Crime Junkie - MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF: John Bender

Episode Date: September 30, 2024

When a 44-year-old millionaire ends up shot and killed in his bed in Costa Rica, authorities are quick to put the blame on his wife. But what unravels next is a much bigger web of lies, injustice, and gems…If you or anyone you know is thinking about suicide, emotional support can be reached by calling or texting the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988. You can learn more about The Good segment and even submit a story of your own by visiting The Good page on our website! Source materials for this episode cannot be listed here due to character limitations. For a full list of sources, please visit: crimejunkiepodcast.com/mysterious-death-john-benderDon’t miss out on all things Crime Junkie!Instagram: @crimejunkiepodcast | @audiochuckTwitter: @CrimeJunkiePod | @audiochuckTikTok: @crimejunkiepodcastFacebook: /CrimeJunkiePodcast | /audiochuckllcCrime Junkie is hosted by Ashley Flowers and Brit Prawat.Instagram: @ashleyflowers | @britprawatTwitter: @Ash_Flowers | @britprawatTikTok: @ashleyflowerscrimejunkieFacebook: /AshleyFlowers.AFText Ashley at 317-733-7485 to talk all things true crime, get behind the scenes updates, and more!

Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And I'm Britt. And the story I have for you today is full of mystery, hence the name. This is the story of John Bender. It's the early hours of January 8, 2010, just past 12 a.m. to be exact, and a guard supervisor named Osvaldo is on the job manning this very large, very expensive, and very controversial estate belonging to John and Ann Bender in Costa Rica. Now things are relatively calm until a single gunshot rings out in the Costa Rican jungle, just moments before Ann Bender comes through his radio crying for help. So Osvaldo and one of his guards immediately head over to where Ann is at, but when they

arrive they have a little problem. The only way to get to Ann, she's on the fourth floor, is to go through the private elevator, and that's been locked down for the night, presumably to keep people out. But now they have to find a way in, and it takes a couple of minutes, and they have to go back and forth with Ann on the walkie-talkie, but eventually they get the elevator unlocked and they get up to where she is in her bedroom. But Osvaldo's not prepared for the grisly scene that he's about to walk into.

When he gets up to the fourth floor, he sees Anne kneeling on the side of the bed, covered in blood spatter. She's holding the hand of her husband, John, who is laying in a pool of blood on the bed. And I don't know if Anne is talking to them or if she's just in shock and she's like mumbling stuff out loud trying to make sense of it,

but according to an Outside Magazine article, she's saying, quote, I tried to stop it, but I couldn't. Now, as Osvaldo takes a closer look, he clocks a semi-automatic 9mm Ruger on the ground next to the bed, which he knows to be one of John's guns. And he's got no clue what's happened here, but John's gun is on the floor, Anne is in shock, and that shock is turning into panic, and he knows that he needs to just get her out of here and get the local authorities in. So he takes her down to the second floor, calls for help, and while they wait, Anne takes a tranquilizer to calm down, and then she begins to reach out to people to tell them that her husband is gone.

She sends an email to her parents to let them know, and then she calls her brother Ken. Now, Osvaldo's not sure how those conversations on the other end are going, like he doesn't know how people are taking the news, he's only getting Anne's side of things. But he's starting to piece together what might have happened when he hears Anne say to her brother, quote, he finally did it. Now, when authorities show up, they have come with a whole host of people. There's the Fuerza Pública, which is the local police, then the Costa Rican's Judicial Investigation Police, which is the OIJ.

There's people from the Red Cross and then the coroner. But I don't know why so many people are there, because it doesn't seem like they treat it much like a crime scene. I mean, I know they talk to Anne, they get a statement from her, but honestly it seems like more people come to check out this mega mansion

that they've heard so much about. I mean, for most of these people, this is the first time that they've ever gotten a real glimpse of what's inside this multi-million dollar estate that's been out here for almost a decade by this point. And Britt, I actually need to show you a picture of this house so you can get what I'm talking about because it's like a house isn't even the right word for this. Oh yeah. I mean my first thought was like a gazebo but it's a

house-sized gazebo. It's round. It's a mansion-sized gazebo. It's round. It's... It's a mansion-sized gazebo. This thing is huge. Yeah. Yeah. I'm floored. Can you imagine just walking up to this in the middle of the rainforest? I know. So listen, John and Anne lived in this four-story building on the property. And according to reporting by Carole Vaughn for the Costa Rica Star, there were also four additional smaller houses for staff. So the property itself, it's like 5,000 acres within the Costa Rican rainforest.

