293. The Vampire Murders

you're listening to an oh no media podcast hey everyone welcome back to the podcast this is murder with my husband i'm peyton morland and i'm garrett morland and he's the husband and i'm the husband quick before we get into the episode i have a question to ask everybody listening have you ever woke up in a bad mood and then went to work in a horrible mood okay anyways because no don't do this don't do this last week don't do this last episode great i was in a horrible mood garrett gave me a hug before we started recording he was like it's okay we're gonna get through this we can do this like i just woke up in a bad mood i was having a bad day record the episode upload just so uh read a whole bunch of comments saying that i am a very mean person to garrett and that i am a very mean person to garrett and that i am a very mean person to garrett and that i am a very mean person to garrett and that i am a very mean person to garrett and that i am a very mean person to garrett my energy is off and i'm a horrible person and so this is my formal apology to everyone for who picked up on my bad mood last week i just simply was in a bad mood that's all no conspiracies here all right thank you baby thank you very much you're welcome yeah i don't know i'm just always happy you know oh my gosh just kidding um i don't know do you want me to say anything got much to say about it i mean you can say my favorite comment we were just doing our thing was they said garrett's walking on eggshells yeah i'm not i promise okay i don't think i think garrett stomps on eggshells yeah yeah i like that i like it too that was good so like he is so grounded and confident he would never ever walk on eggshells around someone and it's actually admirable thanks baby i appreciate that as crazy as i look right now on youtube i appreciate that at least they'll just call you crazy not mean to me well payton's not mean just been a busy month for us we love you guys thank you for being here thank you for supporting us if you are watching on youtube i am sorry i look insane um honestly we kind of woke up and came down to record i've been sick for like a week and a half so i'm just still congested and stuff and i was like i'm not gonna take a shower and get ready my hair can look crazy i'm gonna show off my hair transplant i got some hair transplant i'm gonna show off my hair transplant some hair going and here we are recording again thank you for being here we hope you all had a great halloween um if you did something if not payton and i didn't really do anything we kind of just sat at home we passed out some candy we hung out payton dressed up yeah that was our halloween huh baby yeah it was fun actually it was it was low-key but honestly the vibes were it like it was fun it was good it's a good time we got our morning coffee we got our morning drinks we are here to tell you guys a good case and on that note hopping into my 10 seconds i have nothing because i've been sick and if one of you out there is like yeah you're always sick you know what you can shove it okay shove it okay do you have ibs no all right i don't want to hear it i don't want to hear it i always see the tick i always see these tick tocks and people are like oh that one friend with stomach issues you don't understand you do not know what it's like to have ibs i just deal with it and i'm not gonna lie i'm pretty good at dealing with it huh yeah yeah you heard it here first folks anyways let's hop into today's case um oh we got thanksgiving and christmas coming up we got the holidays coming up so for everyone celebrating holidays it's a good time of year we're probably going to do as it gets closer usually around thanksgiving christmas every year we kind of pick a couple families and um we help them with the holidays so stay tuned for that we're going to be doing that just to submit a family like we did last year yeah yeah so we'll give you more updates on that if you're new here uh we'll we'll give an update soon on that other than that let's hop into today's case our sources for this episode are mynews13.com hauntedhistorytours.com courttv.com sacrosanctum.org horrorobsessive.com west.com oxygen.com newyorktimes.com wkms.org and deadly cult season one now there is nothing wrong with looking for a little magic and fantasy in the world especially when the news nowadays feels so dark we all want to believe that there's something out there that can fix everything with the wave of a wand or the snap of a finger or at least something that can offer us a temporary escape from reality i think that's why so many of us love halloween it's the one time a year where we can become someone other than ourselves and it's like accepted yeah we can exist in a world that feels different from the one we live in every day you know i think that's why it's hard to interrupt um i think that's why a lot of people also do what are those called like the renaissance fair but there's a name for it not a renaissance fair there's an actual name for it larping yes larping yes it's just kind of nice to like escape the world for a second just kind of do i think it's no different than watching a like sci-fi movie or action movie or tv show or playing video games you can kind of just escape anyways and everyone needs that honestly like it's healthy to have one foot in reality and you know being like this is what's going on being responsible so i think it's kind of nice to like escape the world for a second citizen and adult but at the same time for everyone's survival and mental health you have to have those things to escape into and on halloween at least for one day we can pretend that magic and the supernatural exist but for some people halloween doesn't end when spooky season is over for some the fantasy world is a place that they choose to live in every single day and when the lines between fantasy and reality start to blur it can have dangerous repercussions especially when the ones playing pretend don't think there will be any consequences for their actions so let me start today's story by introducing you to rick wendorf and naoma ruth queen or ruth as she went so in 1996 ruth was a stay-at-home mom living in eustace florida with her life partner rick the two had met years earlier after ruth separated from her first husband in which she had two daughters with now both rick and ruth were working at a metal and plastic factory when they were first introduced and they fell in love and that is when ruth got pregnant with rick's baby so adding a