Small Town Murder - #25 - A Killer Caught In A Questionable Way in Gander, Newfoundland, Canada

Episode Date: July 5, 2017

This week, we check out the out of the way town of Gander, Newfoundland, Canada, where police use a strategy to gain a confession from what they think is one of the most cold blooded killers they've ever encountered.Along the way, we find out exactly how nice Canadians actually are, how many people one airport can possibly employ, and if staring at a Wal-Mart security camera counts as an alibi.Hosted by James Pietragallo & Jimmie WhismanNew episodes every Thursday!!Please subscribe, rate, and review!Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts!Head to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Small Town Murder!For merchandise: crimeinsports.threadless.comCheck out James and Jimmie's other show: Crime in Sports Follow us on social media!Facebook: facebook.com/smalltownpodInstagram: instagram.com/smalltownmurderTwitter: twitter.com/MurderSmall Contact the show: [e-mail] See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

You're listening early and ad-free on Wondery Plus. What if you married the love of your life and then stood by them as they developed 21 new identities? What would you do? This Is Actually Happening is a weekly podcast that features extraordinary true stories of life-changing events told by the people who lived them. Listen to the newest season of This Is Actually Happening on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. This week, we look at Gander, Newfoundland, Canada, where a man's crimes are uncovered by a tactic that may or may not be legal. Welcome to Small Town Murder. Hello, everybody.

Welcome back to Small Town Murder. Yay! Yay! Your yay is well warranted this week. My name is James Petrigallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wissman. Man, we are psyched to be with you this week, as always.

As every week. When are we not psyched to be with you, honestly? I am always pumped for this, as I know you are. This is good stuff. This is our happiest time of the week. Small town murder and also listen to Crime and Sports if you haven't or don't know what you're doing. You don't need to like sports.

No. It's unnecessary. Sports have as much to do with that as the town does here. It's just a setting. That's all it is, a backdrop. Just gives you some insight. Just gives you some insight on what's going on with the person, but we want to thank everyone for their iTunes reviews this week because we had a huge week with those. That was crazy.

You guys are awesome. We're pushing toward 2,000. We're almost to 2,000. Which is kind of like the level where the big boys are. You know what I mean? That's where you're- There's some people who go, oh, those people got people to listen to them. Yeah, exactly.

We noticed this week we were beating Alec Baldwin. That's fucking awesome. That's pretty funny. So if you have not yet, please get on iTunes. I know it takes a few seconds to get on there. You've got to sign in and all that. It's a pain in the ass, but this is a way bigger pain in the ass to put all this together. So if you could do that, that would be terrific.

It helps us out immensely on the business end. iTunes and their weird algorithms and the weird way they make their charts, it's so silly. So it's a weird combination of all sorts of things. And weighing in heavily are those reviews. So you guys are keeping us on the charts and keeping us in good standing. So thank you guys so much. Also, too, guys, sometimes it's not enough. Sometimes people are like, I left an iTunes review, but I don't feel fulfilled. I'm not whole.

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Also, while we're at it, listen to P.S. I Hate This Movie, where me and my girlfriend Sarah Hunt talk about bad romantic comedies, and we make fun of them. And it's a good time. It's this but bad movies. We're getting really, really close. Like, we're definitely threatening upon getting you some health insurance. It's almost. We'll see. If you can donate, appreciate it.

Help me get James some coverage. I almost have bills. Right. I almost have, you know, like my electric bill covered. Now we're working on health insurance next. That would be great. Keeping James from having a phlegmy cough in December. That's going to be ugly for you guys, honestly.

I'm thinking of you only. It's really what it is. Before we get started, we do have to give our disclaimer that we give every week. This is a comedy podcast. Facts are real. Research is real. Stories are real. Everything is real.

It's true. But it's a comedy podcast. We're stand-up comedians. So we make jokes. We never make jokes at the expense of the victims or the victims' families. We're not assholes. That's not what we do. We're not scumbags. We're not scumbags, like we've said. We've said this before, and it's true.

We're not scumbags. We're not going to make fun of these people. It comes at the expense of small towns, which we're all from small towns. They all deserve to be made fun of. And, of course, bumbling police forces and murders. We make fun of murderers because they're murderers. Fuck them. They should be made fun of. They're the assholes.

That's right. If nothing, at the very least, they should be mocked. Let's just say that. At minimum. But beyond that, without further ado, Jimmy. Right. We have to get to something huge here. Yeah.

We have to get to this case. This week, we are heading out. Last week, we were in Oklahoma. Yeah. This week, we're heading away from Oklahoma. We're heading out of huge here. Yeah. We have to get to this case. This week, we are heading out. Last week, we were in Oklahoma. Yeah. This week, we're heading away from Oklahoma. We're heading out of the U.S. What? We are going to Canada this week, guys.

Oh, get your parkas. Canada. And I said before, we went to the U.K. Yeah. We did U.K. a few episodes ago. We're going to do Canada. Australia. Yeah.

We know you're there. We see you. We've gotten tons of responses from you guys and case suggestions and all that. So many. Thank you, guys. We're going to be in Australia within the next few episodes, so don't worry. We're going to be all over the place. Also have a case in Italy we're going to cover.

We're going to go international, but let's go to Canada this time, which is not that international from us. It's attached to us, and we kind of think of it as just— It may as well be America because all the population's on the border. It's like if someone was a dick and they had a nice little brother. You're like, well, he's a dick, but his little brother's a nice guy. That's Canada. No offense calling you our little brother because you're probably in size, pretty similar. But you have like 30 million people.

We have 350 million. So we're going to call it little brother just based on population. They're basically exiled Americans. That's what they are. Plus we're bullies. So that's the other thing. You'd be the little brother who's gotten wedgies and everybody feels bad for you because we're such dicks. You have to be attached to us.

You have to get bubble gum out of your hair. Yes, exactly. Let's go to Gander, Newfoundland, Canada. All right. Let's go there. Newfoundland and Labrador, I should say, the official province title, Newfoundland and Labrador, but that's a long title. It's too much. Let's just call it Newfoundland for now.

So Gander, Newfoundland, Canada.ador, but that's a long title. Let's just call it Newfoundland for now. So Gander, Newfoundland, Canada. They got two dogs named after that province? Not bad, right? That's pretty impressive. Not too shabby. We don't have any. No, that's where dogs go. That's where they come from.

Big dogs come from there. Good ones. Two of the best dogs. A couple of solid dogs coming from up there. Very big. Lots of hair. Good shit. Yeah.

Good family dogs. Newfoundland, if I can explain it, because if you're not from Canada, you probably have no goddamn idea where Newfoundland is, just like I didn't before. I knew it was over east somewhere, but it's on the far east side of Canada. It's on the Atlantic Ocean there. Oh, is it? Yeah, it's all the way over. It's like above Maine over there.

It's basically separated into two parts. There's like kind of a mainland Newfoundland that's attached to everything, and there's like a big island in Newfoundland. basically separated into two parts. There's kind of a mainland, Newfoundland, that's attached to everything, and there's like a big island in Newfoundland. So there's two parts. This is on the island part, this gander. It's on the eastern central part of this island, kind of up north. Northeastern, we'll call it. It's a pretty big island?

They're big islands. Yeah. In terms of space, they look pretty big. Wow. Not that populated. Well, no. Because it's all fucking cold. It's cold. It's cold out there. It's wet. It's cold. And we'll find out exactly what kind of it's

there for. This ain't the Grand Caymans, by the way. No, no, no. This is cold island. This is Antarctica almost. This is where big hairy dogs come from. You know what I mean? They need that for warmth. Big hairy water dogs that rescue people. Absolutely. It's on the northeastern shore of Gander Lake, which makes sense. Postal code A1V. That's the postal code, guys. That's the name.

I don't know anything about Canadian postal code, so I'm not going to make fun of it because I don't even know what it is. I just know that's their zip code type of thing. Area code 709 if you want to give a call to Newfoundland. It is a big town in terms of mileage. It's 40 and a quarter square miles. So it's a big town. There's a lot of space up there.

It's Canada. If one thing Canada has, it's space. You bet. They have a lot of space for you. It's plenty. It's such a huge country to think there's only 30 million people there. It's like, where are they? The land mass is ridiculous. And you think about like

Toronto's a huge city. So like, you know, a good percentage of their population's in Toronto and Vancouver and Montreal and Quebec and Calgary maybe. And they're all down south. And that's it. And then there's like 12 hunters with a big hairy dog wandering around the rest of the country, I feel like. That's Canada. That's how we

look at you guys. Sorry. Lots of plaid. You know what? That's Canada. That's how we look at you guys. Sorry, but that's- Lots of plaid. You know what? Look at it as that's how the world sees you. True or not. We're sure it's not true. It's not a threatening one. It's not a threatening one.

It's not an insulting way of looking at you. How we picture you. It's just- Yeah, we picture you in a nice little house covered in snow with smoke coming out of the chimney. Right. That's all. Comfy.