And the house that Ann and John lived in was known as the Bender Dome. Like, that's the big one. And it truly is. I mean, you can see it, but it's something out of, like, a Disney movie. This is a four-story home with literally no walls. That's why you called it a gazebo. No windows.

It's just open to the jungle, which is like my bug nightmare. But they had exotic animals and exotic flowers, and it's basically become like an urban legend to people in Costa Rica at this point. So I think that people are showing up less to help. And I know it's like, like, listen, that's not everyone. Like, I know some people are helping, but I should say some people are less there to help. And I know it's like, like, listen, that's not everyone. Like, I know some people are helping, but I should say some people are less there to help and more

there to get a glimpse at this thing. Maybe even take some pics or snag some souvenirs, which is very disrespectful. But that just gives you a small sense of like how some of the locals might have felt about the benders. Like they see these white people moving in, laying claim to the Costa Rican rainforest. And to them, that is disrespectful in and of itself. Right. So what brought the benders to Costa Rica? Like where are they from? Why are they here? Yeah, so they're from the US,

and John and Anne had bought this land the same year that they met and got engaged. That was in 1998. And they bought it with money that John had made as a hedge fund manager. And then they officially moved to Costa Rica in 2001 when the construction on the Bender Dome was finished. And as for why, well, they're both animal lovers. And I think once they set their sights on this property,

they were like, you know, like, let's just fully go all in, go live there. Let's make our dreams come true. Yeah. And I think their ultimate plans were to eventually start this refuge for wildlife there. Anyways, to go back to the crime scene, though, like, again, that just kind of gives you a sense of like what's happening at the time. No one is necessarily speaking ill of the dead in that moment,

even though there's like, you know, this stuff happening in the background. The people who are there to work ask Anne questions and they ask questions of the security guards about what happened that night. The fact that John's nine millimeter Ruger was in the bedroom at all was apparently pretty unusual given that part of their normal routine was to round up and lock up all of their guns

in this locked cabinet that they have on the first floor. Because this goes back to what I told you earlier about people not loving them being there. It wasn't uncommon for John to carry a gun when he was outside of the Dome for protection, especially after one day in particular that traumatized them in April of 2001, which is just shortly after they moved there.

Apparently, Anne and John were driving along a mountain road when armed men, claiming to be police in an unmarked car, pulled them over, threatened John with a gun, and then threw them into their car to take him to jail. Now these men turned out to be plainclothes officers, and John really was taken to the local police station, but all the dramatic fanfare was just to serve him with a summons. And then just months later, someone else tried to break into their home armed. So that's when they hired guards and bought guns,

including this 9mm Ruger pistol that is now sitting on their bedroom floor. It is the gun that John always kept strapped to his side. But even so, even though it was always on him, even that got locked up usually at night too. Like he never brought that gun or any gun to bed until that night. Now Ann said that that night she was in and out of sleep when all of a sudden she woke up and saw John laying next to her in the bed, pointing that gun at his head.

Which, I mean obviously sent like this shock of adrenaline through her. She said she jumped up, she tried to get the gun from him, but in the struggle, the gun slipped, it went off, and John got shot in the back of the head. So no one was touching the gun and it just went off. Yeah, she says that he dropped the gun and that she never even touched it.

So she's saying he was gonna take his own life and she was trying to stop him, basically? Yeah, basically, yeah. Okay. But listen, when they first met, so this is an important thing to note, they both bonded over their shared struggles with mental health. So Anne was taking medication to medicate the effects of her diagnosed bipolar disorder. But John, who had also been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, was not taking medication. And apparently in the weeks leading up to his death,

he was in a very low phase, according to Anne, like spiraling deeper and deeper into depression. And on the surface, like, okay, like some things are adding up for police. It's at least aligning with what Osvaldo had heard her saying to her brother, right? But something about this whole thing is making authorities suspicious.

Like they're not buying this as an accident. Like they don't seem sympathetic to either of their mental health conditions. So they decide, you know what, we're like, we're not just gonna like take things at face value. They make Anne come down to the station to continue questioning her. Though before they go, they first confiscate her clothing.

And I don't know if that means they make her take off her clothes, like then and there, or if they go give her time to change, but she is allowed to put on some fresh clothes. They cover both her and then John's hands in evidence bags in an attempt to preserve any potential forensic evidence. And then by the time they get Anne to the police station, it's like 11 o'clock in the morning and she tells them basically the same 11 o'clock in the morning. And she tells them basically the same thing she told them at the house. Again. Like she woke up to John aiming the gun at his head.