third daughter to the now blended family it was a little girl they would call jennifer and while rick and ruth never got married they decided to move in together and after rick climbed the corporate ladder at the factory they decided they were making enough money for ruth to now be a stay-at-home mom for their new daughter they actually bought five acres of property in eustace and built their dream home together and then in 1981 they welcomed another little girl who was a stay-at-home mom and she was a stay-at-home mom to their family who they named heather and by many accounts this family seemed really happy they took frequent vacations to disney world they went camping together the girls took music lessons and ruth and rick were basically saving for their daughter's futures okay sounds like a pretty fun life not gonna lie but the two newest daughters jennifer and heather kind of grow up to be very different people and ruth and rick have a hard time navigating that like how to parent these two girls differently because they are so different so jennifer kind of took the popular cheerleader route she was runner up for the title of miss eustace she was smart and studious with a scholarship to attend florida state university in the fall and meanwhile heather was a little more she was artistic and alternative she had an interest in the supernatural and the occult which you know before the year 2000 is a pretty big deal uh she wanted nothing to do with beauty pageants or sports but heather and jennifer seemed mostly okay with being two different people there didn't appear to be much animosity between the sisters or jealousy between them but there were some things about both of the girls's behavior that just didn't work for their parents so by her junior year 17 year old jennifer our beauty queen had started cutting classes because she had began seeing a 21 year old boy named tony jennifer who worked at a supermarket with tony began lying to her parents about her whereabouts and so her parents start trying to keep her from seeing him and jennifer this much older boy, I mean, this is pretty typical teenage behavior. That was until Tony crashed and totaled Jennifer's car. So that is when Ruth and Rick sort of stepped up the monitoring on their daughters. Ruth even took a part-time job at Eustace High School just so she could be at the school to keep an eye on Heather and Jennifer. Because it was around this time that Heather also started acting out in her own ways. It started off small. She kind of began changing her style. She put dead flowers and vases around her room and inverted cross hanging on her bedroom wall. Then her drawings and her art got a little darker. She was starting to attract the attention of other teachers and students and not in a good way. Heather actually strung up a Barbie doll with a noose which she then tied to her school backpack and walked around school with for everyone to see. What is up? So according to her sister Jennifer, she also walked in on Heather harming herself around this time. Okay. Sorry, keep going. So the two sisters are kind of just, you know, struggling and acting out in their own ways. Yeah, I mean, it's sad. It was then that Ruth and Rick, the parents, were planning on sitting their girls down to have a serious talk about the future. But unfortunately, they never got the chance. So on the night of November 21st, November 25th, 1996, which also was the day I was born, by the way. That is true. November 25th, 1996, 17-year-old Jennifer comes home in the new car her parents had got for her because her older boyfriend had totaled hers. It is a little after 10 p.m., which is past her curfew. And since she knows she's broken the rules, she tries to sneak into the house, be extra quiet. And that is when she sees her dad, Rick. Lying there on the couch, the TV is still on. And she's like, okay, good. He's asleep. I'm just going to sneak right by him. But then when she tiptoes over to the kitchen to grab a glass of water, she notices something terrifying. In their kitchen, there is blood everywhere. So she's kept the lights off because she's trying to be sneaky. No way Rick's dead on the couch. So at this point, she's like, I got to flip this light on. So she switches the light on and sees the blood has actually come from her mother, Ruth, who is lying face up on the kitchen floor. She looks over, notices her dad has also been stabbed to death on the couch. So at this point, she goes to look for her sister, Heather, because that's the only remaining member of the family. She can't find Heather anywhere in the house. So Jennifer dials 911. I don't. Okay. I already have some thoughts on this, but I'm going to let you keep going. She tells the operator, I think my mother and father have been murdered and my 15-year-old sister, Heather, is missing. I am not going to say much, but I think my first instinct is Heather might be involved. That's all I'm going to say for now. So police arrive to the crime scene and they find 49-year-old Rick has been beaten to death. Oh my gosh. Chances are he never even saw his attack. It looks like from the one pool of blood on the couch, he was sound asleep when whoever murdered him delivered the fatal blows. Later in an autopsy, they will find he had 22 wounds in total. Okay. I take back my statement of Heather being involved. Because it was beating? Yeah, because it was beating. I just. It doesn't seem possible or plausible to me. Meanwhile, 54-year-old Ruth looks like she had been. trying to defend herself from the attacker. Her hands are above her face. It appears she was beaten so badly, there are actually pieces of her skull that have landed in the next room over. An autopsy will find that she has 23 wounds in total, 16 of them on her head area. Now, at first, this kind of does appear to police to be a robbery gone wrong. There is some jewelry missing, a credit card is gone, as is the family's blue Ford Explorer. They collect DNA from under Ruth's fingernails, since it's clear that she did fight back. And there is also a bloody shoe print in the home for police to examine as evidence. What's interesting, though, as police are investigating this double murder possible kidnapping, they find a note from the missing daughter, Heather. And the note is not the only thing that's been found. The note is basically a goodbye to her parents, indicating that she was running away. Okay. But even more shocking is that on the right side of Rick's chest, there is a burn that looks deliberately made on his chest in the shape of the letter V. So when police speak with Jennifer, she tells them whatever happened to her parents, she now believes after kind of like sitting with the scene a little bit, that her sister or her sister's friends were likely involved. Okay, never mind. She's like, I'm not sure Heather did it on her own. She might have even been forced. It's not like I feel like she wanted to hurt our parents. But this is just kind of what I'm starting to feel. But Jennifer pointed to one person in particular that Heather hung out with that always seemed to be bad news. 15 years old, correct? Yes. Okay. So the person that Jennifer is like, maybe this is who did it, is a friend of Heather's that used to live in Eustace, but had since moved back to his hometown in Kentucky. Someone who definitely lived in a world of fantasy, and had seemingly kind of been slowly roping Heather into this as well, was a 16 year old kid named Rod Farrell. