whole nonsense of like, oh, the money was so that I can buy cell phones for inmates, 'cause they should have cell phones, even though they cannot have cell phones, but she tried to play it off as like, oh, I'm such a charitable person, I'm helping the inmate so that they have a contact to the outside world. No, they're in prison. They don't get to do that. So just a bunch of dumb, dumb shit she's trying to feed police and obviously police aren't buying it. And so as a result of her arrest, Victoria's charged with two felonies, solicitation to commit murder and conspiracy to commit murder, which are very, very serious charges. And then after that, they take her in a custody, send her down to Clark County Detention Center, and she is then held on $100,000 bail. And from there, the story exploded in the media, as you can possibly imagine me with Aaron being a public figure. We all know how it goes. I mean, this is a juicy story by all media accounts and it felt like everybody's talking about it. It was very, very big. Even people who had never even heard of Ghost Adventures before became interested in the story. If any of you listened to one of the other shows, the SESH, they covered this kind of as it was breaking a while back. And yeah, people are just completely shocked by Victoria's idiocy and cruelness. And my God, poor Aaron, I mean, man, just devastation. I mean, everything I saw from him, the things that he said, just awful. I mean, I can't even imagine what that must have been like for him to go through that. Luckily, there is an outpouring of support and love for him online and from his fans. And really just everybody, 'cause everybody's on the side of Victoria needs to pay for what she did. I know for me personally, when I heard about this, I had definitely felt from, I mean, this is just, I think, anyone's worst nightmare to find out that the person that you marry, that you love, that's supposed to be this love of your life, care for you unconditionally, is trying to kill you and is effectively cheating on you with a convicted killer in prison, who is helping her to source a hitman for your death. I mean, that is scary and more ways than one. It's just unbelievable. But six days after her arrest on March 12th, Aaron filed for divorce. The filing for the divorce said the reason was the views, tastes, and likes and dislikes had become incompatible to the extent that has become impossible for them to live together as husband and wife and marital harmony, which you can maybe come back from cheating and affair, but you can't come back from your spouse trying to kill you. There's just no path forward. It's not healthy, it's not safe. And so, I think Aaron absolutely did the right thing there. And honestly, the fact that he's said it so politely in the filing rather than I married a crazy psycho bitch who tried to kill me, says a lot about Aaron. Very, very respectable guy. At the end of the day, he's not trying to hose her or make her out to be what she actually is, as commendable in his part. But the paperwork also asks that neither of them be awarded alimony, which is obviously a very reasonable request in this type of situation. Aaron requested that his assets and debts be confirmed as his solely, which again, makes sense. He absolutely deserves to keep all of his assets, especially considering the fact that Victoria blew through $60,000 of his during all this bullshit she was doing. And apparently, at some point, she had been blackmailed and the details about this blackmail situation haven't become public yet, so it's not really clear if Grant was blackmailing her or if someone else was. But either way, it seems like she paid a lot of money in order to try to cover up what she was doing with either Grant or some other dangerous individual. About a week after that initial filing, Aaron submitted an amended complaint. And in it, he requested $10,000 in punitive damages and accused Victoria of negligence, assault, and false imprisonment, claiming that she made him feel apprehensive of harm, intended to confine him, and inflicted emotional distress. And there's not a lot of details surrounding this that are public yet, or really details about what was going on behind closed doors, but it seems like from this amended complaint that there was a lot more going on behind the scenes than we even know, which would make a lot of sense. And I think would also potentially maybe help us understand Victoria's actions somewhat or why she escalated things so quickly, but we just don't know at this point. I'll definitely be following up as these divorce proceedings unfold, because I'm very curious to see what else sort of emerges, because by all accounts, I mean, everybody's gonna present themselves as loving couple, you know, everything's grand, everything's great online. So it will be interesting to kind of see what was maybe happening behind closed doors though. But luckily at this point, everybody knows what an utter piece of shit Victoria is, and she's been outed for all of her crimes. And ultimately, it really seems like Victoria realized that I'm cooked. I'm absolutely