And like she said before, when she tried to wrestle it away from him, it went off on its own, shooting John in the back of the head. And they take everything down. Again. But after Anne wraps up her interview, she makes a call to her psychiatrist, Dr. Lisano. And Anne begs him to admit her to a hospital. And the doctor doesn't hesitate because it's more than just, like, her mental health concerns at this point, more than just, like, the fact that she, you know, witnessed what she witnessed or was there or whatever.

She has actually been struggling with a lot more at the moment. Like, when she's admitted, they say she looks too thin, like, I mean, sick and lifeless. Girl's about 80 pounds by this point. And an examination determined she is severely dehydrated. And strangely, her body is like covered in these lesions. Now, in the 48 Hours documentary, Paradise Lost, Anne says that doctors gave her a 40% chance of survival those first couple of weeks. Like, we're talking bad shape.

Yeah, what's going on with her exactly? Like, how did she get these lesions? This is like one of the biggest question marks to me still in this whole thing. I don't know what the lesions are, and it's only mentioned by Carole Vaughn in her book called Crazy Jungle Love, Murder, Madness, Money, and Monkeys. What a title. But apparently, John was routinely injecting Anne with, like, dirty river water that he

was convinced was gonna cure her Lyme disease. Yeah, so I think she's sick with Lyme disease. He is definitely making it worse by putting jungle water into her. And like, that's just not science. And in turn was making her very freaking sick. Yeah, like dirty river water injected into your body would? Yeah, and again, I don't know how she felt about it. I don't know if she agreed. Like there's just a lot of, no one really talks about this part of the story, so I don't

have a whole lot to fill in, but it's just, like, worth noting. So she's admitted and immediately put on a morphine drip. She's getting antibiotics, anti-inflammatories, vitamins, like, antiguagulants, pretty much everything she can have. And while she attempts to recover in the hospital, investigators start digging into some things

that caught their eye back at the Bender Dome. to some things that caught their eye back at the Bender Dome. So for starters, let's talk about all of the gems. The gems? The gems. The gems that we're lying about around the house. And it's not like, oh my gosh, I found something over here. Oh my gosh, something over here. Right?

I'm talking 3000 gems in this open air home. What? Yeah, and not even in like a curated case of jewels and stuff. Like they are all over the place, like piled in backpacks and in suitcases. And like some are on display, but it doesn't look even like an innocent collection

to investigators. Like the sheer amount of gems makes them suspicious that the benders could be involved in some kind of smuggling operation. Especially because they can't find any documentation, like no receipts, nothing for any of these gems. Like where did these things come from? So while Ann's in the hospital, the OIJ takes custody of the gems so they can start working on their case against her, because they're starting to build a case against her. And interestingly, they take much more than just the gems.

Like, they take pretty much everything in the house, saying that it's evidence. But at a certain point, the stuff they're taking just seems excessive. Like, I mean, they even snagged their microwave for literally no reason at all. But they claim that they're just being thorough, especially when it comes to those gems. Because if their theory is right, they think that Anne killed her husband to steal the roughly $20 million worth of gems that they found in that house. But hold up. Since when do they think that she killed her husband? Well, this is like the theory that they're building. And I mean, the gems are kind of like what the

catalyst. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, also, they were getting a sneaking suspicion that something was off about the whole thing as soon as they got there. Because I mean, there was stuff beyond just the gems that really, at least they say didn't add up for them. So let's talk about John specifically. So he's found in a normal sleeping position on the bed with his left wrist hanging over the side of the bed, with blood pooling on the bed and on the floor. Now they find the gun, like I said,

on the floor, like by his left hand. They find a spent shell casing, but the spent shell casing isn't where investigators expect it to be. So it's not on the bed, it's not on the floor near the gun, it's actually more behind the bed, on the ground, closer to and side of the bed. But shell casings like get ejected, right? Like that doesn't seem super uncommon or weird.

Right, I mean it's possible also that with so many people that were in and out of the house that maybe it got accidentally kicked or something, like if people weren't being super careful. But that's not the only thing that makes them uneasy. So John also has earplugs in, like I sleep with earplugs too. And they say it makes them think that he was intending to go to sleep, not intending to end his own life. And then there's the gunpowder residue, which is the biggie for them.

Apparently there is no trace of residue on John's hands. And according to an article by Rodolfo Martin, there was no stippling or tattooing on the back of his head, meaning that they say he had to have been shot from at least some kind of distance, like not point blank, like what the investigative authorities would have expected in a suicide.