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. There are plenty of reasons we put off getting support. And for a lot of people, cost is one of them. With BetterHelp, insurance options may now be available nationwide, with an average copay for eligible members of just $23 per session. And while we're reconsidering old assumptions, maybe there are a few others worth questioning too. Women inherit a lot of unwritten rules. Be ambitious, but not intimidating. Be there for everyone, but still make time for yourself. Have it all together, but don't look like you're trying too hard. And I have definitely fallen into all of these traps. But if you have been wanting to start therapy, BetterHelp works with more than 125 health plan networks, and eligible members have an average copay of just $23 per session with insurance. If you don't have insurance or don't live in the United States, you can still get 10% off your first month. And Peyton and I are big advocates for therapy. Give it a try. Life can be crazy. There's a lot going on. Like we were talking about, sometimes it feels like you need to have everything figured out. You don't. Go talk to someone. Go see what's going on. Visit betterhelp.com slash husband to explore your payment options. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash husband. All right, guys, we are getting into a sponsor, and it is one of my favorites, Quince. You know those pieces in your closet that you find yourself reaching for over and over again? The sweater that just somehow works with everything. The jeans you know are always going to fit. That bag you carry everywhere. Well, that is Quince in my closet, okay? All of my Quince products have become my staples, which is why I highly, highly recommend going to Quince's website, checking everything out. It is the quality. It is the quality that sets them apart. I mean, you have the price that they've been able to cut out the middlemen and work directly with factories, so it is cheaper. But the quality of Quince items, I have had them for years. And again, I continue to reach for them time and time again. I'm talking loungewear, silk skirts, cashmere sweaters, and not to mention, they sell baby stuff, okay? Find the fall pieces you'll reach for most at Quince. Download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers, or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns, now available in Canada and the UK, too. And guys, at the very end, when Quince asks you where you heard about them, please, please, please just let them know. Murder With My Husband, it is the best way to support the show. It lets them know that you heard about it here, and it would mean a ton. Again, if you've never shopped on Quince, go take a look, and then let them know Murder With My Husband sent you. Now, Rod was born and raised in a small town called Murray, Kentucky. Rod's mother, Sondra Gibson, was only 17 when she actually had Rod, and his father, Rick, not the same other Rick who has been murdered, was also a teenager at the time they got pregnant. And while the two got married a few days after Rod was born, they actually just split up a few weeks after that. So Rod and Sondra, mother and son, move in with her parents, which is actually a very strict Christian home, which Sondra obviously didn't want to move in with her parents. She feels out of place here because she just had a baby as a teenager. But Sondra worked hard to get her to get her and Rod out from under her parents' roof so she and Rod could go on and live their own life. Now Sandra claimed her parents were the quote mentally and emotionally abusive types who made her existence a living hell. So as a result Sandra had rebelled in a lot of ways which included turning to sex work and exotic dancing as a way to try and make her own money and while he grows up Rod sees the rebellious side of his mother and it's just the two of them and he seemingly kind of starts to follow suit. Not only that the two were very close they took up a lot of the same interests as mother and son. For example some of Sandra's neighbors spoke about them wandering around the neighborhood holding hands even into Rod's teenage years. So from the outside looking in a lot of people said that they appeared to be more like boyfriend and girlfriend rather than mother and son. Okay. And Rod also became fascinated with Sandra's obsession with the occult. So she had introduced him into a role-playing game called Vampire the Masquerade. Rod also said he was exposed to occult rituals as a child and human sacrifices. So I'm not sure how true that is but this is just what he's telling people. That's it. Okay. So as you can imagine. What is going on? Friends are kind of hard for Rod to come by considering the way he grew up at least in his pre-teen years. So when his mother Sandra meets another man one living down in Eustace, Florida Rod didn't put up a fight when she's like hey pack your bags we're moving to Eustace to be with my new boyfriend. But it was clear right away that Eustace wasn't going to change the road that Rod was now on with his obsession with the occult. As he entered high school he was seen outside in the school yard wearing a thick black trench coat even in the hundred degree Florida heat. He began taking martial arts training. He learned how to wield swords and other weapons. Remember he loves this role-playing vampire game. And his mother had little rules when it came to what Rod could do and couldn't do. She didn't give him a curfew. He was allowed to stay out all night as a teenager. He could skip school when he wanted. He