cooked here, and I am facing serious, serious jail time if I don't start cooperating. (gentle music) (gentle music) So in April of 2025, she entered into a plea agreement with prosecutors, and as a part of the deal, the solicitation to commit murder charge was dropped, and in exchange, she pled guilty to one felony count of conspiracy to commit murder. And then in June 2025, she paired in court for her sentencing hearing, where she gives a statement about her actions. So let's take a look at that. - Firstly, it's most important for me. I would like to apologize to Erin. I'm so immensely sorry for the pain and anxiety I've caused to you and the betrayal. You undoubtedly had rightfully healed by my actions. I need you to know that I will always hold blood for you. I genuinely pray you find your joy in peace again, and I will vow out of your life forever to hopefully ease that process. I'm sorry I broke us, and I'm too soon to regret every day. My absolute promise to you is that you will never see her here for me. I intend to leave the state of Nevada, and you and anyone else will never be a danger for me ever again. Secondly, I'd like to apologize to my parents. My actions are not a reflection of how you raise me with unwavering love and support, and I know I'm better than this. Next, I'd like to apologize to the court. I recognize and understand my stupidity. The terrible nature of my crime against airing, my regrettable choices, and monumental acts of judgment. This is my rough thought of, and I'll never forgive myself. Prior to my arrest, I was taking steps toward lending my marriage and correcting my mistakes that led me here. Now having spent 92 days of jail, I've had plenty of time to reflect on my foolishness, and I'm that much more committed to never getting in trouble again, and doing better in every aspect of my life, especially with my mental health. I am truly ashamed, embarrassed, and disappointed with myself, and is deeply and sincerely remorseful for my actions. I don't know how I feel about that to be honest with you. I don't believe a word she says, I'll be honest. I think she's going to just do and say whatever she asks to to save herself at this point. But what really got me, choked up, was Erin's statement. Because you can just feel the pain and agony that he has been dealing with, and how this whole situation has taken such an effect on him. So here's a clip of what Erin had to say. You're out of your seven years, I thought I was in the most loving relationship with marriage with my best friend, someone who I trusted in a whole heart and laugh with every day. Someone who made me feel like I was subtle, like I was her one and only. I was loyal to her and do whatever I could to make her happy. I thought we would be very special and so did everyone else. After finding out she was cheating on me in September of last year, with multiple men, including the man going by the name of Benson, who turned out to be Grandma O. I gave her the option of divorce where we could try to work it out because I loved her so much. She felt so bad and I didn't want to lose me. Every day she felt more special when she was so sorry, at least that's what you told me. Now she's covering, she put, now she's covering, she put her head out and killed me more than more. Black got blackmailed and spent almost all our savings to keep it quiet. They felt more in love with the model. They even got spiritually married and now I was called the first husband. They talked until she was arrested and she sought out, she sought help to kill me. She just led me to fear my life, I've hired security, armed security for a week, not knowing it was over or not, but I was always looking over my shoulder and having to go through therapy and even trying to understand any of it. It's like a heartbreak knowledge that go through my life, I can't trust anything any more. I can cry every day and it feels so low, she's crumming no person I never was, I will always wonder why. Well, worst of all, she lied to me every day. I didn't know about any of the murder plot that hit man with a blackmail until the detectives told me after she was arrested. Now behind bars, she's trying to manipulate the lawyers and trying to silence me and not come here today. That's why I wouldn't be standing here. In honor of this person over here, I don't know at all, not long bit. The fact that this person did all this to me who would know where he no care or love and her heart for me, I will never feel the same, I will never feel safe or be the same but because of what she did, especially when she gets out of the day. She claims she's remorseful now that she's been caught but there at no time before did she ever try to stop this from happening. She tried to have me killed, she gave my location to people, truly for me, we were tried. I truly believe, with people she truly believe we're going to harm me. She even asked for the updates on the murder and this was all when I was just a lovey husband I thought, whether she got minimal or maximum time, I still won't feel safe whenever she's at least, I feel like this deserves prison time, I