Comfy. Drinking a beer with a higher alcohol content than normal. This place was settled in 1936. It's the site of the Gander International Airport, which is how this town started. It was chosen for construction of an airport in 1935 because of its location. It's close to the – it's like the northeast tip of the populated North America, not up in the Antarctic or anything like that. Now, during the Second World War, it became important. They used it as a kind of a base, basically.

They used it to get people in and out from up there. During the Second World War, there was as many as 10,000 soldiers residing there, American soldiers, British and Canadian soldiers during the war. Yeah, absolutely. They had about 20,000 American and Canadian fighters and bombers stopping there en route to Europe. Okay. So it'd be like the last stop, you fuel up, and then you can go to Europe from there,

because it's literally the last stop before the Atlantic. Before it's all water. Yeah, before it's all water and Greenland, which I'm not sure if that was a- Which is, if you know, Greenland and Iceland, the difference is that Iceland is green and Greenland is ice. Like, that's the weird shit. That's so weird. Yeah, they got very confused.

Yeah. I think they got a little confused making those here. After the war, it grew. It's an airport. It's an airport town. It's a refueling stop for transatlantic flights. They'd stop there if they were on their way to Vancouver or somewhere on the West Coast. In 2001, on September 11th, the September 11th attacks, there was a lot of people, you

know, they closed the air, all the North American airspace was closed pretty much. So there was a lot of people stuck. So they came up with something called Operation Yellow Ribbon. 38 civilian and four military flights that were bound for the U.S. were ordered to land in Gander. So they were stuck there. And so these people were stuck in the middle of Newfoundland. But it's better to be there than over American airspace with F-16s scrambled in. That's absolutely true. There was 6,600 passengers and crew members. Uh-huh.

So that's a lot, 6,600. They're all just sitting there on the tarmac. They're all just stranded there. It's insanity. And it's the third. Apparently, Vancouver had a little bit more and Halifax had a little bit more. I'll have to be forced to say there. But Gander was third.

And what they did was they were stuck there for up to six days until airspace was reopened. Holy shit. Yeah. So what they did, these nice people up in Gander. See, Canadians, your other reputation is that you're the nicest people there are. And this proves it. These people volunteered to house, feed and take in these people. Sixty six hundred homes. Yes. Which, as we'll get to, is pretty much

more than half the population of the town. That's crazy. They took in another 50 percent of their town and just took them in, fed them. A lot of these people were stranded. They didn't have things. They didn't. You know, who knows if they had money to take care of themselves or stay in a hotel. Bags were even on those planes. Yeah planes? Yeah, there's a – that's – who the hell knows? There's a woman here talking about how nice the people were. She says, quote, every meal was like an extravaganza. The food, I mean, they were making food at home. We had bakery stuff, buffets of freshly baked goods.

It was amazing. It's not a very – it's not even a blur at all. It's very clear to me. Wow. Like she said, like these people actually had a pleasant time there. They were amazed at how much they liked it. They got another vacation. Pretty much. That's what it was for all. It's very clear to me. Wow. She said these people actually had a pleasant time there. They were amazed at how much they liked it. They got another vacation. Pretty much.

That's what it was for them. That's amazing. That's how they felt like it, which is 9-11 sucks. The world is fucked, but at least this place is nice. And especially if they lived in the U.S., they were coming home going, shit, this is crazy, watching all this shit happen, which had to feel weird from another country, especially from right there, but you can't get home. But these people all bound together to give them pity and brotherhood at the same time. Yes. It feels so weird to say out loud, brother.

Yeah. But that's what they were offering. Yeah. That's so strange. It's like actual, real, like that's some human shit right there. Like this is why Canada has a nice reputation. But we're talking about this town, so somebody was not into feeling the brotherhood. No, if that happened in the u.s

and we took in in any town there would be like 50 rapes you know somebody from the town raped a bunch of people it'd be like a dead lady found in a stream it would be a fucking mess so you guys are nice well it's a wall that's missing it oh god jesus it'd be a it'd be a mess these poor people be going back to canada with nothing but the shirts on their back it was the other way around nothing but their plaid that's it man nothing but the pla shirts on their back. It was the other way around. Nothing but their plaid. That's it, man. Nothing but the plaid on their back and their Newfoundland hairy dog next to them. Most of the streets in Gander are named after aviators. They have Amelia Earhart, Charles Lindbergh, all that kind of sort of thing.

Chuck Yeager. It's an airport town. Everything is based around the airport. Population of this town, and we're going to get into the stats here. We're going to buzz through the stats pretty quick. First of all, not as easy to find Canadian, small Canadian, middle of nowhere town stats as it is American town stats. So I did my best and I found what I can find, and there's some conflicting information. We'll talk about it.

But what I do know is there is 11,688 people there as of 2016. That I am positive about. So not a very big town. Middle of nowhere. And most of the people, half the people work at the damn airport. Really? It's just one of those places. That's all that's there.

Pretty much. It's like their airport is like the railroad is here. Yeah. Like that's what gets you. That's what it is. But it's because there's no way to put a railroad in there because there's so much water. Yeah. It's up there.

I'm sure they have- Frozen and lakes. There's a lot of lakes in Newfoundland too. Is there really?'s so much water. Yeah, it's up there and I'm sure they have- It's all frozen. Frozen and lakes. There's a lot of lakes in Newfoundland too. Is there really? Especially on this island. A lot of lakes, a lot of natural bodies of water. I'm sure it's beautiful too. I've seen the pictures.

It's gorgeous up there. I mean, it is like, you know, if you want to go, I don't know, fishing or you want to go, you do something outdoors, you go, yeah, that's the place right there. That's the clean, cool air. You know what I mean? Now, some of these stats here, like in the US., I do married stats here. They have married or living with common law partner. Oh, they got common law and they count that shit?

They count that. So that's 65% of the population of Gander is married or living, which is slightly higher than in the rest of the province. Median age of these people is 41.1, which is a little, it's older than a U.S. town, which is 37. But in this province, the average age is 44 in New Finland. So they're skewing young. It's actually skewing a little young. On race, I'm looking at the race stats, and it is excessively white. It is 97.4% white, which is honestly what you'd expect.

Maybe four out of the most. Yeah, not knowing anything about Canada, you would just go, yeah, a lot of white people. Happy white people, plaid, cold. Yeah, that's what we think. Yeah, not too much of anybody else, really. 0.5% black. I mean, that's, I don't know, a few people. Out of 11,000, that's not a lot of people.

Yeah, not a lot of people at all, things like that. It's really not a lot. It's white. Let lot. It's white. Let's just call it white. In the 90s, I mean, it's fucking white. That's super white. 97.4. It's as white as it is snowy.

Yeah. If someone tells you something and someone sells you something and they're like, it's 97.4%, whatever, you're like, that's it. It's 97.4% juice. Cool. That's grape juice to me. That's juice. Yeah. Whatever else is in there, whatever, it's fine. Give it a fuck. Yeah. juice cool that's great that's juice yeah whatever else is in there whatever it's fine that's yeah that's it so that's what it is so you guys all

juice that's a good way to put it all juice that's what it is that is 97 alcohol that's all fucking alcohol that's alcohol yeah don't drink that jesus you're gonna die on may 2007 money sense magazine ranked gander as the 10th best place to live in Canada. Wow. So it is. They rank the communities strictly. It says strictly using 12 measurable factors, including weather, real estate values, income levels, unemployment rates, discretionary income, murder rates, and signs of prosperity, such as percentage of late model vehicles.

That seems like it's pretty thorough, actually. And an airport with the ability to get the fuck out. You know what I mean? Yeah. That's nice, too. That's not bad. The other thing is, that was ranked 10 different areas to live in Canada. I didn't know there was 10 different areas to live in Canada.

Yeah, well, we named the cities, and apparently these little towns count. I think we got to eight. Yeah. We don't know. I don't know little towns. That's true. That's the sad part. But they apparently looked at all of them.

They looked at all 13 of them, and they were like, let's rank 10. Which makes sense, too, because the unemployment rate there is 11%, which seems high from the U.S. standpoint. Kind of, yeah. But in Newfoundland, it's 18.6%. Holy shit. I don't think there's a lot of places to work, really, in some of these places. It's a lot of rural. Yeah.

It's a lot of things like that. That's one in five people are unemployed? Here it's 11%, though, because I feel like the airport is a place where it's like, well, if you have no job, you can always go work at the airport. They'll do it there. But Newfoundland entirely, it's 18%. It's 18.6%. Jesus. Almost 19%.

Before we get into the earnings here and what people make, the income levels here, I've got to do the conversion rate here. One Canadian dollar equals 77 cents in the United States. They're worth more than us now? They're worth less than us because a dollar is worth 77 cents. Oh, I get it now. We're valued higher. So it's, yeah. No, that's okay.