Would you expect to see either of those things if the gun fell like she said though? Right. No. But this is kind of the reoccurring theme here. No one seems to be listening to Anne. They don't believe that the story she's telling is true. Anne, on top of that, she told them that she wiped her hands off after everything happened. When? I guess it was sometime between when the gun went off and when Osvaldo was calling the authorities, which I'm like, I don't know, she was honest with you, she told you whatever, but they kind of like hone in on this as proof, like, and that she would have had the evidence

on her hands, but now doesn't because she was trying to cover it up. Like, yeah, but did they collect what she wiped her hands off, like the washcloth or whatever? To see if there was gunpowder residue on that? Yeah, they do. So there are these napkins that they collect from the second floor on a chair, but it doesn't seem like those are tested right away.

And this is what you'll see throughout this thing. Like, it seems like they kind of pick things. So let me tell you the rest. So, Anne is adamant that the story she told them was true. She didn't fire the gun. Who cares about wiping her hands? Like, she said the gun fell. And even if they don't want to believe her word, because they think she has too much of a motive or whatever,

like, her doctors chime in here. They say that she was too sick at the time of John's death to even have the strength to pick up a utensil, let alone a loaded gun and fire it. But authorities just don't seem to care what anyone has to say. They have their story and they're sticking to it. Okay, if her doctors are saying that she's so weak or incapacitated, she can't even pick up a utensil, like a fork or a spoon or whatever, like, how can she even struggle with John? Like, that seems contradictory, right?

I agree. I think, you know, if it's your, if you're to your husband and he is threatening to take his own life, or you think he might be, like, I don't know if there's like an adrenaline component there or... Right. I mean, she had to have been able to move Like, I don't know if there's like an adrenaline component there or... I mean, she had to have been able to move herself, right? And so maybe that's what it was. It was just a sudden movement.

Maybe he thought she was asleep and it surprised him. Like, I think what you bring up is valid, but just like everything in this case, I think there is a potential explanation for it. So in February of 2010, this is about a month after her husband died, while Ann is still recovering in the hospital, they charge her with racketeering, money laundering,

and smuggling contraband, the contraband being those jewels. And essentially, investigators say they believe Ann was illegally acquiring gems on the black market and even importing blood diamonds and then selling them at these alleged millionaire parties that the benders would host at the Bender Dome. And that's how they made their money. Big accusations.

Yeah, they have to have something that backs that up, right? If they do, I don't know what that is. Because Anne is denying all of it. And all of the staff at their estate even say like, I don't know what like, millionaire parties you're talking about, like that didn't happen here. But it doesn't change authorities minds. And no matter how much Ann tries to reiterate to the detectives that John really struggled with depression to an extreme extent, they do not care.

They're not having it. So in the summer of 2010, Ann is released from the hospital. And by August of 2011, investigators feel that they have enough proof to show that Anne murdered her husband in order to gain complete access to all of their assets and all of their gems, and that is when she is charged with first-degree murder. What's Anne's explanation for all these gems and where all their wealth came from? I mean, it's not even like an explanation. Like, it's something that they can easily see. So their wealth came from. I mean, it's not even like an explanation.

Like it's something that they can easily see. So their wealth came from John. He'd worked for the Philadelphia Stock Exchange and Anne says that he created this new method of trading which allowed him to become one of the top traders earning hundreds of millions of dollars. And as for why they got the gems or where or whatever, she said like, they just like shiny things.

They bought them because they just like them. Yeah, like they wanted to collect them. Plus, their Costa Rican attorney and the Bender estate trustee, this guy named Juan Alvarez, told John and Anne that they should start investing in jewelry and gems because those things held their value. They could be easily transported. But worth noting, Juan might have been the wrong person to take advice from. Anne claims that apparently Juan had stolen from their $70 million trust. In one of his last emails to Anne, John wrote, quote, I am a total loser for ever getting

involved with that total scumbag. Talking about Juan. And essentially, with the unlimited power of attorney that the benders had given him, he basically owns everything now that John's dead, including the money and the gems and all of this huge property, which they've named Boracayon.

It's like the name that they've given their estate. And this dude, so like this is where it gets so much more complicated. He is the one who picks've given their estate. And this dude, so like this is where it gets so much more complicated, he's the one who picks out Anne's lawyer. So she's feeling like she might be fucked. Yeah, and I also think we found someone who might be your real suspect.

If there is a suspect, right? Like you would think if they're gonna look at Anne, they would at least look at this guy too. But alas, it is still Anne in prison and as she awaits trial, she actually moves to take Kwon to court for fraud. She files a complaint that he basically used the trust he was tasked with protecting to pay off credit card bills and buy whatever he wanted, including like horses for his farm. And essentially he was like using the money like it was his own.

