Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, we have some exciting news to share. ABC
Speaker 1: News Studios has turned Caroline Brega's story from Betrayal season
Speaker 1: four into a docuseriies. You'll get to meet the people involved,
Speaker 1: You'll hear from people who have never spoken before, and
Speaker 1: you get to see where this story took place. We
Speaker 1: are so proud and excited to share it with you all.
Speaker 1: Stream Betrayal Dirty Secrets now on Hulu or Hulu for
Speaker 1: Disney Plus.
Speaker 2: I just lost my mind. It felt like someone opened
Speaker 2: my brain and it was spilling onto the floor. Everything
Speaker 2: I had known to be true.
Speaker 1: Was just not. I'm Andrea Gunning and this is Betrayal,
Speaker 1: a show about the people we trust the most and
Speaker 1: the deceptions that change everything. For this episode, we've anonymized
Speaker 1: all the names and locations. Leona grew up in the
Speaker 1: Midwest in a town where nobody was a stranger.
Speaker 2: The town is tiny. There's less than five thousand people here,
Speaker 2: so everybody knows everybody.
Speaker 1: Her family has lived there for four generations.
Speaker 2: It's hard to go anywhere and not be running into
Speaker 2: somebody that I know or knows someone in my family.
Speaker 1: Just outside of town, the landscape gives way to huge
Speaker 1: fields of corn and soybeans. It's a big farming community.
Speaker 1: Lots of kids at Leona's school were part of a
Speaker 1: youth organization called FFA Future Farmers of America.
Speaker 2: During FFA week, everyone drove their tractors to school.
Speaker 1: Growing up, Leona spent a lot of time with her
Speaker 1: younger sister. They were close and was protective of her.
Speaker 1: She's an oldest child to her core. I am definitely
Speaker 1: type a personality. I want everything to be perfect. I'm
Speaker 1: a black and white person. I do not do well
Speaker 1: with gray, so I have to follow the rules. Her
Speaker 1: family didn't have a lot of money, and if Leona
Speaker 1: wanted to go to the movies, grab dinner with friends,
Speaker 1: or go on class field trips, she had to come
Speaker 1: up with the money herself.
Speaker 2: I started working pretty much full time at sixteen, and
Speaker 2: so I would go to school till three, get to
Speaker 2: work at three thirty, be there till ten.
Speaker 1: After high school, Leona stayed in her hometown and lived
Speaker 1: with her parents. She was still a teenager and was
Speaker 1: saving up money to move out. She dreamed of moving
Speaker 1: to a bigger city one day, but she needed more
Speaker 1: financial stability.
Speaker 2: Nobody in my family has been to college, so all
Speaker 2: I had known was you start working.
Speaker 1: At eighteen started working at her state's Department of Revenue.
Speaker 2: Shortly after I started that position, I got a friend
Speaker 2: request on Facebook.
Speaker 1: It was from a guy she went to high school with.
Speaker 1: His name was Aiden. They had never been close, and
Speaker 1: she only remembered a couple of vague things about him.
Speaker 2: He was a grade above me. He was in theater,
Speaker 2: and I remember seeing him on stage when I would
Speaker 2: go watch the performances, but I wasn't going to see him.
Speaker 1: She accepted his friend request. Then Eden sent her a
Speaker 1: message asking her how she was doing. The two started
Speaker 1: chatting where.
Speaker 2: Are you living, things like that, catching up about what
Speaker 2: life looked like for the last couple years.
Speaker 1: Eden told her that he had joined the military and
Speaker 1: was living a few states away. She told him about
Speaker 1: her new job and caught him up on what was
Speaker 1: happening back home. She started to look forward to Eden's messages.
Speaker 1: It was exciting because I was getting attention and it
Speaker 1: was from someone who got out of our town, so
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, maybe I have some chance of
Speaker 1: getting out of this tiny town. They messaged back and
Speaker 1: forth for months, Then the holidays rolled around.
Speaker 2: In December, he said, Hey, I'm back home. Would love
Speaker 2: to get together and have dinner.
Speaker 1: Leona agreed, and a few days later we went on
Speaker 1: our first date. Leona still remembers walking into the restaurant
Speaker 1: and seeing Aiden.
Speaker 2: He was in the military, so I was clean, shaven,
Speaker 2: all the things. We sat and we talked four hours,
Speaker 2: just laughing and having such a good time. I was
Speaker 2: enthralled with him.
Speaker 1: If you had seen them at the restaurant that night,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't have believed it was their first date.
Speaker 2: We were just making jokes like we had known each
Speaker 2: other forever, just instant connection.