don't know, so just leave your hands running. Thank you. I mean, Aaron's impact statement just got wrenching. It just really puts this whole thing in a perspective and as stupid and dumb as it was, it was a dangerous situation for him and it was ultimate betrayal by the woman that he loved. I mean, it's just horrible on all accounts. But after this, Victoria's lawyers argued to try to get Victoria a shorter sentence because they claim that she had abandoned the plot to kill Aaron back in November of 2024 and when I heard that, I immediately thought of something else because if we remember back to when Grant Amato's contraband phone was seized by prison staff, this was in October 2024, so just weeks after the first attempt. So did she really decide on her own to stop plotting to kill Aaron? Or did she just simply lose access to Grant because he didn't have his phone anymore? And would she have continued had she still had access to him? Hmm, makes you think. Because I think ultimately the circumstances just changed. This plan was clearly fallen apart. She lost access with Grant and so I think it was more so that's why the whole plot stopped rather than her trying to do the right thing and fix what she had already done. I don't buy that whatsoever. Either way, the judge showed very little sympathy for Victoria. She's not going to just get off with a slap on the wrist or 90 days in jail or anything insane like that because I think everybody would have been pissed. Victoria ended up being sentenced to a minimum of 36 months and up to 90 months in prison, which is roughly three to seven half years at the Florence McClure Women's Correctional Center in Nevada. Have fun in prison, bitch. Not a fun place to be, which I think it's hard because I think a lot of people are like, well, what if it actually gone through with it and Aaron had been killed? I think ultimately the sentencing would have been harsher and obviously the charges would have been harsher as well, but I think for this particular case, three to seven half years, I hope she stays in there for the seven and a half. But part of me thinks put her in prison, throw away the key. She's a danger, man. She's something's wrong with this woman for sure. So I don't know. Let me know what you think. You think this was a proper prison sentence for her or should she see more? There was one detail I came across that was absolutely heartbreaking from when Aaron was in the courtroom. This witness overheard Aaron say quietly to someone, all I wanted to do was go and hug her, but it's all so wrong. So even after all this, Aaron is such a good guy that he still, you can tell he still has like that love and care for her. I mean, it was his wife and I totally get that that even after they've done something so horrible, so horrific that seeing her in that state and seeing, you know, what's about to happen to her that there's still some care for her there. And I think that speaks immensely to Aaron's character, but that wasn't the only thing that Aaron said that day because outside the courthouse, he gave a brief interview and he said this, he said, I feel terrible. All of this is such a mess. I haven't seen her since she dropped me off at the airport. So is the first time I've even looked at her. It's tough, but that's just half the story. Wait till you hear the rest of it. Jono, if Aaron ever plans to be more public about everything that he went through, but based on what we already know and what he said, seems like there is a lot more to this story. It sounds like it's absolutely devastating. So where are we at now with things? Again, this is an ongoing case. This is an ongoing situation and things have not stopped because in August, Victoria filed a counter claim to Aaron's divorce filing. And if you couldn't stand her already, just listen to this. The documents said that she believed the two of them could reconcile their marriage, but that ultimately she would not try to stop the divorce. However, she still made a list of demands even after everything she's done. be asked for the return of personal property. Obviously that's standard, but is absolutely insane is that she is also asking for Aaron to pay her legal fees and monthly alamoni. Can you believe that? Just go in a prison and she's asking for alamoni and for him to put the bill for her legal fees. Insane. It's the only word to describe this insane, which just tells me that she feels entitled to Aaron's money because she was married to him, and I think when we go back to motive, I think money was absolutely a part of it. But not only that, it gets even better. She's also demanding to keep his last name, which why on earth would Aaron want Victoria to continue going by his last name? I think all these demands just tell us that Victoria is out of her mind. I mean these are absolutely insane demands, demands that I'm sure Aaron will not grant her. Why on earth would he grant somebody who tried to have him killed to be able to take his last name, give her all this money to help her after everything that she did? What the right thing to do on Victoria's part would just be to sign