So that's how you can look at this if people in the U.S. are listening. We're 77% worth more. Is that how it is? No, we're 24, 23. You can buy a Canadian... Look at it this way. You can buy a Canadian dollar for 77 cents. Right, gotcha.

That tells you right there. We're doing a little better on it, which is actually better than it used to be. Right, we've always been worth more, but it was much more. Much more, yeah. We used to be worth more than a pound, too. Yeah, right, right, right.

But if you got one of those fucking beaver buck change dimes things in your fucking change, you're better off throwing that shit right in their face. It's just going to keep confusing you. Throw it out the window on the way out. But not anymore, apparently. That's going to be worth three quarters of what it should be worth. That's great. The average household income here is $80,152 Canadian.

Okay. Which, in the U.S., it's about $53,000. So that's pretty high. In the area, the average is, like in the province, the average is $55,000. So this is way higher. Wow. They're doing well up here. Good disposable amount of income, high retail sales numbers.

It seems to be kind of a booming thing here. The jobs, though, when you look at the jobs, it is mostly sales and services and retail. About 50% of the jobs are either sales and services or retail. So that tells you right there. There's a lot of go in that store and get behind that cash register type of jobs there. There's a lot of go buybuy shoes at a shoe store. There's a lot of just, it's a normal little town. Yeah, absolutely.

Now, if we've convinced you to move to Gander, it sounds wonderful. You want to get yourself a big dog and a pipe and a plaid shirt and sit there. We have the Gander real estate report for you right now. I found a three-bedroom, two-bath house. It's like a vinyl siding. I don't know. It looks depressing. 259,000 Canadian. I

found a two-bedroom, one-bath, 840-square-foot little house for $179,900, which has recently reduced $9,000. You should get on that. That's a deal. And then I found a five-bedroom, three-bath, 3,300-square-foot, really nice family home, $324,900. And that's like $200,000 here. Yeah, three quarters of that, whatever that is. And that's recently reduced about $15,000. So you guys jump on that deal right now if you're in Gander. You got some beaver bucks to save.

Oh, baby. Things to do in Gander. Oh, man, so many things to do. Think about it. You can look at the ocean. You can stare at the lake. You can help people that are stranded. You can walk around the airport. There people that are stranded walk around the airport there's a lot of shit to do there's a lot of shit to do you can go to the north atlantic aviation museum i'm in which i'll go look at guys if you're in

need of entertainment what do you do up there for entertainment and what is that besides look at the plains land you can go to the beyond the overpass theater company oh which it's quote central newfoundland's only professional theater festival. Laughter and thrills on stage all summer long. This season, we bring you comedy, thriller, drama, mystery, and music. Join us for a season to remember. You gotcha. Get your asses up there and watch some shitty dinner theater.

Enjoy. That's a top activity. And if you get lost and can't find it, it's just over there, right beyond the Overpass. It's just right there. It's just past, yeah. It's just beyond. Just beyond. You can't miss it. It's just past Austin. Can't find it. It's just over there, right beyond the overpass. It's just right there. It's just past, yeah. It's just just beyond. Just beyond. You can't miss it.

It's right there. I wonder if everything there is just in terms of it. It's like right by the airport on the west side of the airport. Everything just airport adjacent. They just say it. Crime rates here. I cannot find the exact crime rates of this place. Really?

It is so high. I looked up and down, left and right. I'm sure they're out there everywhere. They just don't want to spread rumors. They're so nice. I can't find the exact rates, but what I could find was numerous articles touting how low the crime rate was there and how much lower it was than the average of everything else around it.

Maybe they just don't have any to report. It is not. Yeah, there's not a lot of crime, especially the violent crime there. There was very low murder rates. They're nice people. They'll take you into their goddamn home. Nice people. At least one. Let's talk about some people from Gander, shall we?

First of all, let's talk about Jennifer Hicks. Jennifer Hicks, she's the youngest of six kids. She has two brothers, three sisters. She grows up in Musgrave Harbor, which sounds like a Canadian town. If you said name a Canadian town that's not a major city,

Musgrave Harbor, I guess? I don't know. Sounds like a Canadian town. It's a town of about 1,000 people outside of Gander by about an hour. Her father died when she was a teenager. He used to work on dragger boats. I don't know what that is exactly. I assume it's something you drag and get fish. Drags nets, probably, catches shrimp or something.

Catch a Labrador in there. I don't know exactly what you do. But yeah, and her mother was a home care worker who died as she became an adult. In 1997, she moves with her sister to Gander. Oh. So they were going to get out of this Musgrave Harbor here. Let's move to the big town of Gander. You bet.

That's a step up. What year did they do this? This is 1997. They move here in the summer of 97. As we know, the airport's there, and that's the main deal here. The hub. The sisters are planning on taking a business administration course there. Jennifer actually did not graduate high school.

She has no high school diploma. She made it to grade 10. So she was going to get her high school diploma, and then her and her sister were taking business administration courses. That was the point of moving to the bigger town. Okay. So she fucked up. She just needed a new change of scenery.

That's what it is. She needs a change. It's two sisters. Their parents are dead. They're like, what are we sitting in this town for? Let's go to school and try to make something of ourselves. I can't imagine both my parents being dead when I'm 16 years old. Miserable. Miserable.

Miserable. The whole thing. She's lucky she's where she is. Yeah. She could be so fucked up. People can take her in now and she's in Canada. She's going somewhere amazing. It's a perfect place.

The food is going to be an extravagance. Do you remember? Yeah. No shit. Everyone remembers it. Buffets of baked goods. So she, at this point, rather than getting her high school diploma, she meets a guy. Okay.

She meets a man named Nelson Lloyd Hart. Fucking Nelson. And we'll talk about Nelson here. He's the eldest of three sons. He has a bit of a troubled childhood, not in terms of being in trouble, but in terms of illness. He's nine months old when he had a really high fever. Yeah. And this fever triggered epileptic seizures in him.

And his father has epileptic seizures, and it triggered this illness, and it never went away after that. That stuff is terrible, man. It's awful. I mean, I can't imagine. I got a buddy that has it. He has to wear a bracelet in case he seizes up in public so that they know what he has, what's going on. Yeah, so you know what the hell's wrong with him. Yeah, you don't just fucking lock him up and put him in a straight check.

Shit is so scary. It's insane. Yeah, I've been around people with seizures. It's the on. Yeah, so you know what the hell's wrong with him. Yeah, you don't just fucking lock him up and put him in a straight jacket. Shit is so scary. It's insane. Yeah, I've been around people with seizures. It's the worst. I've seen them. They're horrible. They're really scary. It's really bad.

His mother, Pearl, we'll hear a lot from Pearl over this. His mother recalls him having seizures as an infant with his eyes, you know, turning around and his head foaming at the mouth, his tongue hanging out. God grieve. It's so bad. And she said this prevented him from being normal, having a normal childhood, as you would expect. It really was. She said, quote, he was always deprived

of a lot of things, and he was always a little bitter, which makes sense. I could see that. His schoolmates, nobody wanted to hang out with him. They'd tease him. They'd call him ugly. He just, not only physically, too, he's a heavyset guy, not very attractive, and he's

having epileptic seizures. So if you're a child, you don't want to hang out with this guy. Because kids are mean. Kids are fucking cruel. They just don't want to hang out with anybody different. And this guy is different. This kid is different in five different ways. By 12, he'd already, by the age of 12, he was going on his third year in the fifth grade.

Third year in the fifth grade. Third year in the fifth grade. Fifth grade. That is brutal. When kids learn how to make fun of kids. That's what I mean. It's the worst time. And now he's like two years older than the other kids. They're probably making fun of him for now being stupid

in addition to being sick and fat and everything else. Now you're an idiot too. You're an idiot. You're 13 in fifth grade. It's terrible. Brutal. It's brutal. It really is.

And the size of him. I mean, you stand out at that age. He's got a mustache for Pete's sake. This is not a good thing. A real bad mustache, too. A bad teenager mustache. He's the only fifth grader who's jerking off constantly. Constantly.

Constantly masturbating on everything. They're like, this kid is way too deep into puberty to be here. His mother agreed with the school officials that there's no point in this. So she kept him home. At the fifth grade point in this. So she kept him home. At the fifth grade. Oh, no. Just kept him home. What?

Just hanging out. You can't do that. He doesn't need school anymore. She said, quote, to look at him, he was healthy. You couldn't see into his brain. So she just gave up. He lost his driver's license several times due to his condition. He eventually gets medication that allows him to keep driving that keeps us under control a little bit.

You mean the driver's license he got in seventh grade? Yeah, exactly. If he went to seventh grade. That's fucking crazy. His mother said that he believed his driver's license was the only thing in the world he had going for him. So he never wanted to go to the hospital when he had serious seizures because he was always afraid that the doctors were going to make...