Speaker 1: Leona and Aiden stayed in their booth, talking and laughing
Speaker 1: long after they finished their meal, even after four hours
Speaker 1: had gone by. Leona didn't want the date to end.
Speaker 2: It was such a significant moment for me. I can
Speaker 2: tell you exactly what booth we were sitting in. That's
Speaker 2: how vivid this memory is.
Speaker 1: As soon as she left the restaurant, she told her
Speaker 1: friends about the date.
Speaker 2: I'm not good at keeping secrets, so I can't at
Speaker 2: all when something exciting happened in my life, like I
Speaker 2: just have.
Speaker 1: To tell Aiden was equally as excited about her. We
Speaker 1: went on the next date Within the next few days,
Speaker 1: they went to the movies and saw Flight with Denzel Washington.
Speaker 1: It's an action movie about a pilot who was forced
Speaker 1: to crash land an airplane. Leona and Aidan were gripping
Speaker 1: their arm rests the whole time.
Speaker 2: After we left, he was like, why in the hell
Speaker 2: did you pick that movie?
Speaker 1: They laughed about it. As Aidan drove Leona home. He
Speaker 1: walked her to her front door.
Speaker 2: It was freezing outside because it was December, and I
Speaker 2: remember him just shivering because he was so cold, And
Speaker 2: I remember having our first kiss on my parents porch
Speaker 2: that night.
Speaker 1: Eden was changing jobs within the military and was transferred
Speaker 1: to the reserves. He moved into a place an hour
Speaker 1: outside of their hometown and made the drive to see
Speaker 1: Leona whenever he had free time.
Speaker 2: He's taking me to his favorite restaurants in this town,
Speaker 2: and we're just hanging out constantly. We're texting all the time,
Speaker 2: calling each other.
Speaker 1: That initial spark of attraction kept growing. Pretty soon they
Speaker 1: were inseparable.
Speaker 2: This is a person I want to spend all my
Speaker 2: time with because I'm having so much fun, Like we're
Speaker 2: talking about whatever, we're laughing, and I had never experienced
Speaker 2: anything like that before. So I'm like, Okay, well, this
Speaker 2: is obvious that this is the person I'm supposed to
Speaker 2: be with. Introduced her to his family. His dad's a preacher,
Speaker 2: his mom is a nurse. I loved them.
Speaker 1: Aiden's family loved her too.
Speaker 2: I immediately became a part of their family. I was
Speaker 2: hanging out at their house. We were always doing stuff together.
Speaker 1: In some ways, Aidan and Leona were very different.
Speaker 2: Aiden was a very private person and I'm the complete opposite.
Speaker 2: I'm an open book.
Speaker 1: Aidan planned everything out carefully, while Leona was spontaneous. But
Speaker 1: in many ways they were similar. Growing up in the
Speaker 1: same town meant they understood each other's childhoods.
Speaker 2: We both were raised in a situation where our families
Speaker 2: didn't have a lot of money, so the movies were
Speaker 2: like a gift. You get one piece of candy, and
Speaker 2: it was like a luxury. She and Aidan were just
Speaker 2: barely adults, not even twenty one, but they both made
Speaker 2: their own money and could indulge in little luxuries. These
Speaker 2: dates fell exciting. We went to the movies. That was
Speaker 2: our thing. We got to do that together and kind
Speaker 2: of heal that smaller version of the both of us
Speaker 2: that like, we didn't get to do that when we
Speaker 2: were kids, but now as adults, we get to choose
Speaker 2: to do that.
Speaker 1: It was December of twenty twelve. A new movie had
Speaker 1: come out that they both wanted to see, The Hobbit,
Speaker 1: so they grabbed their favorite snacks and settled into their seats.
Speaker 1: Then Aiden turned to Leona and told her he had
Speaker 1: a question to ask her.
Speaker 2: He said, do you want to go steady with me?
Speaker 2: I remember being like, absolutely, there's no question about this.
Speaker 2: It was so exciting.
Speaker 1: But in a few weeks, Aiden was leaving for the
Speaker 1: East Coast, where he'd complete his next round of military training, and.
Speaker 2: So we knew our time together was going to go
Speaker 2: by quick, and so any moment we could, we would
Speaker 2: spend time together. He ended up staying at my parents'
Speaker 2: house with us during a snowstorm. We were just hanging
Speaker 2: out in my room and I decided to tell him
Speaker 2: that I loved him.
Speaker 1: As the snow swirled outside, Aiden told Leona that he
Speaker 1: loved her too. The next week, the day they had
Speaker 1: both been dreading, arrived. It was time for Aiden to
Speaker 1: leave for the East Coast to start his new position
Speaker 1: in the military. He would fly there from a military
Speaker 1: base a few hours away from their hometown. Leona came
Speaker 1: with him to drop him off.