Now this does prompt an investigation into Juan and eventually the court removes his name as the trustee of the Bender's property. But Ann isn't dropping these charges anytime soon, even though at the end of the day, investigators do not believe he has anything to do with John's death. And they kind of write this guy off

as simply like a shady business guy. And actually, not only do they not look at Juan, somehow they use this whole thing as even more proof of Ann's guilt. Like they think that her attempt to put him in the spotlight was just to deflect focus off of her. So in 2012, Ann's charges for racketeering and money laundering seem to just suddenly get dropped, though the contraband charges are still standing. And then nonetheless, her trial for the murder of her husband begins just months later in January of 2013. And this is the start of years in and out of the courtroom. A trial in Costa Rica is very different than a trial here in the U.S.

Anne is not facing a jury of her peers. She is testifying in front of a panel of three judges assigned to her case. And her defense team, you know, not Juan, her new defense team, focuses on her experiences both on the night John died and even before. As you probably have gathered by now, the life she paints with John is not all sunshine and waterfalls and rainbows in paradise. The time leading up to John's death was bleak for the couple.

Anne tells the judges that just two months before John died he had tried to jump off their open-air elevator and he was feeling progressively more depressed. He told Anne that he wasn't a good person and his emails to her got really intense. Like there's actually one they have put out that I think you should read just to kind of give people a sense. Okay first, don't these people live in the jungle together? Why are they emailing? I don't know. I could never find out why so much of their communication is documented over email.

I don't know what their schedules were like. I don't know if this is just... If there's like travel and stuff. It's just like how they... Yeah, I don't know. Okay. It says, quote, "'I'm losing my fucking mind right now.

"'First, sick again, and now this shit. "'Today is a total fucking nightmare "'and tomorrow will get worse. "'Just when I was feeling I could learn to be happy, "'now I get this and I want to be dead. "'I feel so fucking horrible. "'I want to kill everyone and then me. "'I deserve to die." End quote.

Oof. I know. It's not ever clarified what he meant by, now this s*** and like, now I get this. So, like, I don't know what thing was going on. I don't know if it was the Juan thing. I don't like even have a date on this. But it does show you just how dark of a place that he was in in the time leading up to this.

Now, he also told Anne that he was afraid he was going to hurt somebody, most likely her. I mean, she's the one with him all the time. They spent so much time together. And he told her before, like she would be safer without him. According to reporting for Outside Online by Ned Seaman, Anne maintains the same story she has been telling

over the last three years, with some more specific details. The night John died, she had gone to bed before John, and by the time he came to bed, she was in and out of sleep. But she immediately woke up when she heard him say, quote, "'You don't know how it feels to wake up "'with your spouse half dead next to you.'" End quote.

Wasn't he the one killing her with dirty river water? I don't get it. Or the Lyme disease or just like her, they couldn't make her better. I don't know. Honestly, I don't know that it ever made sense to her either. I think she believes it was just kind of this manifestation of his mental illness. But then she goes on to tell the same story, right? Like they struggle, the gun goes off.

But the prosecution pokes holes in Anne's story and they present their theory and their evidence, John wearing earplugs, the trajectory of the bullet, where the gun ended up. And the prosecutor says it's just not plausible for a left-handed person to shoot themselves behind their right ear and then for his gun to be on the floor by his left hand.

So how are they so certain it's impossible if they were struggling or she was trying to get the gun from him or whatever? So they bring in two experts. So they have a forensic expert and a police inspector who both argue that there was no sign of a struggle. I think that's one of the big reasons that they don't buy her story. And so if there's no signs of a struggle and then they that's one of the big reasons that they don't buy her story.

So if there's no signs of a struggle and then they're saying these things don't point to a suicide, then the only other option in their mind is that she killed him. And they come to trial with one more piece of evidence. They claim that while Ian didn't have gunshot residue on her hands, the clothes that she was wearing, the ones that they took from her at the scene, The clothes that she was wearing, the ones that they took from her at the scene, did show gunpowder residue. But I'll say it before you do, like, it doesn't disprove the story that Anne gave. But it can, again, if they have this story they're presenting, it does fit into theirs, right? That she's got gunpowder residue on her clothes, but she wiped her hands, whatever, whatever.