More paperwork. He was going to get it revoked. He was going to get his license revoked. So he would try to hide the seizures, which is a terrible thing to do here. By his mid-20s, he's jobless. He's living at home with his mom, Pearl. And he's a fifth-grade education. This guy's life is not going well for him.

This is not what you dream about for your child at all. It really isn't. It's tough. Now, Pearl at this point, a man moves in. She has a relationship. She has a common law husband, and he moves in, and he doesn't like it at all. Nelson does not like it at all and threatens to kill him. Yes.

Nelson threatens to kill the common law stepdad. You don't get to do that, Nelson. Not great at all. Now, that's going to stand out a little bit as a red flag. So the common law, the stepfather here decides maybe he should move out. What do you think? He just threatened to kill me. He's really not doing anything productive.

Maybe we should kick him out. He's 20. Yeah. His mother just said, quote, he was sort of a child in a man's body, which makes sense because he only went to the fifth grade. Pearl, that's kind of your fault, too. Yeah, exactly. You could have done something, Pearl. I mean, I don't know what her life was like, and I don't know what kind of knowledge she had.

I don't know the wherewithal she had or the ability to do anything or anything like that. But you've got to try harder for your goddamn kids to just pull them out in the fifth grade and go, OK, Nelson, sit at home. You can't do that, man. When he's 20, you've got to look in the rear view and go, I kind of Norman Bates-ed him. Like, this is not a good way to raise a kid. That's exactly right. Yeah, his seizures kept happening worse and worse and worse. They became so severe that in October of 1997, the provincial government out there in Newfoundland arranged for him to receive live-in care.

Now, this is a point of contention. I've read several different things. I've read a hundred different things about this, and half of them say this and half of them say the other thing. This makes sense to me, but we'll see here. Apparently, the live-in care that they received turned out to be Jennifer Hicks. She was the live-in care person at this point. She was the nurse.

Yeah. So, Hart, Nelson, he liked her. Obviously. But how many girls do you think this guy meets? How many women does he meet? He's met four in his life. You know what I mean? And three of them were mean to him. His fifth grade teacher. Yeah. I mean, he does not meet women. He doesn't go out. He doesn't go to the club party, doesn't have a job where he can meet anybody.

So if a woman comes into his home and is semi-attractive to him, he's going to be all over that shit. My favorite person in the world. Yeah. And before long, apparently him and Jennifer hooked up. Oh, boy. They were together. So this, honestly, I've never expected him to find any woman at all that would that would be with him but she found someone now or he found someone this caused jennifer to lose

her home care job because she's not allowed to date patients i can imagine that seems fair it seems like a conflict of interest yeah i would say let's see that i can see that's the first thing i'm like that makes perfect sense uh now so this means both of them are now on social assistance because he was on social assistance before. To afford her. Well, yeah, just to buy food. Right. And now she is also there.

There's also an alternate side of this that says that they lived in the same apartment complex and bumped into each other and became friends and hooked up that way. hooked up that way, which I believe this live-in care story more because I can't imagine him being able to socially approach a woman in an apartment complex and do well enough to end up hooking up with her. Right. That scenario implies that a man that has a fifth grade education and has epilepsy also has unbelievable game. He's got game. He's got, he spits some game.

That's all it is. He's walking through the apartment complex., he spits some game. That's all it is. He's walking through the apartment complex. You gotta have good game. Let me holler at you. No. The fact that she would come over every day against, you know, being paid to, against her will.

Yeah, she didn't like say, I'm gonna go over to Nelson's house. She's like, this is my job. And then kind of maybe get to know him and see his little suite. And also, we'll find out from Jennifer, she's really nice. I feel like she might feel bad for him.

She's also very gullible, which she's from some tiny town in Newfoundland. It's less than a thousand people in a town in the middle of nowhere. Whose parents are dead? She's not worldly, this girl, at all. She dropped out in the 10th grade. She's not a worldly person. Not well-traveled. Absolutely.

So soon they hook up and she becomes pregnant. Oh, my God. He got her pregnant. Wow. So that works. So everything else in up and she becomes pregnant. Oh, my God. He got her pregnant. Wow. So that works. So everything else in his body might not work. This guy. The sperm is swimming, boy.

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I'm kind of proud of him at this point. He found a woman that would tolerate him. But here's the thing. They're both on government assistance, and now they have a child in the life? Jesus. Not just a child. Oh, my God. She is pregnant with twins.

No! Twins, which is the worst scenario for this. That's the hardest way to get through life. That's the hardest way, especially if you have nothing. Oh, my God. Apparently, this terrified Nelson. Of course. He was worried that the kids if you have nothing. Apparently, this terrified Nelson. Of course. He was worried that the kids would also have epilepsy.

So he was very concerned about that because he got it from his dad's family. So he was very concerned. Shit, I'm going to have these kids season up all over the place. And he's not healthy and he has no money. And he's very worried about how the hell he's going to take care of her, of everybody. All three of them. Everybody. Yeah.

He's a big guy, too. By this point, he's a big guy too this by this point uh he's a big guy he's about six years older than jennifer too uh and he is she's about five foot five she's petite and he's 300 pounds he's a big dude and he's balding um he's a big balding heavy set epileptic guy so and now he's got twins coming and no prospects and no way of taking care of him. Yeah, not to turn it into like a vanity thing, but is this a cute girl? It doesn't matter, honestly. It doesn't matter, and I don't know, honestly, because I didn't see pictures of her back then.

I'm just fascinated by this right now. It's insane. It's insane. I mean, she's a nice person. She's a tiny, young girl. Nice person. Clearly and incredibly gullible. And yeah, and also, too, she's got some gumption to try to change her life. Yeah.

You know what I mean? That sort of thing. She's got a drive to try, at least. Yeah, that's what it is. And now she's pregnant with two kids. Pregnant with two kids. The mother, Pearl, his mother, says still that seizures controlled his life. Yeah. And this also made him suffer from depression.

Yeah. Same thing. After a while, this relationship progresses. She's pregnant. All this is going on. You would think that he would be happy and maybe this would get him to a better place in his life. You would imagine. Well, I mean, just to the fact that he's going to have twins, which most people, if you're going to have kids, it's kind of an exciting thing.

Listen, I had a job. My wife was pregnant with our first kid. Just one. I was sweating bullets. I was losing my fucking mind. But you also were in a 300-pound epileptic with a fifth-grade education that probably never thought he would have a wife, a family, anybody that would even want to. He probably didn't even think he'd have a friend, a family, anybody that would even want to – he probably didn't even think he'd have a friend, this guy.

Yeah, no doubt. And now he found a woman who's willing to be with him and have his children. So, I mean, in that point, he's got to at least feel like he's being accepted by something or somebody. But it's so weird, too. He was a nice guy outside of threatening the common-law husband with murder, his mother's husband. But after this, he starts getting a little different.

Jennifer said, quote, it was after he got me, he turned around. He started getting violent and all this kind of stuff, getting mad and smashing up furniture. He was a jealous and violent person. So this comes out of nowhere. This is she didn't expect this. She was working at the Albatross Motel. She was cleaning and working the desk and that sort of thing. Just, you know, that's the job that she could get around there.

And she's trying to support her goddamn family and this fat bastard here. Yeah, sure. So she's doing that. He didn't like her working there. Didn't like it at all. He would wait for her in the parking lot. Didn't like her working there. That was no good.

And then when she'd go out, he'd wait for her in the parking lot of the mall while she went shopping. Oh, no. Things like that. He's very, very jealous. And controlling. One time he put a knife to his own throat and vowed to take his own life. And it's insane. And telling her that she would be blamed for it.

It's like, if I kill myself, they're going to blame you for murdering me. What the shit? I have a knife and blah, blah, blah. So, I mean, he's trying to be controlling. Yeah. Controlling is a big thing for him because, honestly, probably, too, he's never had a control of a goddamn thing in his entire life, including whether he can sit there and not shake violently. So I can see this.

He's never had a girl in his life either, and he doesn't want to lose it. He doesn't know how to treat people. Right. And he doesn't know how to treat people. And not being around, not having any social interaction past the fifth grade, you don't know how to treat people. And I'm not making an excuse for his behavior whatsoever. Don't treat people like this. You know ahead of time. I'm sure his mom said, hey, don't threaten women.

I'm sure at some point his mom said that or he's heard that or he saw it on a TV show or something. It's not that I'm just saying he hasn't had the practical practice at this of actually interacting with people and knowing how to not drive them away from. Sure. She was super. Jennifer was super excited about the twins. She found out they found out five months in and she was super excited. Five months in, she found out. Five months in, she found out that she had twins going on. Okay, there was twins. Brewing and percolating in there.

Yeah, not five months after being pregnant. Okay. Only in America, only in America would that happen. It'll end up in a dumpster outside of a prom somewhere. So, she's super excited about it. Nelson is not so much excited about it. He's kind of being unemotional about the whole thing. Now, the girls are born in March of 1999.