Speaker 2: And it was pouring rain. It was the kind of
Speaker 2: rain where the car FOG's up and you don't know
Speaker 2: which temperature to put it on to figure it out.
Speaker 1: But nothing would stop them from savoring those last hours together.
Speaker 2: We are singing at the top of our lungs or
Speaker 2: taking pictures while we're driving, like just being in that
Speaker 2: moment of like, we're not going to see each other
Speaker 2: for a very long time, so we're going to just
Speaker 2: be in it.
Speaker 1: When they said goodbye, they were both crying. The drive
Speaker 1: back home without him felt so empty.
Speaker 2: I drove home on these curby ass roads while it's
Speaker 2: raining and I'm on the phone with my best friend.
Speaker 2: It's just falling because i was just so sad, just
Speaker 2: crying because I'm like, I just dropped the person off
Speaker 2: that I love.
Speaker 1: Because Aiden was switching jobs within the military, he had
Speaker 1: to go through basic training again.
Speaker 2: And because of that, he was not allowed to have
Speaker 2: a cell phone for the first several weeks. We would
Speaker 2: write handwritten letters back and forth, so very like he
Speaker 2: is in the military, we're writing the letters.
Speaker 1: In those letters They began to dream of what they
Speaker 1: wanted their future together to look like.
Speaker 2: We knew we wanted to have kids, we were going
Speaker 2: to live on the East Coast. We're getting married before
Speaker 2: I'm twenty one. You know. There was this very detailed plan.
Speaker 1: Their letters back and forth became a penciled in hopeful
Speaker 1: blueprint for their life. When Leona missed Aiden, she reread
Speaker 1: his letters and imagine their future together. Finally Aiden got
Speaker 1: a phone.
Speaker 2: And so Aid had called me to like kind of
Speaker 2: fill me in all what was going on, and then
Speaker 2: he says, I think we should get married.
Speaker 1: Leona was overjoyed. She didn't hesitate. This is how it's
Speaker 1: supposed to be. I found my person, So why waste
Speaker 1: any more of my time? She was ready to run
Speaker 1: full speed towards the life they dreamed of. They decided
Speaker 1: to get married that Christmas. That gave them just over
Speaker 1: six months to plan the wedding.
Speaker 2: All the things started happening very quickly. When we were
Speaker 2: doing wedding planning, his mom and his sister were involved.
Speaker 2: His sister was one of my bridesmaids. I went that
Speaker 2: next week and bought my wedding dress.
Speaker 1: While they were apart, Aiden and Leona sent photos and
Speaker 1: intimate messages back and forth on Facebook Messenger. That summer,
Speaker 1: Aiden flew Leona out to visit him on the East Coast.
Speaker 1: Seeing each other in person, they were even more giddy
Speaker 1: about their wedding. They talked through every detail together. Because
Speaker 1: Aiden proposed over the Leona didn't have a ring yet.
Speaker 2: And He's like, can you explain to me, like what
Speaker 2: you want your ring to look like? What do you
Speaker 2: want the band to look like? And so I'm explaining
Speaker 2: this and I'm kind of leaned up against him, and
Speaker 2: he was like, do you want it to look like this?
Speaker 1: Aidan pulled a ring out of his pocket and he slid.
Speaker 2: It onto my finger and I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: it was bigger than I expected it to be, as
Speaker 2: like a full carrot. It was better than I had
Speaker 2: dreamed of.
Speaker 1: She called her family right away and they celebrated with her.
Speaker 1: The rest of her visit was just as magical. They
Speaker 1: watched fireworks burst through the dark sky and explored the city.
Speaker 1: We were kind of getting a feel for what our
Speaker 1: life was going to look like. Finally, their wedding week
Speaker 1: arrived and Aiden traveled back home.
Speaker 2: The night of our rehearsal dinner, everyone, all the bridesmaids,
Speaker 2: all the grooms men. We went bowling. After words, they.
Speaker 1: Piled into the bowling alley, ordered food and laughed, watching
Speaker 1: their friends get competitive with each other or just.
Speaker 2: Having like the best time, enjoying each other's company, laughing,
Speaker 2: cutting up, no care in the world because tomorrow we're
Speaker 2: gonna be married.
Speaker 1: But then in the middle of the celebration, something disturbing happened.
Speaker 2: My sister starts receiving these text messages from an unknown number.
Speaker 1: Leona's little sister went pale.