the divorce papers and then to never contact Aaron again. That would be the best thing that she could do at this point. And it just seems like she's continuing to skirt around her part in all this. She's really not taking any accountability for it. There's some remorse, but I feel like the remorse is more so I'm bummed because I got caught rather than, you know, I'm truly sorry for what I did. And let's be real. I mean, she was falling in love with a convicted killer. I think that says everything you need to know about Victoria and we can even go back to her statement in court. I mean, she's like, you know, I won't contact you again. You'll never hear from me again. I'll just bow to your life. And in more recent issues like psych, I need money. I want to keep your last name. I want to be forever connected to you. Yeah, that's not letting someone heal. That's not letting someone deal with the trauma that you cause. So it's just, it's just fucking insane. At the end of the day, Victoria is out of her mind. I think she's been out of her mind for a long time. I think she's probably dealing with some serious mental health issues, if I have to guess. You know, either that or she's just turned into a very selfish human being that only cares about herself and only cares about how things look online, look to the outside world. And she loved all the great things that being with Aaron brought her all the vacations and money and nice things. And ultimately, she didn't want to, you know, be the partner that he needed and didn't want to try to work on the relationship in a healthy way. And ultimately, at the end of the day, decided that a killer was going to be her out. And, you know, now she's sorry when that all doesn't work out. I mean, it's just, it's insane. And at the time of recording this, there haven't been any updates, really. I looked far and wide and there's really not been a whole lot going on, you know, as these divorce proceedings sort of play out, but I'll definitely be keeping an eye on it because I think there will be more that comes out with this case as time goes on. But ultimately, at the end of the day, I just hope that Aaron is able to pick up the pieces after all this horrible, horrible situation he went through this experience and he's able to move on with his life. I hope that he's able to find a way to trust somebody again and find somebody who truly cares about him and has his best interests in mind and gives him the love and appreciation that I think he truly deserves. And you know, it's been cool to see all the outpouring of support for him. You know, he's obviously got the whole Ghost Adventurers community and family and, you know, the rest of the, the guys have obviously been there for him. So he's, you know, I think he's surrounded by a lot of people who deeply love and care for him. I truly hope that he can find peace after all this because I can only imagine how incredibly difficult it must be to try to even make sense of all this. And I hope for his sake that Victoria leaves him the hell alone and can just step out of his life after all the, all the damage that she's done already. That would be probably the best thing that she could do at this point. So it'll be interesting to see how this sort of all unfolds and I think Aaron in all of his years never could have imagined that he would be living through his own horror story, real life horror story. And that the, you know, the scariest thing is ever encountered would be his own life. I mean, just that's got to be a really crazy place to be in. But with that being said, that is where the case kind of sits today. We'll see how things unfold from here, but at the end of this I want to hear your thoughts. What are your thoughts on Victoria? What do you think her motive was? And if you're a fan of Ghost Adventures, drop me your favorite moment from Aaron over the years. He's a really funny guy. I'd love to meet him one day. It'd be really cool. He seems like just a great dude. And somebody who deeply cares about the people that he loves. And yeah, I hope he's doing well as best as he can be. But yeah, thank you for listening. And watching this episode of True Crime with Kendall Ray, aka her husband, Josh, appreciate you for being here. If you're here at the end, again, if you want to see more true crime with Kendall and myself, we have a podcast mile higher. We do a lot of true crime. We also do other types of mysteries on there as well. But if you want to hear more about Gran Amato again, an absolutely insane case, the link is below in the show notes or description for that episode on Lights Out. Which again, maybe you're a paranormal lover out there. Maybe you're you're interested in cases like Gran Amato's case, Lights Out covers the full gambit, all sorts of very interesting things over there. So appreciate you for being here. Thank you for putting up with me. I had a lot of fun being here. And I hope you all have a wonderful day. And I'll be back very soon. She's doing amazing. She's very excited to return. But with that, I bid you guys farewell. Thanks for having me. See you next time. [BLANK_AUDIO]