Two little girls, both girls. His mother said, Pearl, said that Nelson was worried that if he had a seizure with babies on him, it causes his hands to clench up. He was afraid that he would hurt them, even if not drop them. But he was afraid even if someone took them, maybe he would clench up and he would crush them or something like that. I can't imagine the amount of fear going through his head with everything. Otherwise, she's healthy, good pregnancy. Everything goes on fine. March 9th, 1999, they have the two little girls, Karen and Krista.

Karen's the elder by two minutes. She was five pounds, eight ounces. And the other Krista was over six pounds. Wow. So a couple of nice, yeah, good-sized kids. They're growing them big up there. A five-foot-five girl did that. Five-foot-five girl pumped that out.

So good for you. Good for you, Jennifer. Just Jennifer's tough, man. I like this lady. She's a strong girl. They're delivered C-section to not kill her. Which is good. Yeah.

That's helpful. To not kill her. Krista. Krista the- Second one. She's the second one, but the heavier one. She is the bigger personality. She's very bossy.

She's the one who's like, we're doing this, and that's it, and directs the other one around, which a lot of times with twins, that's how it is. All right. They were very close, though. They dressed them exactly the same. The, which a lot of times with twins, that's how it is. All right. They were very close, though. They dressed them exactly the same. The girls wanted to be dressed exactly the same, too. They liked it. They thought it was cool.

Well, that's fine, then. They were just happy-go-lucky kids that thought it was neat that they looked exactly alike. That's all it was. March of 2000, they get married. Okay. Local justice of the peace, they get married. So that's a nice, once you have twins, maybe you should probably worry about, let's get married. What the married. Why not?

You generally figure that out before the kids. But in the event that it happens, whatever, as long as it's a happy ending, I don't give a shit. Exactly. They didn't make a big deal out of it, too. There's just a casual thing. Jennifer said she wore jeans and a T-shirt. Oh, that's nice. Down to justice of the peace, whatever. He wanted to be married, Nelson. His mother said that all he ever wanted out of life was, quote, to work and have a family. That's all he says he ever wanted.

Okay. Well, he's got one of those right now. Absolutely. Now, before this, in 1998, he broke his neck in a car accident. Holy shit. Didn't cripple him or anything, but he had a broken neck. He broke a vertebra in his neck in a car accident. And right after the kids were born, he receives a $25,000 insurance claim on the whole thing. So he's excited. They can kind of get settled a little bit. That's a nice, you know, they bought a bed.

They bought an armoire, a table set, clothes for the newborns, things like that, just to get yourself set up and ready. They used it smartly. They used it smartly. Yeah, he didn't piss it away yet. He didn't go get her boobs or any shit like that. Not boobs. Boobs will not happen.

I can tell you that right now. No one's getting boobs in this entire story. Nobody's getting braces. No braces, no boobs. Well, we'll get into that. Okay. Social services, though, because they were on assistance, they would come and check the kids.

They found out about the insurance claim and they forced him to sell everything he had bought with it and give the money back what give it to them relinquish the money that's not very cool i don't understand how that works i don't know canadian laws but his mother said that's when everything started going downhill um the social services after that because they were you know not being able to provide for their kids was threatening to remove the children. They told Jennifer that she's going to have to make a choice between the girls and Nelson. They did this.

Nelson's brother, Melvin, offers to take them in. Yeah. Only not him. Just Jennifer and the babies. Not him. So. How bad must that feel? That's rough.

Looking at everything right now, Nelson really gets fucked with a lot by everybody he's getting government assistance yeah he gets in an accident he gets insurance money and then the government says you you're not entitled to that you're not entitled to it yeah it's it's it's it's messed up but he's also he's also an asshole too he doesn't he she says this whole time that he doesn't pay any attention to the twins and he seems to resent them. And she remembers when they were about a year old,

she was feeding them and Nelson comes in the room and wanted something from her and she was like, I'm, you know, feeding two kids right now. He said, quote, you care more about

them youngsters than you do me. Yeah, motherfucker. That's how it works, asshole. Yeah. They came out of my fucking body. They're my kids. This is how it works. You're supposed to care more about your kids, asshole. Yeah. They came out of my fucking body. They're my kids. That's how it works. You're supposed to care more about your kids,

asshole. They can't take care of themselves, you moron. No, you're fucking old. You're a grown man. You're an adult. Yeah, you fat fuck. Go do something with yourself. Make yourself some soup, you fuck. Jesus Christ. Oh, that makes me mad. Another time, she said he kicked his foot through the door of one of the kids' rooms because they wouldn't stop crying. So he kicks

a hole in their door, which that'll get him to stop crying. That's going to make him cry more because you just scared the fuck out of them. She said he never hit them but was what was always mean to them. Yeah. And violent. He gambled. He begins gambling. At one point whatever furniture they had he sold.

He would cash the family's social assistance checks. He said he would go over to a she said Jennifer said he would go over to a local pub and play the machines there. And he would go there. Quote, he would go there when the doors open. It wouldn't leave until the machine shut down around two thirty. Wow. So he's just gambling any time they might have and any chance they might have to build a stable environment for their family. He's going to piss it away. So this is coming.

This is all a lot, obviously. Nelson is a mess. He's unraveled. He's unraveled. He's clearly not taking the responsibility of the family seriously. I don't know what his condition has to do with it or anything like that. But he's doing a shit job of being a dad and husband at this very moment in time. On August 4, 2002, Jennifer's getting ready to take her twin daughters, both of them here,

to the Demolition Derby. Okay? They're going to the Demolition Derby. The Demolition Derby is part of a big festival that they're having there. It's the Festival of Flight they're having, and it's got all sorts of shit, and it's their big gander festival. I didn't mention it in the things to do because I was going to talk about it now. Gotcha.

So they're there. They're gonna go to the uh they're gonna go to the demolition derby it's a very nice sunny morning the kids krista and karen very they're dressed nice ready to go um you know they they they're apparently they like getting ready and stuff so they're like not you know a mess or anything they're girls they're girls yeah they're girly girls like that so they're're ready to go. Out of nowhere, Nelson, who doesn't do shit with the girls ever, it just doesn't care, he offers to take them to the park because

Jennifer said she needed about 45 minutes. She got the kids all ready. She needed to take a bath and get her makeup on, get ready to go out for the day. She took care of the kids first. So he says out of nowhere, hey, I'll take them to the park while you do that. That seems like a nice thing. And she's like, fuck, that's helpful. Yeah, that'd be great.

They won't be running around my feet. Wow. All of a sudden you give a shit? Yeah. Jennifer said about a quote, he didn't seem contrary or nothing like that. I said, all right, you can take them. You can tell exactly how these people talk by the two quotes we've had from each of them. They're like, hey, they care about them young and more than me.

So it's one of those things. It's like this is very Alabama Canada here. It doesn't sound contrary or nothing. It's one of those things, not to make fun of her, but you know how it is here. So she lets them go. They set out. They go to Little Harbor, which is right near there. It's a little

town right on the lake. It's real close. It's about 10 kilometers away. So that's close. A few miles away. Six miles. Yeah, exactly. So he goes. She starts getting ready.

The kids really wanted to play on the swing sets. Apparently, they just built a swing set there. It's right by the lake, and there's a little park. And they built a swing set, and the girls were like singing about the swings. Like, we want to go on the swings, swings, swings. Oh, that is adorable. How do you not take the kids on the goddamn swings? Anybody would take the kids on the swings.

So maybe she thinks, Jennifer thinks, you know what? He's finally getting melted by these little girls. They're melting his heart. And I would, I'd take them on the swings too. Fine, go. But there's a problem. 20 minutes later, he comes back and the girls aren't with him. No kids. That's a problem. Not good. That's, that's not great. He tells her, this is his story that comes out later, and we'll get into the details of the whole thing. He tells the police that he saw one of his daughters fall in the water. He's unable to swim. He can't swim at all. So he threw the other in?

So what he says is he jumped into his gray Dodge Shadow and drove for help. Drove for help. That's not what you do. Also, by the way, has a cell phone in his car. Doesn't call for help. He gets in his car. He drives for help and Drove for help. That's not what you do. No. Also, by the way, has a cell phone in his car. Doesn't call for help. He gets in his car, he drives for help and arrives home. That's where he goes for help. Home. To his house. Ten kilometers away.

Yes. Unbelievable. Jennifer said, quote, he said that Krista was in the water and he drove all that way and never called nobody and never done nothing about it. I asked him where Karen was and when I got in the car, Karen wasn't there. Oh, my God. So she thought you have one of them at least.

No, he said he just, he's like, oh, no, I just left her at the park too. She's on the swings. Yeah. She was singing. So she's, Jennifer's freaking out. They arrive. This is the most horrible, imagine the feeling in this poor woman right now. I have it right now.