Speaker 2: She was receiving pictures of someone's penis.
Speaker 1: The photos were accompanied by a slew of graphic questions.
Speaker 2: What is her opinion of the way this is shaped
Speaker 2: or sized?
Speaker 1: What do you think about this? Do you think this
Speaker 1: would be pleasurable to you? Leona was horrified. Her sister
Speaker 1: was only seventeen.
Speaker 2: It was just like the wind got knocked out of me,
Speaker 2: and I was like, oh my god, like I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2: I mean, she's under age.
Speaker 1: At this point, more and more messages flooded her sister's
Speaker 1: phone incessantly.
Speaker 2: We're bowling, and we're immediately not having fun because my
Speaker 2: sister and I are having to deal with this. My
Speaker 2: sister's like, what the hell's going on.
Speaker 1: Nobody in their friend group recognized the number, no idea
Speaker 1: who it is, none whatsoever. Leona pulled Aiden aside to
Speaker 1: tell him what was going on. He looked disturbed.
Speaker 2: Aiden was like, Oh, that's really bizarre.
Speaker 1: They were starting to think it was just spam, but
Speaker 1: then the messages got personal.
Speaker 2: They know who I am, and they know who Aiden is.
Speaker 2: The person had hacked into my Facebook account and got
Speaker 2: all of these photos and these very specific details about
Speaker 2: our sex life.
Speaker 1: Leona thought of all the intimate exchanges she'd had with
Speaker 1: Aiden over the last few months. The thought of someone
Speaker 1: reading the made her sick. Then the text to her
Speaker 1: little sister took a turn. It started to sound like blackmail.
Speaker 2: If you don't send us nudes, then we're going to
Speaker 2: send out these pictures and release this information about your
Speaker 2: sister and her husband's sexual relationship.
Speaker 1: On the night before Leona and Aiden's wedding, they went
Speaker 1: to a bowling alley with their friends. Everyone was having
Speaker 1: a great time until Leona's sister started receiving disturbing text
Speaker 1: messages from an unknown number. The text revealed that they
Speaker 1: had hacked into Leona's Facebook account and accessed hundreds of
Speaker 1: sexual images and text messages sent between her and Aiden,
Speaker 1: and now they were threatening to release these photos and
Speaker 1: texts if Leona's sister didn't comply with their demands.
Speaker 2: If you don't send us nudes, then we're going to
Speaker 2: send out these pictures and release this information about your
Speaker 2: sister and her husband's sexual relationship.
Speaker 1: She made her way through the Bowling Alley to Aiden
Speaker 1: and told him what happened.
Speaker 2: Aiden was like, Oh, that's really bizarre.
Speaker 1: He left his circle of friends and came over to
Speaker 1: see the text himself. When he saw the messages, his
Speaker 1: concern heightened. Aiden was a private person. Hearing that someone
Speaker 1: accessed intimate details about their sex life clearly disturbed him.
Speaker 2: You could immediately feel the air in the room. Just leave.
Speaker 1: Aiden told Leona's sister to ignore the messages for now.
Speaker 1: They didn't know who they were dealing with, and they
Speaker 1: needed to treat this with caution.
Speaker 2: We'll just ignore it. Let's just deal with this subtlely.
Speaker 1: Time. They all stayed at the Bowling Alley until late
Speaker 1: that night and tried to have fun. Leona did her
Speaker 1: best to put it out of her mind and take
Speaker 1: in all the joy and excitement around her, but it
Speaker 1: was hard to ignore what happened. The next morning, Leona
Speaker 1: woke up and it was her wedding day.
Speaker 2: I was just so excited to like get down that
Speaker 2: aisle and see him and be with my husband. Like
Speaker 2: I'm ready to start our life.
Speaker 1: Leona Aiden. Their families and friends packed into a church
Speaker 1: in their hometown. Leona walked down the aisle and met
Speaker 1: Aiden at the altar. When their eyes locked, she felt
Speaker 1: the same certainty she'd felt on their first date.
Speaker 2: I remember knowing that this was the right decision. I'm
Speaker 2: just crying and like I'm wiping a tear off my face,
Speaker 2: And I was just so happy because he was my
Speaker 2: best friend. He was someone I could confide in. We
Speaker 2: had these plans where our future, and it was just
Speaker 2: so exciting to get it started. Let's start our life.
Speaker 2: Why are we waiting another second.
Speaker 1: The rest of the day was filled with dancing, speeches,
Speaker 1: and wedding cake.
Speaker 2: Everything was joyful.
Speaker 1: She tried to stay in the moment and not let
Speaker 1: the text from the unknown number ruin the day.