began to play with his mother and began using drugs. And it presumably got worse once Rod made some new friends. One of them being Heather Wendorf. So the two would stay out late at night going to cemeteries hanging out by old mausoleums. They'd have deep discussions about art and the occult. I think it's pretty safe to say that as teenagers with underdeveloped brains hanging out in the cemeteries their reality begins to differ. Oh yeah. I was gonna say especially as um a male too like yeah I feel like my brain was not developed until a couple years ago. Like it just takes a long time. Right. And Rod began telling Heather things. He like genuinely tells Heather his teenage friend that he is immortal. And he's being serious? Dead serious. Okay. He was quote the devil's child walking with earthly feet. Oh no. Okay that's not good. And he'd ask Heather things like quote what if you and I were deemed rulers of the world. Okay. All right. Look I'm all for video games. I'm all for like role playing like yeah this is just. I think also at this point in time. That's not good. Like the it started kind of in the 70s. I don't know. I don't know if it started in the 70s but getting up into the 80s and 90s. Like satanic panic. Yes. The occult. But we're kind of far from the satanic panic. Well I think spreading into other places it kind of took like it was a big thing around this time. When was Dungeons and Dragons big? Is it around this time? Does anyone know? Yes. I don't remember. It starts around this time and people did believe Dungeons and Dragons was like an evil game. Okay. Um and I will say because of this because of the older generation's belief in satanic panic and the occult and evil taking over the world it became a way for kids to rebel. Yeah. Like kids who wanted to rebel were like well if I just get into the occult I'm cool and I'm rebelling against my parents but. I mean thinking you're the devil's child and you're the ruler is not good. Well it's also a little different than like liking the color black and hanging out in cemeteries. You know what I mean? Like being quote unquote emo. Or goth is very different than being like I'm Satan's baby. Yes. Like there's just a step farther here that is no longer reality. So over time Heather introduces her new friend Rod to a friend from a different school in the area named Janine. And Rod and Janine actually start dating which Heather according to sources didn't seem to mind. Their relationship was pretty platonic like just friends. But with one more person to entertain Rod's lies get even stranger because he now has two girls who are kind of into what he's saying and believing him. His beliefs become a little bit more convincing especially to himself. He tells Janine his girlfriend that she is an ancient queen and that he had been alive as far back as the 1500s. He actually tells her I am a 500 year old vampire not named Edward but named Visaggio. Holy crap. OK. Cool. But Rod's time in Eustace was actually short lived. So after his mother's relationship didn't work out with the new boyfriend she's like hey Rod we're moving back to Murray Kentucky. And this is around the start of his sophomore year. So Rod moves with his mom but keeps in touch with Heather often racking up huge phone calls. He's like I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. I don't bills with her as they talked for hours every night. They are best friends. But that time in Eustace had awakened something in Rod, this time with these two girls where they all kind of lived in this false reality. And it helped him find his charm and charisma once he moved back to Kentucky. So upon his return, Rod met a student at his high school who was also into the occult, a teenager named Jaden Murphy. Now, naturally, Rod gravitated towards Jaden and his small group of friends who, in a devoutly Christian school, all stuck out in a pretty big way. For Rod, it felt like he had finally found this community that he had been searching for. Like these two girls had given him the confidence to then go back and be confident enough to have a solid friend group who was like him. Yeah. Jaden and his friends, were also really into the role-playing game, Vampire the Masquerade. So this friend group kind of begins dabbling in vampiric rituals. The two, Jaden and Rod, become fast friends. And in January of 1996, after a little over a year of knowing Rod, Jaden invites him officially to become a part of his vampire family, if you will. They would have loved Twilight around this time. Loved it. Loved it. And he offered to help, quote, cross him over into this vampire family in an sort of initiation ritual. Now, Rod's dream of becoming an actual vampire at this point is starting to come true, at least to him. So late one night, the two friends meet in a local cemetery. Jaden cuts himself up and says, here, Rod, drink my blood. And then Rod does the same, cuts him and lets Jaden drink his blood. And then they sit in a quiet meditation, waiting for the transformation into a vampire to take over. And? Well, I mean, they believe this is happening, but it's clear that Rod does not see himself as a vampire. So he's not the type of guy to be like, I'll just do what you say. Shortly after this initiation ceremony took place, Rod decided, thanks for turning me into a vampire, but I think it's time that I start my own vampire cult. So he approaches this kid he'd known for a long time named Howard Scott Anderson. Now, Scott, as his friends called him. And Rod kind of had a lot in common in more grounded ways. They both came from unstable households. And he's like, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't holds both had parents who were struggling to make ends meet and both had caretakers who were kind of said to be emotionally maybe even physically abusive so in a way when rod introduces this new vampire cult that he's starting to scott scott's like actually yeah it sounds like a great escape from my real life a way to feel like they had some control in their own lives which is why rod's like yeah all you gotta do is drink my blood and you can join my cult so scott accepted rod's invitation to partake in the blood drinking ritual and from there rod used that charisma and charm that he had been developing being in florida to recruit two other local friends to his cult charity kessie and dana cooper it's crazy the amount of people i think it's not that crazy i think they could be vampires i was gonna say it's crazy but i don't know i guess not that crazy isn't there