But in spite of their best efforts, it's not enough to convict Anne, because this case is circumstantial as hell, and the judges see that. So in January 2013, she is unanimously acquitted. And according to an article in La Nacion, the judges do provide reasoning for their acquittal. So they say that the evidence doesn't prove that Anne murdered John, but it also doesn't prove that John took his own life. He could have shot himself with his right hand,

even though he was left-handed. They can't be certain that his body wasn't moved or that the gun wasn't handled by a witness. Like, pictures or a super secure crime scene maybe would have helped with this, but like the things were very slob-kabob in the beginning of this investigation. I mean, they didn't dust the gun for fingerprints.

They didn't take anyone's prints at the scene, at least not for like a few hours after people had been there. And they also didn't take any crime scene photos until after things had been moved around and basically tampered with. Which, why not? Like, why is all this like missing and messy?

Well, they say they had to wait for sunrise for lighting reasons, because even though this house was lit by like 400 Tiffany lamps that are scattered around, like I guess there wasn't enough of like the right type of light that they needed to capture at all. Like they say that those photos, they took some maybe, but they weren't good quality. And those photos don't capture any of the small details

like the blood spatter and all this stuff that they're trying to point to. But the judges are like, you didn't do it. Like, it's just not there. I get what you're saying, but you can't prove what you're saying. And so all in all, there's just too much doubt in this case. And basically, Anne's free from all the mystery

surrounding that night on January 8th, 2010. The thing is, when Anne's released, she can't just go back to her home. There's still this legal battle going on between her and Juan, or like Juan and the trust in a state. And she can't leave Costa Rica either because her passport was confiscated due to her own legal stuff. So once Anne is released, she has to move into this small apartment in a suburb of San

Jose. But she has people to rely on, like her friends and her family, and she's got a new boyfriend named Greg who supports her in her newfound freedom. Which actually wouldn't last very long, because eight months after Ann is released, the Costa Rican Court of Appeals overturns her acquittal and a new trial is ordered.

So she basically is getting tried for John's murder a second time. Oh they don't have double jeopardy there. Nope and if a prosecutor or defendant doesn't like the outcome they can just appeal and they can go back and do it again and again. Jewelry do. I mean they can even use the exact same evidence and witnesses and charges. Nothing has to change. Just like, I want to do this over. And it could just be like as many times as they want. Yeah.

The only difference in anything is that they'll get a new panel of judges. And listen, this second trial is practically like the first, but there are a couple of new witnesses to try and sweeten the deal on each side, and it ends very differently. So the trial lasts about a week total, and on May 27, 2014, this time Anne is found guilty of murdering John Bender, and she's sentenced to 22 years in prison. And everyone on Team Anne is shocked when they hear the verdict. Like no one was expecting this to go this way. And Ann's boyfriend Greg is immediately outspoken, telling the media that he doesn't think Ann

will survive in prison. I mean, she's still dealing with Lyme disease and overall, I mean, she still does not appear to be in a healthy state. But the court doesn't care. And the judges' reasoning for their guilty verdict this time boils down to the blood patterns in the crime scene photos, they say. I thought you couldn't see those blood patterns in the photos.

Girl, that's what I was going to say. Like, it's got me twisted because I don't think you really can. Like, they showed some of the scene pictures in the 48 Hours episode, and it is super dim. I don't see a whole lot, but I also don't know exactly what I'm looking for because they don't really point to anything specific in their ruling about the blood patterns.

Right. Something, as best as I can put it together, it's like something about the way he's laying down and that the blood is pooled under him, which to me makes sense if he was laying down to begin with, but I don't... I don't know. They do say, this is the one thing, pulled under him, which to me makes sense if he was laying down to begin with. But I don't, I don't know. They do say this is the one thing. So in this new trial, there was something new that they do point to that made them go to this guilty verdict.

It was like the first thing that made me be like, hmm. So the prosecution says that there was a tear in a pillowcase near John's head with gunpowder in it. So they think that he'd been shot with the pillow held up against his head. And according to the Tico Times, they don't feel like the gun just simply slipped during the struggle, hit the pillow, and then went off like Ann claims,

because apparently there was no smoke or burn patterns on the pillow, meaning that the gun couldn't have been touching the pillow. But there still is this tear. So the only explanation they say that there is, is that the gun was further away from the pillow and Jon's head when it went off. Like, which is making enough sense. But then, I mean, if you look at it closely, you can at least make an equally compelling argument the other way, like every freaking thing. I guess I just can't figure out the motive here. They were their gems. She owned them, too. She was stealing from who? They were hers.

I know. And I think maybe this is why I've had such a hard time with the story from the beginning, is because it does not make sense to me. The prosecution insists they don't need a motive, which they don't, right? That's the same way here. You don't have to prove a motive to prove that someone did something. But to your point, you had the gems.