Speaker 2: I put it out of my mind. This is my day.
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna let whatever it is interfere with that.
Speaker 2: We got so much fun. We're all having a good time,
Speaker 2: but there also is this like lurking chaos in the
Speaker 2: background that you can't quite ignore.
Speaker 1: Aiden only got a few days off for the wedding.
Speaker 1: They didn't have time for a honeymoon. In fact, two
Speaker 1: days after they got married, he had to return to
Speaker 1: the base. Leona had been so focused on the wedding
Speaker 1: that she didn't account for how hard the goodbye would be.
Speaker 2: The reality hit me at that point. I'm like, oh
Speaker 2: my god, this man that I love so much is
Speaker 2: about to leave, and I just immediately start crying.
Speaker 1: They said a tearful goodbye, and Aiden reported back to
Speaker 1: his base on the East Coast. Leona stayed in their hometown.
Speaker 1: With the wedding over, she focused her energy on helping
Speaker 1: her sister deal with the blackmailer.
Speaker 2: I just remember being so concerned about it because it
Speaker 2: was my responsibility to take care of this. She started
Speaker 2: with the most obvious solution. I had told my sister
Speaker 2: to just block the number, but that didn't stop it.
Speaker 2: We would block the one number, and then almost immediately
Speaker 2: it would be coming from a different phone number.
Speaker 1: Then to her horror. Her little sister started receiving screenshots
Speaker 1: of Leona and Aiden's private conversations.
Speaker 2: The person had all of these photos and these very
Speaker 2: specific details about our sex life.
Speaker 1: Leona felt sick. They really had hacked into her face book.
Speaker 1: They'd seen everything. It was an unthinkable violation. The messages
Speaker 1: to her little sister all had the same disturbing tone.
Speaker 1: They were cruel and emasculating towards her husband.
Speaker 2: They said, I've seen photos of Aiden and he's tiny.
Speaker 2: Can you believe that your sister is with somebody like that?
Speaker 2: How embarrassing.
Speaker 1: When ignoring the messages didn't work, Leona's sister texted one
Speaker 1: of the numbers back.
Speaker 2: She would say, leave me alone, stop texting me, stopped
Speaker 2: doing this, and they would just still pile in.
Speaker 1: Nothing she said made the sender back off. She refused
Speaker 1: to send intimate photos of herself and tried to just
Speaker 1: keep locking the numbers, but it was hard to manage.
Speaker 1: After her sister had been dealing with this for three months,
Speaker 1: Leona got.
Speaker 2: A text herself. They said, your sister isn't doing this now,
Speaker 2: we're escalating it.
Speaker 1: After that, they sent Leona a photo, an intimate image
Speaker 1: of herself one that she'd sent to Aiden. It was
Speaker 1: clear this image was a bargaining chip, a threat.
Speaker 2: The messages kept coming. They were just making fun out
Speaker 2: of our sex life. How embarrassing for you that you
Speaker 2: have to ask your husband to do this so you
Speaker 2: can be completely satisfied. This is embarrassing.
Speaker 1: She wanted to report it, but the idea of showing
Speaker 1: these messages to the police mortified her. The fear kept
Speaker 1: her silent, so she ignored them and blocked the number
Speaker 1: each time they sent her something new. The next month,
Speaker 1: she went to visit Aiden at his military base. It
Speaker 1: would be their last time seeing each other before his
Speaker 1: upcoming deployment. He would be gone for nearly a year.
Speaker 1: Before he left, they had a peaceful week together.
Speaker 2: It was such a great time. I was hanging out
Speaker 2: with the people that were going to be my support
Speaker 2: system while he was deployed. We went to the movies
Speaker 2: all the time. We were hanging out with his friends.
Speaker 2: It felt like nothing could get in our way. But
Speaker 2: in the meantime, we're still receiving these messages, and they're
Speaker 2: getting worse.
Speaker 1: Finally, Leona snapped. She texted the number back. I told
Speaker 1: the person I'm like You're ruining my life. You're invading
Speaker 1: our privacy. What I do with my husband is none
Speaker 1: of your business. You need to get a different hobby.
Speaker 1: But it became clear humiliating her and Aiden was the
Speaker 1: hacker's full time hobby, and they had no plans of
Speaker 1: dialing it back.
Speaker 2: Whenever they would start message, it would just last for hours.
Speaker 2: Even if you weren't responding, they would just spam you
Speaker 2: with information or spam you with texts. And so I'm
Speaker 2: having to stand up for my husband to this person
Speaker 2: I don't even know, and also trying to figure out
Speaker 2: out how to get them to stop messaging.