a huge group in like washington um where twilight was started where they all think they're vampires seattle yeah well i don't think it's in seattle isn't it like it's uh west washington or something it's not forks i don't think so no no i never heard of a vampire cult there i think it's i do know seattle i think it's somewhere to have vampire cults and then also um new orleans is rumored to have pretty big vampire cults okay but here's the thing you also there was pretty popular vampire movies around this time yeah and so and especially like i think it's called the lost boys i've watched it but it's basically like this group of bad boys who are actually vampires and they're like teenagers early 20s and they're like cool kind of like vampire diaries in a sense yeah but it is way more like gang culty like it's like this culty group of vampires and so i think it's called the lost boys if i'm remembering right and they like torment this local group of teenagers but essentially i mean they could be looking at themselves kind of like that it's just crazy the i mean i get it but i don't get it but i get it you know and i think like with rod's abnormal upbringing where rules didn't really apply to him and it was okay to be different like actually like urged to be different he starts kind of slowly morphing into the perfect cult leader because the next two girls that he asks to join his cult also come from dysfunctional households which is like a typical um predatory i'm just trying to figure out if do these kids and like people that do this do they actually believe they're vampires or as part of them they know they're not they just want it to be true you know what i'm saying i don't think it matters i know but i i'm just curious like how many of them actually think like no i'm a vampire or it's just like let me belong to something correct yes i don't know yeah so now that rod had kind of started his own vampire family it was them against the world and real life responsibilities were slowly slipping away from these kids or at least to rod not only did rod begin skipping class he was now being outwardly disobedient at school he was smoking on school grounds talking back to teachers and rod supposedly recruited more members from there at one point rod and jayden's vampire coven had seemingly merged so they decide to like become one and that basically ends up being about 25 kids in total that are in these vampire cults and one of those members get this apparently is rod's own mother sandra so she joins her son's vampire family all right guys we're jumping into an ad and it is the one and only skims we love skims and i'm so excited i get to talk to you about their loungewear and pajamas if you follow me on instagram i just posted but i did get one of their sleep sets that's like a deep burgundy color so cute so rich so soft and then i also got a fleece set that's like this chocolate brown so freaking cute i love a good matching set and i love skims again the sleep set i got is the soft lounge sleep set i also got a fleece set that's like a soft lounge sleep set always get 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we sent you and it helps support the show simply safe ahead of crime and in real time it was said that sondra even wrote letters to jayden murphy's 14 year old brother saying that she wanted to be his quote vampire bride for eternity what the 14 year old boy so she goes full force and that's insane that is insane his mom so you have to think like in this delusion if your own mother is involved rod really believes that like his his reality has now completely shifted they often had their meetings and gatherings at an abandoned cement structure in the middle of the woods that they decided to call hotel california and there they would drink each other's blood and partake in other occult rituals and while i don't know if this was true of the other members i do know that rod started taking heavy drugs as well during this time he was doing pcp lsd heroin and he gets more violent by may of 1996 rod had been suspended from his high school for being too disruptive on campus and things at home seemed to be getting worse too sondra actually filed a quote beyond parental control report on her son rod now this is interesting because i feel like we don't see this happen a lot basically these reports are a legal document a parent will have issued for someone 16 or younger to basically say like i can't parent this person anymore like i don't have any control i can't manage them it points out that the behavior is possibly a risk to themselves and to others and it gives permission for the juvenile court or social services to get involved when things get out of hand though i will say this does not legally absolve a parent of their responsibility or accountability for their child's actions it's kind of basically like just red flagging the system but apparently a big part of the reason why sondra even did this while also partaking in her son's delusion is because she claimed that rod had started being verbally abusive and was threatening to kill her though according to other members of the vampire family sondra was not much better like she was just as abusive and at least verbally back to rod so things seemed to get so out of hand in that family that in september of that same year jayden was even pulled into it wow he and rod got into a massive argument it turned into a physical alter of the family and rod's violence escalated further he starts becoming violent towards animals i'm not going to go into detail but he was killing animals like several animals from the humane society like i was talking to jayden the first time i was talking to jayden the first time i was talking to jayden so so i mean all the signs are there that he's basically going to kill somebody yes so rod was brought in for questioning after um killing these animals but police could find no evidence that it was actually him he denies all involvement he ended up getting off for this crime without a conviction but unfortunately that would just be the precursor to what rod was planning next so as i mentioned heather was a victim of a crime and rod was a victim of a crime and rod was a victim of a crime heather wendorf and rod had stayed in touch this entire time after he had moved back to kentucky so she's kind of like hearing from the outskirts everything that is happening that he had started this huge cult he had this following there were a lot of late night phone calls where rod kept her up to date i would