You had the house. You had the money. You didn't need to kill your husband to have access to any of it. Yeah. Why would you? Now after Ann's guilty verdict, she is transferred again back to the hospital

because she's still in such a bad state. And the prosecutors have to decide whether or not to place her in a psychiatric care unit to serve out her nine month preventative detention, which is something that the court orders for her to serve while her sentencing is under review because they think she's a flight risk. Eventually though, Anne is sent to prison

to begin serving her 22 year sentence. And this is when she needs her support team more than ever. But unfortunately, that team starts to dwindle because in November, 2014, Anne's boyfriend, Greg, dies in his bed under mysterious circumstances. Now, obviously, Anne's in prison. So while both deaths are quote mysterious,

investigators aren't even looking at her as a suspect. But that doesn't stop the media from comparing Greg and John's deaths, until they can ultimately share that Greg died of an asthma attack in his bed when he was just 40 years old. Despite being like just kicked and knocked down, Ann is not backing down from a fight. Her defense team files an appeal against her guilty verdict, because again, you can do this as many times as you want. And in February of 2015, the decision is made on that appeal and her conviction is thrown out.

According to reporting by Carmen Picado, the Court of Appeals upholds the filing and the court declares the conviction sentence to be invalid and therefore Anne should be immediately released. So Anne's out again, but not completely free because authorities still have her passport. So she basically has to go in weekly to let them know she hasn't left the country. And it was at this point that Ann caught the attention of 48 Hours. And while they were a great source for us while researching for this episode, they actually also play an integral part in Ann's case because they brought in their own experts

to try and decide what happened that January night five years earlier. These forensic experts, Selma and Richard Eichlinbaum, pour over all of the evidence. They even go to this big estate to try and get a better understanding of the crime scene and what happened there in 2010, because the house is still there, still abandoned, still in legal limbo, I'm assuming,

but they're hoping they can be useful in Anne's upcoming, third, trial. So when the time comes, Selma is allowed to testify, and she's there to help poke holes in experiments that the prosecution has done. And most alarming to both Selma and Richard is that authorities never looked at the trajectory of the bullet to tell where the alleged shooter could have been in relation to John laying on the bed.

It seems like they only, when they talked about trajectory, it was only because of like where the shell casing or whatever was found. They also claim that it's likely John's body did move after his death just based on the way that blood had pooled around him on both sides. But moved from where? Like from a completely different room? Or just like slightly moved on the bed? No, I think everything happened in this like condensed area of the bedroom, on this bed.

Basically, the Eichlin bombs are saying that they did a blood pressure analysis and what they found supports the hypothesis that there was a struggle before John was shot. Like that's what they're talking about. Just like Anne's been saying this whole time. Right. And they believe that if Anne was trying to get the gun from John, it's completely reasonable that it could have mistakenly gone off.

John was shot, then he fell back against the bed, causing blood to pool on both sides of him. But that's about all the new information that was brought into trial number three. And in September 2015, this is less than a month after the trial began, Anne is absuelta, or absolved for a second time. When is it actually done though? If everyone can just appeal and appeal and appeal until we're blue in the face? Oh, she's making sure it's done because after this second acquittal, Anne is like, get me the out of here.

And her and her parents and her brother who had been down this whole time for the trial, they immediately buy tickets home to the US. The US consulate in Costa Rica had given her a new passport that would get her out of the country. But when Anne tries to go get her boarding pass at the airport, she's denied because apparently she's on Costa Rica's no-fly list.

So like there's all this back and forth. She reaches out to her lawyer. They learn that Anne is still listed as a person awaiting trial in the system, which is like why she's on the no-fly list, which obviously isn't true. They have to jump through a bunch of like legal loopholes. They get her off the list. And finally, she is able to escape this nightmare in the rainforest that has essentially been going on since 2001 when they got there.

So she flies home to the States, specifically to Florida, where she hopes she'll get to stay for a very long time. Though all is not resolved in Costa Rica. Unfortunately, there's hardly any details about the outcome of her fight against Juan, other than, like, I know he got removed as a trustee in 2012, but I don't actually know if she ever regained access of the trust or got the money back that he spent. According to the Tico Times, Anne's gems are still in legal limbo, like while they try to determine ownership

or like if taxes are due or whatever. And Anne comes to a verbal agreement to basically pay $1.5 million in taxes, like that the central customs office claims she owes on, wait for it, the $7 million value of the gems. Seven is a lower number than before, wasn't it? Originally valued at like $20 million. Yep.