Yeah. We both have kids. We both have two kids, and we're, this is insane. This have it right now. Yeah. We both have kids. We both have two kids. This is insane. This is your biggest nightmare. This is not how you react to one of them being injured either. This is why you don't want to let your kids out of your sight because you worry about crazy shit like this happening. So, you know, it's so bad.

So they arrive at Little Harbor at the park there on Gander Lake. And the first thing they see is by the wharf, Krista is floating face down. So she is dead in the water. Actually the ambulance got there. She was still alive. She was floating face down but she was still alive. Karen the other little girl was pronounced dead at the scene. Where was she?

They found her in the water. She was like she wasn't floating right there. They found her. Krista held on at the hospital and she died the next day at the hospital which which is, I don't even know what to say. Again, I say this all the time, but it's like, what the fuck do you even say about that? These are three, two, three-year-old girls. Like, you can't get any worse than this. This is fucking horrific.

Now, his story on the whole thing is he said he got, when he got there, he took Krista out of the back seat and put her on the ground and then got Karen out. And he said just as he put Karen down outside the car, he shut the door and he said he had a massive seizure. That's his story. He said he recalled one of the girls running, but he can't remember whether she was running toward him, running toward the water. He said, and this is what the mother said said too, the twins were very frightened of seizures when he had them, which I don't blame them, these poor kids. And, you know, they would hide from him if he had one at home. They would go run and hide because they were scared.

They didn't want to see anything happen to their dad. I've seen a grown adult have one before. They're fucking scary. It's scary for a three-year-old, and it's your dad. I can't imagine. He said he saw, he thinks he saw Krista go into the water, he said, but the fit, he said he was all confused and out of it from the seizure. He said, quote, all I could picture was Jennifer.

Where's Jennifer? I couldn't see her, but I could see her, but I couldn't get to her. So he was like having whatever he said, delusions, basically. He says he knows he got behind the wheel of his car, but doesn't remember driving home. He said, quote, by this time, I was starting to come around to my real senses. I said, oh, my God, Karen's there, too. He says as he went back, got Jennifer, as he sped back, he said, she said it didn't even seem like Nelson was going fast enough, but he had his foot to the. But he's, yeah, he's, you know, but she was like, let's go faster.

I mean, let's be honest. Yeah, exactly. It's not going to go very fast. No, no, it's as fast as a Dodge Shadow goes. She said that they found Krista in the water, which, unbelievable. Jennifer couldn't swim either. So she couldn't even. No, there's three.

She started searching for Karen. Oh, Jennifer. Jennifer couldn't. The wife didn't know how to swim either. The wife didn't know how to swim either. What the fuck is going on here? So she shows up and she can't find Karen. And rather than diving in and looking for her, she has to go walk around the woods looking

for her, hoping she's there. Oh, my God. While she's looking for Karen, Nelson goes to a nearby gas station and calls authorities there. I don't know what happened to his phone. Police obviously came, and they obviously had some questions for him. He says as they got there that he suffered a second seizure of the day, and he said, quote, I loved my daughters, my own flesh and blood. There are times when I cry, cry, and cry.

Well, you should cry all the time about that, you asshole. Now, after this happened, Jennifer stays with him. They have, you know, obviously problems, but she stays with them. She says she barely remembers the funeral. Imagine planning a funeral for three-year-olds. She had to go buy them shoes to wear at their funeral. Like, imagine that. The fucking unreal.

It's unreal. And they have, like, what they wore. I can't even say it because it's too much. It's honestly just too much for me to even get their funeral. Like, imagine that. The fucking unreal. I don't want to. It's unreal. And they have, like, what they wore. I can't even say it because it's too much. It's honestly just too much for me to even get it out. Like, it's too... She bought dresses and shoes and all that shit. Yeah. Winnie the Pooh sandals, Jimmy.

Oh, fucking hell. How fucking sad is that? Jesus. Doesn't that just make it worse somehow? Yeah, a little bit. They're so fucking little, these kids. They're so... Jesus Christ.

Spring clothes. It's too much. That's sickening. It's honestly making me sick. It's too much. That's sickening. It's honestly making me sick. The funnest time of the year, and those are the clothes they have to wear forever now. Unreal, man. What a scumbag. Unreal.

So it's ridiculous. A few days after the deaths, Nelson throws out all their clothes, all their stuffed animals, pictures, everything. No. Everything. You don't do that. But they're doing an investigation, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police retrieve all that stuff from the dumpster. They get that.

Actually, there's a false story in the St. John's Telegram that says that they're going to charge him criminally with this, and then they run a correction the next day saying the police have started a criminal investigation but haven't identified a subject. Sounds like somebody put off-the-record shit in the paper. Yeah. It sounds like somebody fucked up. Yeah. For now, though, no charges are filed. Okay.

No charges are filed. Three years go by. Okay. Three years go by. February 2005. Three years of him throwing shit away. Three years of him after he threw the shit away. She's still with him.

What? She's still with him. She's not... My wife asks so many questions when I did nothing wrong. You know what I mean? I feel like Jennifer's not that bright, if I'm going to be honest with everybody here. I feel like Jennifer's just a little simple. Not that bright. I feel like she's simple, and she's just not, she's like Forrest Gump.

She just takes whatever he says as gospel and goes, all right, well, that's a really shitty situation. It's ridiculous. That's awful. Whatever he says is gospel and goes, all right, well, that's a really shitty situation. It's ridiculous. It's awful. They're living in Grand Falls, which is about an hour away. And a man shows up.

They meet a man. He's approached by just some man in the street named Steph Suave. This is this guy's name, which right away, right there. This guy said he's looking for his missing sister. Okay, this is, like I said, this is February 2005. He's a French-Canadian guy described as a, quote, swarthy French-Canadian. He pulls up. Isn't swarthy a negative thing? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

He's a little shady. He pulls up, asks for directions, pulls out a photograph of a young woman with blonde hair saying this is his sister. He said that she's a drug addict and she gambles at the local bars. Because they know he does. She knows he does. Steph Suave tells them that, like I said, it's his sister, and their mother is dying of lung cancer in Montreal

and wanted to see the daughter before she died. Okay. So this sounds like a pretty heart-tugging story. Seems legit. Suave says, look, if you can help me find her, I'm not from this town, if you can help me find her, I'll give you 50 bucks. Okay. They could use 50 bucks.

Hart said that could go to her to bed, is what Nelson said to himself. He still couldn't find the sister. They looked all around. Suave gave him the $50 anyway and gave him a carton of cigarettes and said, if I give you this, will you search another town for me? And he said, yeah, sure. What the hell? Jennifer thought it was a little strange, but Nelson said, no, no, he's legit. And they said, all right, fine. Out of nowhere now, Suave started using him for other things. He started talking about this mysterious big boss he has. He's saying he's a gangster and he has this all-powerful boss that needs work done for him. It's really weird.

The next day, after he didn't find her in both towns, Suave asks Nelson if he offers him more money and says, will you collect a package, take it from my hotel, take this package, and will you deliver it to somewhere? This story just got so weird. It got so weird. Nelson suspected there's drugs in the package, but he does it anyway. After a while, though, nothing happened. Suave is giving him all sorts of odd jobs just different things he said

that he had a group of associates they ran a trucking outfit and handed heart business cards with the name on it it was bcw transport uh you know completely had a toronto address the whole deal they had nelson cart a ski do in a u-haul to uh another town a man signed an invoice the whole deal water ski yeah like a ski do like a water ski? Yeah, like a ski-do, like a water ski. Sea-do. A ski-do. Sea-do. It says, I have ski-do in the actual documents of the court documents. Well, it might be a ski-do.

I don't know. I know they're called sea-dos, but they called it a ski-do in court. All right. So I said ski-do like a fucking moron. It's a ski-do. Anyway, also had him drive a brand new Pontiac Grand Am somewhere. This is so weird. Over a few months, Nelson had earned more than $15,000 working for this guy.

Also, too, they were taking both of them. They were taking Jennifer out to dinner with them. They were going out to dinners. Nelson would take Jennifer to a fancy hotel for the weekend because he had money in his pocket. It was crazy. He bought a headstone, actually, engraved with two angels for them that was four thousand dollars that was the you know the whole deal she had a uh winnie the pooh dolls encased in waterproof plastic cubes by the thing which whatever i'm not going to get into that uh we both have made the same face yeah it's enough

with fucking winnie the pooh yeah he. He paid $6,500 for a used 2000 Pontiac Sunfire, which, this guy loves shit cars. He loves them. Oh, my God. That's a fucking Casey Anthony car. Yeah. It's ridiculous. It's an awful car. Yeah.

It's a mattress for their bed, the whole deal. She's just buying necessities. Yeah. They just said it was, he said, the Lord finally answered my prayer, he told his mother, with this suave guy coming in and doing the whole deal. Jennifer or Nelson, neither of them had a job. They lived in a small apartment, so now they at least had a bed. They said, quote, we never had a bed to lie on.