assume like law enforcement has to be aware of this at this point right i mean i don't think enough to like do anything or understand how serious it was they probably said something like that i don't think enough to like do anything or understand how serious it was i think it's a joke at this point just high school kids being kids so heather is also keeping him up to date on what's going on and so heather is also keeping him up to date on what's going on and so happening back in eustis and it's during these late night phone calls that she mentions something to rod she says her father was sexually abusing her now from what i could find there was never any evidence or police reports to reflect this but nonetheless rod saw this as an opportunity a chance to swoop in and save heather be her knight in shining armor or her vampire in shining armor so 16 year old rod at this point rounds up his followers 16 year old charity who's actually his new girlfriend 19 year old dana 16 year old howard scott and told them hey guys we are heading to florida on a vampire mission so in the early morning hours of november 23rd 1996 they hopped in scott's car and they begin driving south initially rod told them the plan was just to pick heather up and then all go to the hospital new orleans together they felt that there in a city that embraces the occult they would be amongst like-minded people perhaps they could even expand their vampire clan further maybe live their long term together except there was clearly more to the plan that rod wasn't sharing with his other clan members so two days after rod and the others arrived in eustis they pick heather up and go to a local cemetery rod and heather walk off for a bit scott said they were gone for about an hour and a half and during that time rod crossed heather over in his standard ritual basically drink my blood i'll drink yours during that meeting heather explained to the others how her father had been abusing her her mother was refusing to believe her and she was looking for someone who could finally do something about it get her out of her situation so rod introduces this detailed plan to the rest of the cult since they had gotten a flat tire on scott's buick that day they now needed another car to drive to new orleans and heather's family had this nice new ford explorer so that night heather would sneak out of her house and meet the other girls in the group a quarter mile up the road and meanwhile rod and scott the boys would sneak into heather's house steal her parents ford explorer so then they could take the car to louisiana and that's what happened sort of except people died yeah so after heather left that night rod and scott went into the wendorf's garage and saw the explorer they didn't just hop in and pull out of the garage instead rod grabbed a crowbar and went into heather's house with scott kind of following behind him rod tells scott we're just going to steal a few more things from the home he's like we also need to arm ourselves that's why i'm grabbing the crowbar just in case so scott goes in with him and starts and starts snooping around the house for money and then rod spots heather's dad rick sound asleep on the couch and i don't know what goes through his head i don't know if he was like i'm a vampire and he was like i gotta unleash this violent rage that has been building up inside of me and i'm delusional at this point rod or rather bisagio his vampire alter ego as he was actually calling himself at this point he walks over he lifts up the crowbar and he just starts swinging at sleeping rick beating him to death on the couch and that's my gosh when scott sees what's happening he starts to freak out he didn't think they were going to hurt anyone so he obviously goes up to rod what are you doing and according to scott rod had this demonic look in his eyes and he screams back at scott to go find the keys to the car so scott's dad is like i don't know what to do i don't know what to do scott claims he was terrified he did what he was told and that's when ruth came out of the bathroom and spotted rod and according to scott she begins fighting back she threw a cup of hot coffee at rod she scratched him in the face it only made him angrier he starts swinging at her with the crowbar dude attacking her even worse than he did rick and after both rick and ruth were clearly dead rod burned the letter v into rick's skin as like vampire for his um vampire named vasaggio yeah yeah and while rod is marking his territory if you will scott grabbed the keys and the couple's credit cards and then they both jump into the ford explorer they catch up with the girls a little ways down the road they swap the license plates of the two cars putting the plates from scott's buick on the explorer and then they take off for new orleans now obviously the boys are at least rod is covered in blood there's a crowbar in the back seat of the car heather think well rod obviously needs to tell them what happened because they are confused and when he tells them what happened supposedly it comes as a shock to the three girls they begin screaming and crying especially heather she was like this was not supposed to be a murder plot her parents just you were supposed to just take my parents car but scott says he wasn't really buying heather's tears while he didn't know for sure he actually felt like he had been set up and that heather and rod when they had like walked earlier that night had planned this and then like set scott up and scott went in and this murder plan happened and he felt like heather knew about it beforehand interesting so it's not long after that jennifer comes home obviously sneaks in her parents dead her sister missing she calls 9-1-1 the police arrive this trial is going to be insane because you have a bunch of different young kids who are all going to rat each other out disagree with each other lie it's going to be a mess and it's kind of like what you were saying earlier i think the curtain will fall really quickly on who actually believes the delusion they're living in and who was just doing it to be a part of something and is quickly going to be like i had no part in this yes and obviously when police arrive she says hey now my sister's missing i don't know what's going on but i do she has some like scary friends that could have done this so she's completely right with her assumption that maybe her sister's friends had something to do so once police realize that the family's car has been stolen they have a big piece of evidence to