Allegedly at the beginning, now after all these years, it appears the gems in their custody are considerably less valuable. Maybe there are less gems to estimate the value of. Like depending on if you think the Costa Rican government has been fair and true to the Benders this whole time. Maybe there's something else going on. Eventually though, she does get her jewels back, or at least all that the customs claims they have of her collection.

And she regains access to the Bender Dome, the entire estate, which she promptly puts up for sale. Like she's definitely not gonna need it because she never intends to go back. But she might not have a choice because even though she is back in the US, Brit, they come for her again. Okay, I'm not saying she did it or she didn't do it, but-

I mean, I have feelings, but yeah. But there has to be some kind of accountability here, right? No, I mean, like immediately her lawyer's appeal, but the fact that Anne was able to get home, I think is what is the biggest thing in her favor because apparently Costa Rica does not allow trials when people are not there. You have to be present in the courtroom in Costa Rica for trials to proceed.

I mean, could they extradite her? Well, they could, and they do have an extradition treaty with the US, but since she's already gone through three trials, her lawyers and other legal experts don't think that the US would actually extradite her. And they prove this when Costa Rican authorities issue an arrest warrant for Anne in January of 2020 and no extradition occurs. And she is now totally out of the woods because in 2022, Costa Rica faces some of their own reform to their criminal procedure code that prohibits double jeopardy.

According to the Costa Rica Star, in 2023, the Constitutional Court orders the end of criminal proceedings against Anne. And shortly after that, there is a final dismissal sentenced in her favor after 13 long years of fighting to maintain her innocence. During all this, did John still have family who are around? At the end of the day, what did they think? There's actually not a lot of mention of John's family and any of the source material.

It seems like it was just John and Anne against the world when they moved to Costa Rica, but I know it wasn't for a lack of trying, like on John's family's part. It's mentioned in Carole Vaughn's book that once John started struggling with his mental health, he eventually kind of just shut his parents out of his life completely. He stopped replying to their concerned emails. And I know John's dad does support Anne.

He even wrote a letter for her. And John's friend supported her too. He was also aware of John's mental health condition. And I mean, this is where I think it's important to say, like bipolar disorder can be difficult to talk about, especially when it is a friend or a loved one who's experiencing it. However, it's not just people struggling

who can call for help. As a supporter of someone, you can also call or text the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 here in the US. They're available 24-7 to anyone experiencing a mental health crisis or anyone who needs assistance supporting someone in a crisis. You can find all the source material for this episode on our website, crimejunkiepodcast.com. And you can follow us on Instagram at crimejunkiepodcast. Don't forget to follow because we will be back next week with a brand new episode.

And stick around because we have some good for you. Alright, Crime Junkies, another month has come and gone, which means another good segment has hit your feet. That's right. That's right. This week, we have a pretty cool submission, really highlighting and showing the impact that true crime content can have. It says, Hello, my name is Cody Sharman, pronounced like Sharman the toilet paper.

I have listened to you guys the past several years. Due to your show, we have changed our policies and missing persons and runaways in dispatch. One, we do not believe in the 24-hour rule. Two, all persons, no matter the age, are entered missing into NCIC. We do not send bolos or attempt to locate. Those do nothing. When entering persons into NCIC, an actual hit or delayed hit will be sent to dispatch when that person's vehicle or name is ran. So we know they are actually missing or may cause harm to themselves. BOLOs and ATLs are overlooked, and the officers just have to remember the information, which

honestly is nearly impossible several hours into your shift. If dispatch enters said person and we receive a delayed hit, we at least have an approximate area that that person was last seen in, or at least where their plate was ran, whether it was by an officer, plate reader, or traffic camera. My goal is to implement this nationwide. Bolo's don't save lives. Dispatchers do. So the part of you didn't read the part of the letter, it said it,

but I assume he works for like a dispatch, like a law enforcement office? Yeah, and to see someone like this in this position take the initiative to put something like this in place I'm always surprised how these stories affect different people and it's cool to see Somebody who's like, okay I see everything that's happened and it's what I talk about all the time, right? Like we don't like say all the bad things just like like hammer on people and say you're doing a bad job It's like okay if we would have done X Y and Z. We want to see change

Right, like how would the outcome have been different? And so for somebody who's actually in a position to make change and to put in policies that would make something different, and then like do it, but because of our show is like absolutely unbelievable. Cody, you're the freaking best. I love it.

Wish you all the best. Thank you for your service and for everything you do. Crime Junkie is an AudioChuck production. So what do you think Chuck? Do you approve?