All we had was a sponge on the floor. What? So they're just, they're living horrible. They said they couldn't even afford food sometimes. And before this, they couldn't afford headstones. So this seems to be like a huge deal. Like one of those rolls, like a camping roll sponge? Yeah, I think so.

Or like a dish sponge for like a pillow. I think like a double thick yoga mat is what they're going for pretty much. That's pretty much what it is. That was their bed. That's it. Terrible. He keeps, Suave starts sending him on different trips out into the mainland of Canada here. In Halifax, Suave gave him a key to a numbered locker at a YMCA.

Inside, this sounds, this is like a movie. Inside, Nelson found an envelope and brought it back to Suave. And a third man that he didn't know, Suave told him these are credit cards and showed him the samples and said, you know, this is what we're doing basically. We do illegal shit. Yeah. Suave looked at him, heart set, and said, you know, this is what we're doing, basically. We do illegal shit. Yeah. Suave looked at him, heart set, and said, you don't tell nobody. You can't tell your mother, your wife, your dog, your cat. You can't tell your goldfish.

You're in a circle now, and you don't get out, he tells him. So he's basically telling him, you're in a gang. You are a crip now. You're in a crime syndicate. You're in a crime syndicate. Enjoy. Right. You're a consigliere now.

Yeah, absolutely. He would take him on to different things, yeah absolutely uh he would take him on to different things too where he would take him to like uh you know rough somebody up and nelson didn't have to do it but he would like suave would rough somebody up ahead in front of him and that sort of thing and just to show him that he was a gangster um you fuck up we'll leave a horse on your sponge yeah yeah we'll leave a horse head in your sponge bed. In your sponge bed. Suave asked him, what about if you have to pull the trigger? And Nelson replied, I have no problem with that. Oh, my God.

Insane. They're in Montreal. Suave calls Nelson, and he says, we got to go see the boss. Okay, this is the big boss. And he says, we got to go see the boss. Okay. This is the big boss. Word had arrived that a, what he was saying is that a member of a rival gang was going to tell police that he witnessed Nelson drown his daughters.

That's what he tells him. So the boss, Suave, they meet with the boss and he tells him this boss controls the underworld. This is, you know. This guy's the one. Yeah. People go, they said, if you go to his, you know. This guy's the one. Yeah. People go. They said if you go to his, you go to see him, he's rich and powerful. He might be there to help you.

Or he said people might get cremated when they go there. Flush down the toilet. Bye bye. Type of thing. That's what the guy said. This is what the guy was telling him. Flush down the toilet. Bye bye.

Unreal. So Nelson said he was a hard looking fellow, the boss. So Nelson said he was a hard-looking fellow, the boss. Nelson said that the boss told him, tell me how you've done away with your daughters. That's what he said. And so Nelson said, never, sir, never. I never hurt my daughters. I'm an epileptic.

And the boss said, oh, no, no, no, no. Don't go lying to the boss. Don't lie to the boss. So Nelson says he was terrified. And he said he thought he'd be made to go away if he went against the boss so he says he just uttered his confession he said i drowned my daughters i pushed them over the wharf uh and he told the boss how he uh you know knocked the knocked him into the water with his knee pumped him off the deal um he said it was a relief to him nelson because he knew that they weren't going to kill him or break his ribs. You know what I mean?

So he figured he was good. Suave actually would have him act it out at the wharf, how he did it. He wanted to see. What? Yeah. I guess he said the boss wanted me to show me. So he acted it out. Yeah.

It's unreal here. But they tell him, Suave tells him, that they're going to take care of this guy who said he's going to tell him. We're going to take care of this fucking guy. Hart said he's told Suave, he said, I don't want any part of a murder. And they said, no, we're going to kill him. We're just going to take care of him. Yeah. Okay.

So still, though, he needed an alibi. Hart said, I'm going to get an alibi for this while you're doing this. I don't want anybody messing with me. So what he does is he takes Jennifer, picks her up, didn't tell her why, just get in the car right now, took her to Walmart. And when they got there, he turned to her and said, Jennifer, look up at the camera and smile. And they stared at the security camera for 20 minutes. That was a way of saying, look, we're here.

Here we are. Alibi. We're not hurting anyone. He might as well have held up a sign that said alibi on it. It's fucking ridiculous. That's awesome. So the next day, because that was unreal, right? This is June 12th. They's fucking ridiculous. That's awesome. So the next day, unreal, right? This is June 12th.

This is June 12th, 2005. Next day, June 13th, Nelson is arrested at the airport in Gander where Suave had told him to go pick up a plane ticket for a trip to the mainland. They gathered outside his car, the police, and Hart immediately tried to call Suave.

He was like, I'm going to get out of this. The cops said, quote, no point in calling Steph. He's with us. That is a long way to go to get a confession out of a man. So they got videotape confessions for the whole deal because the boss there, that was all a videotape setup. I'm admitting to the whole deal. Yes, the whole deal.

This sting, they do this, it's called the Mr. Big operation up there. They do it to a lot of people. Really? It's a big thing they do all over the place to get people to admit to shit. Costs over $400,000, this particular sting. Yeah, because they gave him like 30 grand. They're giving him all this money. It's done to many criminals.

He's charged with first degree murder on that day at the trial. Hey, guys. Just going to take a quick break from the show to tell you about – this isn't even a sponsor. No. This isn't a sponsor. This is – They're just friends of ours. People that are awesome. They're not just friends of ours.

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And now back to the show. Get on there. Give it a shot. There you go. And now back to the show. At the trial, they showed the jury the hidden confession. Sure. They showed him the hidden tape. They said to, the boss said to him in the tape, who was really a police officer, he

said to Nelson, this was about the perfect murder. And Nelson said, it was pretty well organized. So the guy said, you must be a thinker, eh? And Nelson said, sometimes it pays to be that way. So this just, I mean. You must be a thinker, eh? Yeah, yeah, I'm going to go get an alibi by standing in front of a Walmart video camera. So stupid.

I'm not a thinker. And Hart's lawyer claims that he was intimidated by the undercover, by these people, and just made up the story to impress them. That's what he said. I just made it up to impress them. I mean, that seems like the easy way out of this whole setup. It is. It is.

But it's interesting here. Now, March 28, 2007, jury comes back on this with a verdict of guilty. Wow. They got him. They sentenced him to life in prison with the eligibility of parole in no less than 25 years. So 25 years before parole. Holy shit. Life in prison. He's fucked. So 25 years before parole. Holy shit. Life in prison.

He's fucked. By the way, Jennifer is staying with him at this point. Get out of here. Staying with him. He didn't testify in his own defense because the judge refused to close the court to spectators, which turns out to be a big deal later on. Okay. But he didn't want to testify in front of people.

Hart said in a brief statement that, you know, he said he didn't do it. He said, quote, I'd like for the people of this town, the public, to know what was done to me. I was told to go against the crime boss. I tried to tell him the truth, but he didn't believe that. Yeah, so she. There's no crime boss, bro. No. Jennifer Hicks is still fucking visiting him in prison.

People are, like, guys are asking her out. She's turning him down. No, I got to murder her back in the day. I got to murder her. I got to, guys are asking her out. She's turning him down. No, I got a murderer back in the day. I got a murderer. I got to go. You know, unreal. So September 17th, 2012 is an appeal to the Supreme Court in Newfoundland and Labrador. They, three panel judge here unanimously decides that Nelson should have been allowed to testify

in privacy because of his tendency toward epileptic seizures and the stress of thinking and speaking clearly with so many people around. The judges also ruled that the audio and video transmission of his testimony could have been provided to the spectators outside the courtroom. He didn't need to be there. So, yeah. In a two-to-one decision, the appeal judges found that the evidence of confessions obtained from Hart by police and Mr. Big Stain was in proper coercion and inducements, breaching Hart's rights.

Holy shit. Court ruled that the confession should not have been admitted to trial. It was a two-to-one. There was one dissenting. The majority appeal decision says that that evidence should be tossed out. Police preyed on his vulnerabilities by offering him cash and friendship. Court ruled that they deprived Nelson of meaningful choice about whether to give an incriminating statement to Mr. Big. Quote, Mr. Hart was coerced into incriminating himself in circumstances where the reliability of the resulting confession is questionable.

This strikes at the core principle against self-incrimination and strongly favors exclusion. Holy shit. He says he doesn't know if it was a false confession or not, but the way it was obtained doesn't matter. They grant him a new trial. Okay. New trial, and they tell the— I was on the edge of my seat, and I'm going, no, don't let him out. They tell the prosecutors it's now up to them whether to proceed with a new trial, but without a confession, they don't have any goddamn evidence against him.

They have nothing against him, and he is set free. What? Set free. Oh, by the way, on August 4, 2014, which is the anniversary of them dying, he is set free. Unbelievable. The next day, August 5th, Crown prosecutors announced that they will not seek another murder trial for Hart. They don't have any evidence, they say. They have to withdraw the murder charges against him.