work off of so they put out the license plate information that night and within a few hours they actually get a hit police in seminole county just 38 miles away say they found an abandoned vehicle with those plates in their jurisdiction obviously it's not a ford explorer it's on scott's buick because they switched the license plates so then they look up the vin number to the car that has the family's license plates they find that it's registered to howard scott anderson in kentucky after hearing that he's definitely friends with rod and been traveling with him and they most likely now have heather they now have a solid lead on this investigation the problem is they don't know where the teenagers are headed they just have what they assume to be the license plates on the ford explorer well these kids make a lot of mistakes along the way for instance they use the wendorf's stolen credit card to purchase gas and a knife on their route to louisiana but they keep going despite seeing reports on the news that the police are onto them and a few days later they get to baton rouge and they're able to get to the police station and they're able to get to the police station and they're able to get to the police station and they're able to get to the police station louisiana and it's there they start dumping things their clothes the murder weapon none of them have slept they're exhausted they're running out of money so charity this is rod's girlfriend actually does something drastic at this point in like just i don't know what i imagine to be just like confusion fear hysteria hysteria she calls her grandmother and is like hey can you send me some money um hey now obviously they're not going to be able to get to the police station and they're going to be able to get to the police station and they're going to be able to get to the police station obviously charity's grandmother at this point has heard that her granddaughter is in trouble because the parents have been contacted she's like so you're on the road with murderers like you guys are wanted right now you know that and so charity's grandmother is like girl go to the police yeah turn yourself in tell them what happened the grandmother hands over the number charity called from and police are able to trace it to a phone booth just outside of baton rouge grandma doesn't send the money instead she sends a team of police officers who find and arrest the five teenagers on november 28th this is just three days after the murders so it doesn't actually take long to get rod farrell to confess to the murders and to being the mastermind because as you can imagine him fully believing this delusion he's like oh yeah this is what had to happen he is more than happy to be like i'm a vampire and i murdered these people okay now scott however is like listen i was at the scene of the crime but i did not murder either of those people i had no idea it was gonna happen i didn't know this was the plan and meanwhile charity and dana say they had no idea the plan was to commit murder either until after the boys got back in the car and said it happened and here's the thing there is a ginormous line between stealing a car and murdering two people right so the girls are like no no we just thought we were getting heather away from her abusive dad and that we were all going to run away to new orleans Now also, I mean, I guess we'll see what happens with Heather and all that. I just, I think it's hard. Rod obviously being delusional. Heather, sounds like she might be pretty delusional as well. It's hard. I'm not saying it didn't happen to not discredit it, but it's also hard to believe if the dad was abusing because this is a mess. So how do you know what's true and what's not true? And I think also police don't know whether to believe Heather about if she knew the plan or not. But they, after talking and investigating, they start to lean on the side that Heather did come up with the murder plan with Rod. But she's claiming through and through she didn't know he was going to murder her parents. Yeah, I don't know about this. Rod's mom, Sondra, was also questioned. She's like, once they kind of hear about the dynamic there and what had been going on back in Kentucky. Police questioned Sondra. They're like, did you know about the murders? And she's like, well, actually, I overheard Heather asking Rod to kill her parents. Okay, but how can we trust her too? Because she's delusional as well. Well, and also it's like protecting your son by not putting the entire blame on him and claiming he was doing it for Heather. That's a good point. They give her a polygraph and Sondra fails it. And after she fails the polygraph, apparently. She recants the statement. She's like, never mind. I lied. I didn't hear this. Okay. So eventually, Rod Farrell was charged with armed burglary, armed robbery, and two counts of murder in first degree. He pleads guilty to all of it at the start of his trial in February of 1998. 17-year-old Rod was then sentenced to death, making him the youngest person on death row in Florida at the time. I mean, this is brutal murder. Like, I. I'm not surprised he got sentenced to death. I think it's. It's Florida as well. And yeah, I mean, I have not much to say about that. I mean, justice. Like, he killed. It's insane. A sleeping person. Killed two people. However, this obviously is later overturned in 2005 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that juveniles couldn't get the death penalty. Which, as you guys know, I also adamantly agree on. Rod was resentenced to life in prison. Without the possibility of parole. Now, as for the others who were maybe under his spell, was this a cult? Were they almost manipulated? We don't know. Now, Rod's girlfriend, Charity Kessie, was convicted of two counts of third degree murder. Obviously, because after finding out the murder happened, she didn't turn anyone in. Robbery with a gun or deadly weapon and burglary armed with weapons. So, she gets charged with the robbery. And burglary, even though, according to the statement, she wasn't at the actual crime. She was given 10 and a half years in state prison. Wow. Dana Cooper was convicted of the same charges. She was given 17 and a half years. Wow. That actually surprises me they got so long. Well, Scott Anderson was convicted of the same charges as Rod and he was sentenced to life in prison. Really? He wasn't sentenced to death like Rod originally was. Though, Scott later. Had his sentence reduced to 40 years behind bars. Life in prison at 17, as