Speaker 1: My sister Leona felt alone in this. A few weeks later,
Speaker 1: Aiden was deployed to Afghanistan and she was back at home,
Speaker 1: laying awake at night thinking about who could be behind
Speaker 1: these messages. Was it one of their friends, someone else
Speaker 1: in town, or a random stranger hundreds of miles away.
Speaker 1: Even as the messages escalated, she tried not to burden
Speaker 1: Aiden with it.
Speaker 2: I was trying to keep his feelings in check because
Speaker 2: he is literally deployed in the Middle East, so he's
Speaker 2: got his own stuff going on, Like I have to
Speaker 2: control all of this back home and I'm failing as
Speaker 2: a wife.
Speaker 1: This is falling on me in every way. Leona had
Speaker 1: been trying to handle everything on her own, but nothing
Speaker 1: was working. In fact, it was only getting worse. She
Speaker 1: needed help.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go to the police about this.
Speaker 1: Leona and her sister went to the police station together.
Speaker 2: I started explaining what's been going on and they're like, okay,
Speaker 2: well we need you to write out everything. So we
Speaker 2: sit there and we write everything down, and I'm like,
Speaker 2: what are the next steps on this? What can we
Speaker 2: do to resolve this? And that's when they said, unless
Speaker 2: you've been physically attacked, there's nothing we can do. And
Speaker 2: it's just about like, why did I just waste my
Speaker 2: time writing all of this down and reporting it to you.
Speaker 1: A few weeks later, Leona was scrolling through Facebook when
Speaker 1: she saw a post that made her stop in her tracks.
Speaker 1: A girl from her high school posted about receiving strange
Speaker 1: messages from an unknown number.
Speaker 2: She posted a screenshot of the messages that she got
Speaker 2: and the photo.
Speaker 1: Reading through the messages, Leona immediately recognized the jeering tone.
Speaker 2: Look at this person's penis, what do you think about
Speaker 2: the size or the shape? Do you think this would
Speaker 2: be satisfying to you.
Speaker 1: This was clearly Leona's hacker. Her high school classmate turned
Speaker 1: to Facebook for help. She asked, has anyone.
Speaker 2: Else heard from this person? Like? What is going on?
Speaker 1: Leona clicked on the comment section of the post. What
Speaker 1: she saw stunned her. Dozens of comments from other people
Speaker 1: in her town saying that they too had been getting
Speaker 1: harassing texts from an unknown number.
Speaker 2: There were so many of people commenting on the posts
Speaker 2: that were like, yeah, I'm also receiving these.
Speaker 1: Leona was shocked. She thought she and her sister were
Speaker 1: alone in this. Over the course of that spring, the
Speaker 1: hacker tightened their grasp on Leona's town. She saw more
Speaker 1: friends from high school post about the harassment online. No
Speaker 1: one knew who it was or how to stop them.
Speaker 2: They were using email, Facebook, text messages. It was just
Speaker 2: all the time. You never knew where it was going
Speaker 2: to come from.
Speaker 1: When Leona saw her friends or ran into her old
Speaker 1: high school classmates, the unknown number text always came up.
Speaker 1: Their entire town was on edge.
Speaker 2: And then my close friends started getting messages and email
Speaker 2: addresses were being spammed with this stuff. It was just
Speaker 2: encompassing every aspect of my life, like it was everywhere.
Speaker 2: All of a sudden, more and more people came forward
Speaker 2: saying that they had received disturbing messages. I'd say everyone
Speaker 2: included probably like twenty or so people. We all went
Speaker 2: to the same high school.
Speaker 1: Leona's town is a hard place to hide. Remember it's
Speaker 1: home to just five thousand people.
Speaker 2: This had to be.
Speaker 1: Someone they all knew. Everyone was trying desperately to figure
Speaker 1: out who was lurking behind the unknown number.
Speaker 2: April, May, June, and July were just very intense with
Speaker 2: the amount of text messages. People in my community are
Speaker 2: getting stuff. People are posting about it on Facebook, like
Speaker 2: who else is getting these messages?
Speaker 1: For some people in their community, the messages died off
Speaker 1: or only happened once, but for Leona they were constant.
Speaker 2: It felt so personal. What did we do?
Speaker 1: Eden and Leona were exhausted trying to figure it all out.
Speaker 1: Instead of talking about their plans for a family, all
Speaker 1: of their energy was taken up by the unknown number.
Speaker 2: Our connection is definitely strained because he's working, and you know,
Speaker 2: the times we are talking were bickering about money or
Speaker 2: this person that's harassing us. He was irritated that every
Speaker 2: time we talked on the phone, we were having to
Speaker 2: deal with this, and so it was like, can I
Speaker 2: just call you and talked to you about literally anything else.
