On July 5, 2012, 16-year old Skylar Neese returned to her family's West Virginia apartment after working an evening shift at Wendy's. Her apartment complex's surveillance video showed that Skylar snuck out of the apartment through her bedroom window at 12:30 A.M. on July 6 and got into an unknown vehicle. Her father said that she did not take her cell phone charger and that her bedroom window was left open as if she planned on coming home before the morning. But she was never seen again.
Skylar was an only child who her parents would describe as a good kid. But in the months leading up to her disappearance, Skylar had been hanging out with some rebellious and troubled friends, smoking pot, drinking, and joy riding around town. In the investigation that followed, Facebook posts and messages would reveal a strained relationship between Skylar and two of her best friends. Police believed this social media trail could help them find Skylar, but the truth was something that would shock everyone and break her parents’ hearts. Join us at the quiet end today for Cruel and Unusual, a discussion of a young life callously cut short by those who no one, even Skylar, would have ever suspected.
The bodies of 27-year-old Rachel and 9-month-old Lillian Entwistle were found on January 22, 2006 in the master bedroom of their Hopkinton, Massachusetts home where the Entwistles had been living for only ten days. Autopsy results would show that Rachel died of a gunshot wound to the head and baby Lillian died of a gunshot wound to the stomach.
Just hours after the deaths of his wife and daughter, Neil Entwistle purchased a one-way ticket to London and boarded a British Airways flight. On January 23rd, Hopkinton Police located Neil at the home of his parents in Nottinghamshire, England. He told a detective that he left his home at around 9:00 AM three days earlier to run an errand, and that his wife and daughter were both alive and well and in the bed in the couple's bed when he left. When he returned at around 11:00 AM, he claimed to have found both had been shot dead. He then covered the bodies of his wife and infant daughter with a blanket and left. He did not call for help.
Neil Entwistle’s behavior after his family was killed brought suspicion upon him. But what detectives discovered in their subsequent investigation was completely unexpected. For a young professional couple living an apparently charmed life, what went on behind closed doors and on the Entwistle’s computer was very disturbing. If being a shitty husband makes a man a murderer then Neil would be found guilty of these crimes. But was there legitimate evidence proving that Neil was responsible? Join us today for Cold as Ice: The Murders of Rachel and Lillian Entwistle.
In 1928, agriculture and the movie industry were booming in the Los Angeles area. But a string of child abductions and murders in nearby Wineville changed the lives and views of the locals. Someone had kidnapped, sexually abused, and murdered at least three, and possibly as many as twenty, young boys.
From 1926 to 1928, teenager Sanford Clark was kept prisoner on his uncle Stewart Northcott’s chicken farm in Wineville. He suffered unimaginable abuse and witnessed horrific acts by Northcott.
Sanford’s escape from the clutches of his abuser and his journey to live a life without violence is inspiring. His time on the farm was a living hell and the stories he shared with the police were unlike anything they had heard before.
Today we’re talking about a dark part of history that most people were in a hurry to forget. As brutal and upsetting as the crimes of Stewart Northcott were, it is the resilience and strength of Sanford Clark that makes this story something worth telling and something that can stay with us as proof that good can prevail over evil.
For several years, Dr. Paolo Macchiarini was known as a scientific pioneer, a supersurgeon and a miracle worker. He was turning the dream of regenerative medicine into a reality. While much of the scientific community was eager to believe he had made breakthroughs, not everyone was convinced.
Most of Macchiarini’s patients died within a few years of their surgeries and the experimental procedures actually made their conditions much worse. Investigations revealed that he had actually falsified his data as well as his medical credentials.
While at the prestigious Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Macchiarini invented his technique. Instead of stripping the cells from donor windpipes, he had plastic scaffolds made to order. He gave his “regenerating” windpipes to at least 17 patients worldwide. The results have been disastrous.
In 2014, Paolo Macchiarini was hailed as gifted medical pioneer in an NBC special produced by Benita Alexander. Paolo and Benita became romantically involved and planned to marry. But as the wedding day approached, the plans unraveled. Benita realized that Paolo had lied to her about a lot of things. For one thing, he was still married to his wife of 30 years.
Why does an intelligent and skilled surgeon create a house of cards in his personal life and perform surgeries that he knows will result in suffering and death for his patients? As one surgeon put it, he would choose to die by firing squad before experiencing a death caused by one of Macchiarini’s tracheal transplants. His experimental surgeries have been compared to the crimes of Nazi doctor Joseph Mengele. Yet he remains free. Join us at the quiet end today for a fascinating and horrifying discussion: Bad Medicine: The Downfall of Paolo Macchiarini.