everyone admits, he didn't even touch the murder weapon. You're still there. I don't know if I agree with that. I think we've done other cases where people have been brainwashed, but, you know, in a sense to do something. I mean, brainwashed or not, if the story is true and he showed up thinking they were going to take a car and then his friend murdered two people. Life in prison does seem pretty heavy for that in my opinion. I think even 40 years seems pretty heavy. And usually I am on the aggressive side. I mean, granted, afterward, he didn't immediately go to police, but they're also teenagers, group mentality. Yeah, I don't know. Anyways, I mean, it's not our decision. Not to make excuses because obviously. No, I just, it's just interesting. I don't know. It's just that, like, the whole group adamantly claims, including Rod himself, that Rod was the only one who talked about the murder of Scott Anderson. He didn't even touch the murder weapons. Yeah. So I don't know. You know, it's not like these typical teenage stories where it's kind of confusing about who actually did it. Yep. So the interesting part about this aftermath is that when it came to Heather Wendorf, she seemed to get off the hook easily. The state attorney decided not to prosecute her. You are kidding me right now. Her lawyers argue she didn't know about the murders until after they were over, that she was a victim in this. That she went with the group because she feared for her own safety because the person driving the car had just murdered her parents. This is what her defense is arguing. Wow. So she never even faced charges for her parents' death. Disagree with that. But Heather's family still seemed to blame her for Rick and Ruth's murders. Afterwards, Jennifer was sent to live with her aunt and uncle before going to college, and they refused to let her have any contact with Heather. And meanwhile, Heather was sent to live with her grandmother. She then went to a psychiatric facility and then to a foster family. She later went to art school. She got married. She moved to North Carolina before finally reconnecting with some members of her family. The question still remains, though. Wow. Did Heather know what was going to happen to her parents? I don't know if we will ever know. Is it possible she thought Rod and all of his claims were nothing more than storytelling and family? fantasy perhaps everyone underestimated rod ferrell and what he was really capable of which just goes to show when we believe something long and hard enough the lines between reality and fantasy really do blur and it's in that gray area that possibly the most dangerous decisions are made and that is the story of the murders of ruth queen and rick wendorf i think the only thing honestly that i am not sure about is like scott sentencing and maybe the other girls sentencing because i think it was group mentality i think rod led the whole thing i think if it was this day and age the sentencing would actually be less i think we're less harsh than we used to be but also i don't know i don't know we will i don't think we'll honestly ever be able to do that i think we'll never be able to do that i think we'll never be able to ever know exactly what happened exactly went down we don't have text messages we don't have more evidence such as this insane like i think it's insane i feel like those parents are dead crazy crazy crazy case i don't know it's um and five kids were on the run for three days it's pretty mind-blowing i will say obviously i think the reason if i could come up with an explanation for why you're saying we used to be more harsh i think it's because we have better understanding of psychology now um when you understand what actually goes into manipulation group mentality underdeveloped brains that especially the teenage group mentality oh like rod right do whatever you want but oftentimes there is one leader and when that happens in teenagers teenagers will do things they wouldn't normally do i'm not saying this is an excuse for the behavior because every decision made in this case was wrong yeah every single decision as soon as they found out it was i'm not saying this is an excuse for the behavior because every decision i mean just going to even steal a car was wrong as soon as they found out it was murder theoretically they should have immediately left and went to the cops i think i'm just trying to think right so okay let's say scott's in there and let's say scott tries to stop rod what if rod then goes to kill him which is what heather's defense said was how are you expecting heather to get out of this car and go to cops when this person just brutally murdered her parents and she's in the car with i just think it's crazy scott got four years i don't know why i'm thinking so much about that i just think it's wild because if he didn't touch everyone admitted he didn't touch anything he was just like oh shoot i'm going along with everything now what's happening things are going insane at 17 it's not like he was 30 years i'm usually not in agreeance with this stuff i'm usually in agreeance with long sentencings and the death penalty but this one i'm not i don't agree with it and i might be curious to actually know maybe a little bit more like more about scott more about what was going on what he has to say what he has to say but i think i disagree with this you actually just brought up a good point keep in mind that majority of these kids didn't come from very stable families take heather out of it the people that he had like recruited were all from very dysfunctional vulnerable families yeah i just want to make clear before we end garrett and i are not excusing any of the bad behavior we're trying to screw psychologically come up with an explanation this is ridiculous and screw i mean rod deserves what rod a hundred percent i mean please rot in prison for life i don't know how else to say it and if you don't agree with me sorry that's it yeah i think um no excuses but pondering an explanation behind the psychology of how we get to this place is needed it is needed because that is how we further understand humanity and how it is so not black and white all right you guys that is our episode for this week spooky season is officially over so vampire cults and all the spooky things we will probably typically go back to our just regular true crime cases. Even though this is true crime, I tried to do a more spookier theme for the month. Yeah, I will see you next time with another episode. I love it. I hate it. Goodbye.