Speaker 2: We were just trying to make it tell November because
Speaker 2: that's why, and he would come home.
Speaker 1: They began to argue more. The hacker was ruining everything
Speaker 1: in her life, and she worried her relationship with Aiden
Speaker 1: would be next.
Speaker 2: I remember just bawling my eyes out, like I'm going
Speaker 2: to get a divorce in less than six months because
Speaker 2: of this shit. What is going on?
Speaker 1: The harassment drove Leona into a state of constant paranoia
Speaker 1: and exhaustion.
Speaker 2: It was just chaos all the time, everything around me.
Speaker 2: I was failing at because I couldn't figure out who
Speaker 2: this person was. I couldn't protect my sister, couldn't protect
Speaker 2: my husband.
Speaker 1: Then the text took a new turn. The hacker seemed
Speaker 1: to be watching her and her sister.
Speaker 2: They would know details about our comings and goings, comments
Speaker 2: about seeing us out and about we are always looking
Speaker 2: over our shoulder. It felt like a stalker type vibe.
Speaker 1: But she couldn't protect herself because she didn't know what
Speaker 1: or who to look for.
Speaker 2: I was panicking because I had no idea who it was.
Speaker 1: This was the last straw. Something had to change. She
Speaker 1: already knew the police couldn't help, but they needed protection. Finally,
Speaker 1: Aiden had an idea.
Speaker 2: He knows people in the military world that can figure
Speaker 2: this out. He was going to reach out to his
Speaker 2: friends in the private investigation world, and they were going
Speaker 2: to figure this out because of an IP address, especially
Speaker 2: if they're using a Facebook.
Speaker 1: Aiden contacted one of his friends who worked as a
Speaker 1: private investigator. Leona agreed to give it a try. Finally,
Speaker 1: Aiden called her one day.
Speaker 2: With good news.
Speaker 1: The private investigator was able to trace the text messages
Speaker 1: back to an IP address.
Speaker 2: Based on these text messages, his PI people had said
Speaker 2: that they were two hours away, so it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: he's not in our community, so that's it seems like
Speaker 2: we're fine there.
Speaker 1: For the first time in six months, Leona felt relief.
Speaker 1: This invisible omnipresent force had finally been pinpointed to one location,
Speaker 1: one IP address. This felt like a fixable problem.
Speaker 2: His PI then had to step in and take control
Speaker 2: of it and say something to him to just like
Speaker 2: make it stop.
Speaker 1: Sure Enough, after the PI intervened, the messages from the
Speaker 1: unknown number went from a constant stream to a slow trickle,
Speaker 1: and then one day the messages stopped entirely.
Speaker 2: This person disappeared. I don't know how this person disappeared,
Speaker 2: but they stopped.
Speaker 1: The entire town seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.
Speaker 1: Her Facebook feed turned from screenshots of harassing texts back
Speaker 1: to engagement posts and photos from family reunions. Slowly, people
Speaker 1: went back to their own lives. That summer, Leona packed
Speaker 1: up and moved to a town on the East Coast
Speaker 1: near Aiden's military base. For the first time in her life,
Speaker 1: she was living one thousand miles away from her hometown.
Speaker 1: She was twenty one now and Aiden was twenty three.
Speaker 1: Aiden was coming home from deployment that fall, and they
Speaker 1: were going to start their life living together for the
Speaker 1: first time. Leona wanted everything to be perfect when he
Speaker 1: got there.
Speaker 2: I decorated the house. I hung balloons and hung photos
Speaker 2: of us welcome home banners. I just made this whole
Speaker 2: big deal about it because I was so excited to
Speaker 2: really start our life.
Speaker 1: Finally, the day arrived, Aiden was coming home.
Speaker 2: It was the classic movie of the guy coming home
Speaker 2: from deployment. You're in the hangar and you're waiting for him.
Speaker 2: It's the middle of the night and there's a room
Speaker 2: full of people. Were just waiting for our loved ones
Speaker 2: to come home and spotting him from across the room
Speaker 2: and just like wanting to run directly to him.
Speaker 1: For Leona and Aiden, this was a fresh start, a
Speaker 1: chance to refocus on their marriage and each other. They
Speaker 1: had made it out of their hometown and the stress
Speaker 1: of the unknown number felt far away. Leona hadn't received
Speaker 1: any disturbing messages in months.
Speaker 2: It was so incredible. There was no deployments on the horizon.
Speaker 2: We have our home together and we do our favorite things.