Oh, my God. He's not even present to hear it. The judge said this brings the matters to a close. He's released after spending nine years in custody. It's unreal. And the lawyers are, they're asking the lawyers, is he going to sue now? I was just going to ask you

that. Is he fucking suing? I'll drown this fucking guy in a lake myself if they give this fucking guy a penny. I swear to Christ, I will push this epileptic fuck in a lake and watch him see. don't care he's out living they say that uh the the lawyer says mr hart has been affected psychologically in a tremendous fashion as a result of the sting and his prolonged incarceration they're trying to like get sympathy for him fucking sympathy for this asshole unbelievable so he's he's released to an undisclosed location they don't tell anybody after nine years you know how at the end of these i feel we feel real For this asshole. Unbelievable. So he's released to an undisclosed location.

They don't tell anybody after nine years. You know how at the end of these I feel we feel real scummy for like what happened? Yeah, yeah. Like right now. This is worse. This is the most scummy I've ever felt. Yeah, it's fucking horrible, isn't it? There are two dead babies. I loved Canada before this.

Yeah. I loved it. So nice, except for guys like him. Now, on the good side, November 28th, they set a trial date for new charges against him from an incident in prison in 2013 where he threatened to cause bodily harm or injury and assaulted a police officer. There was a prison guard who apparently shoved his lunch plate through his cell door and it fell on the floor. There's a camera with no audio that shows Hart lying on his bed when the items fall down. He came out of his cell and told the guard his lunch was on the floor. And then he grabbed a kettle from the common kitchen area, something like a tea kettle,

and threw it at the wall-mounted TV. The video shows all this. He then goes back into his cell. Corrections officers go in to get him. There's a whole big deal. Hart, in this video, Nelson's lying face down on the ground, appears to be yelling and all this shit. Eight officers go in and they swarm. You know how they do with these riot response teams and guys.

Apparently, guards all testified that he threatened to kill them and said he was going to, quote, stab them up. So, nice guy. He's threatened to kill this one, threatened to kill these people, and he's probably pushed his kids in the water. He's probably killed somebody before. So they sentence him to a 60-day house arrest. That's it. That's what he gets out of it.

That's what he gets for threatening jail, for threatening guards in jail. Unreal. And now the government's paying for his life anyway. Yeah. Jennifer Hicks says now she's not with him anymore. She finally broke up with him. She said that she was fiercely supportive of him. Now she fears him.

She said she goes to her daughter's graves every day. You know, she's just trying to make it all go away. And she said she blames herself. She has a quote here. Quote, I blame myself. If I had the time back, they would never have gone with him. Why didn't I keep them home? Who other can you trust with your kids other than their own father?

Fair. Fucking fair. It's so fair. She says, thinking back, that she was always a little suspicious of what happened at the park. And she would sometimes ask him if he had, quote, done away with the girls. And he would say, no, I never done away with the girls. That's all he would say. But she said, there's always something in the back of my mind that i didn't believe him i didn't trust him all

the stuff that the police saved from the dumpster that he threw out she still has the things and plastic bins in her closet in her apartment which i don't blame her i wouldn't be able to throw that stuff out either uh she lives in saint john's nelson is currently living somewhere in saint john's his mother says he's being looked after and treated as, quote, his nerves are bad. No one will give a location because people will go there and rip his fucking head off. I would hope so. Even in Canada. Even those nice people will do there.

Jennifer wants him to be back in prison. She said, quote, it might take me years. They might find something else. I don't know. Why should he be walking the streets happy-go-lucky getting away with the girl's death while I'm suffering every day of my life without these precious little angels if there is anything in my power that i can do i am doing it there is no justice for me and my girls it's like me and the girls just it's like me and the girls are just washed under the rug jesus poor fucking people

why she gotta use washed yeah no no water hurts. Fuck, these poor people, man. Or this poor lady. This is Jennifer Hicks. I mean, I feel so bad for her because her daughters are dead, and at the same time, I'm like, goddammit, pay attention. Her whole life is filled with death, though. It is. Everybody dies, except for her sister. Everybody else is dead. Except for this asshole. And this fuck.

This fuckhead who she wishes he's dead. So for staying, like, I don't know how she would stay with i guess i commend her loyalty or whatever but i mean how the fuck do you not just go no that's just i think i have one percent of my brain yeah that's 97.4 percent white if i have two per 6.6 percent of my brain even that little bit yeah that says maybe he i'm not with him right fuck him. I can't be with him and not want to stab him in the throat. 97 percent innocent isn't innocent. No, not innocent.

Fucking enough. Holy shit. What a mess of a story. That story fucked me up. I had a terrible week of sleep because of this. I kept thinking about these little girls and it just drove me crazy. And I hope it doesn't do the same to you guys. I hope we could make it semi enjoyable along the way.

If you enjoyed that story or are telling of it, as I like to say more accurately, Jesus Christ, please get an iTunes and let us know. Give us five stars. I feel awful. It helps us a ton. Doesn't matter what you say. Like we said, Patreon.com slash Crime and Sports or PayPal. You can do Crime and Sports at gmail.com. We have some awesome people we're going to give shout-outs to right now who did just that this week.

Jimmy? Heather Budd, Selena, Gretchen Oswald, David Smith, Brittany Harrington, Tyler Card, Amy Reiners. Reiners or Reiners? Dixon Balls. I'm going to go ahead and assume that that is a fake name. I'm going to hope that's a pseudonym. Dixon Balls. Yeah.

I'm going to assume pseudonym on that one. Let's go ahead. I'm going to go with fucking amazing still to read that. Dixon, D-I-X-O-N, balls. That's, yeah, that's something right there. That's awesome. Milo Grant, Sean Kerrigan, Peyton Shaver, anonymous donor. Somebody gave us a large donation, which was incredibly sweet.

So thank you. Didn't want them said, but thank you so much. You have no idea what that means to us, honestly. Thank you. KDL, Jamie Crawford, Dan Gardner, David Newsome, Naomi Jones. No, it's Naomi James. Jesus. Arthur Thurman, Monica Robertson, Casey Turk, Rebecca Doe, John Joyce in the UK.

That guy's awesome. This one's so tough. Marjolaine Spites or Spitsy or Spits? She knows who she is. We love you. Thank you. Such a tough name. Thank you.

Kerry Clark and Lisa Morrow. And from Jake Hinka in Michigan, he said, I was listening to your You Follow Oklahoma episode in which you mentioned that modern soldiers don't have shit on World War II vets. As a former soldier who served in Afghanistan, I have to say, you're absolutely right. Thank you for not being mad at us. Those magnificent bastards deserve the moniker The Greatest Generation for more reasons than I can even begin to list. That said, you guys are amazing.

I love both podcasts. Stay awesome. Jake from Michigan, not State Farm. Nothing against the military. It was mainly a Hitler thing. It was about Hitler. Those guys were amazing, and they did it, and you did it, too. Thank you. Thanks, everybody. Thanks for

finding Bin Laden. Whether you fought in Afghanistan or not, thank you for listening. Honestly, we appreciate the shit out of it. Jimmy, you want to give them your social media? At WismanSucks, W-H-I-S-M-A-N Sucks on Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat not, thank you for listening. Honestly, we appreciate the shit out of it. Jimmy, you want to give them your social media? At WismanSucks, W-H-I-S-M-A-N sucks on Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. And thank you all for sending me all those amazing pet pics this weekend.

It was my favorite fucking... Don't send me your pet pics. I don't give a shit. I love animals. I'd be like, stop sending me your fucking dogs. I don't want to look at pictures of my own fucking dog. Send them to me. Send them to Jimmy.

So thank you guys. That was a fun weekend. Yeah, not bad at all. Also, too, you can check me out at Stand Up Live in Phoenix, July 21st through 23rd with Paul Verzi, who is a hilarious guy,

New York guy, works with Bill Burr all over the place, really funny and a good friend of mine. So that is a show you definitely want to come out to. 100% good time all around. Also listen to the Verzi Effect.

It's a podcast. It's very good shit. You can catch up with me at Jimmy P is funny or you can just copy and paste my last name. Do all that. And if you want to get on the list for any of those, shoot me a message and I'll get you in for free. How's that sound? Oh, you can't beat it, guys. Can't beat it.

We can't wait. Until next week, everybody. It's been our pleasure. Bye. until next week everybody it's been our pleasure bye hey prime members you can listen to Small Town Murder early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Or you can listen early and ad-free with Wondery Plus and Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed

red wound on his arm and seemed unwell. She insisted on driving him to the local hospital to get treatment. While he waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car to pick him up at the exit, but would never be seen alive again, leaving us to wonder, decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott? From Wondery, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one and many more. Every week, hosts Aaron and Justin sit down to discuss a new case, covering every angle and theory, walking through the forensic evidence, and interviewing those close to the case to try to discover what happened.

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