Speaker 2: We go to the movies, we have date nights.
Speaker 1: Before long, Leona found out that she was pregnant.
Speaker 2: They were both thrilled. I quit my job and just
Speaker 2: started preparing for our oldest daughter to be born.
Speaker 1: When their daughter was born, it felt like everything was
Speaker 1: clicking into place. This was how she had always envisioned
Speaker 1: their life together. As Leona settled into her new home,
Speaker 1: she made friends with other military worns lives and.
Speaker 2: We're hanging out with each other all the time. I
Speaker 2: become really close with one of the other wives and
Speaker 2: we're hanging out almost daily, and then right before my
Speaker 2: oldest first birthday, I find out I'm pregnant again. When
Speaker 2: our daughter turned one, we had this big party, we
Speaker 2: invited all of our friends over. Everything seemed normal, but
Speaker 2: then something bizarre happened. Everyone disappeared. After that party. I
Speaker 2: stopped hearing from everybody after that.
Speaker 1: All of her new friends suddenly stopped talking to her,
Speaker 1: even her closest friend, who she saw almost every day.
Speaker 2: I don't understand what happened. We just stopped communicating and
Speaker 2: she doesn't answer my text messages.
Speaker 1: She told Aiden about how all of the women seemed
Speaker 1: to be ghosting her, and.
Speaker 2: He's like, I think it's probably best you just distance yourself.
Speaker 2: I had a lot of things going on, so I
Speaker 2: was just like, I'm just gonna focus on my family.
Speaker 1: Leona gave birth to their second daughter. She and Aiden
Speaker 1: savored all of their time with their two girls, but
Speaker 1: their time together as a family was limited.
Speaker 2: He is gearing up for another deployment. Then he deploys
Speaker 2: six weeks after she's born, and he's gone for six months.
Speaker 1: Leona's mom stayed with her during Aiden's deployment to support
Speaker 1: her and her kids. It was hard being away from Aiden,
Speaker 1: and Leona looked for things to fill her days. She
Speaker 1: started filming makeup tutorials.
Speaker 2: I'm doing these videos of live doing makeup, and this
Speaker 2: friend that I was really close with starts popping up
Speaker 2: on my lives making comments and like reaching back out
Speaker 2: to me.
Speaker 1: It was her close friend who hadn't replied to her
Speaker 1: in months, and so.
Speaker 2: I'm like so excited to hear from her. So I
Speaker 2: called her and I'm like, I'm so excited to hear
Speaker 2: from you, But what the hell where have you been
Speaker 2: the last year? And she tells me, She's like, well,
Speaker 2: you need to talk to your husband, And I'm like,
Speaker 2: what do you mean? And so she proceeds to tell
Speaker 2: me that he had been harassing all the women in
Speaker 2: the group, and all the wives.
Speaker 1: Of the group. Leona was confused. Aiden would never harass women,
Speaker 1: but then her friend said something chilling. Over the past year,
Speaker 1: some of the military wives had been getting strained harassing
Speaker 1: messages from an unknown number.
Speaker 2: It was the same stuff that had been happening, and
Speaker 2: they have proof that it's Aidan.
Speaker 1: That's why everyone ghosted her. Leona was still in disbelief.
Speaker 1: Her friends sent her all the screenshots they'd gathered. It
Speaker 1: took me three hours to read through all of these screenshots.
Speaker 1: They were emails, they were Facebook messages. As she read
Speaker 1: through the messages, her stomach dropped.
Speaker 2: What do you think about this? Isn't this embarrassing?
Speaker 1: It was the exact same language her hacker used.
Speaker 2: It felt unreal. I felt like I was looking at myself,
Speaker 2: watching myself receive this information. In that moment, everything clicked.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, it was Aiden the entire time. It
Speaker 2: was right in front of my face, and I didn't
Speaker 2: see it. He did all of this.
Speaker 1: For six months, Leona and her husband Aiden dealt with
Speaker 1: sexually threatening texts from an unknown number.
Speaker 2: By the time they.
Speaker 1: Moved to the East Coast for Aidan's job in the military,
Speaker 1: the texts had stopped.
Speaker 2: But after a few years.
Speaker 1: One of Leona's friends told her the military wives had
Speaker 1: been receiving disturbing messages from an unknown number, and when
Speaker 1: she saw the messages, Leona was horrified. The texts were
Speaker 1: identical to the ones she had received back in her hometown.
Speaker 1: The pattern had repeated. Even though they were one thousand
Speaker 1: miles away. The only constance were her and Aiden. Suddenly
Speaker 1: it was horrifyingly clear.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, it was Aiden the entire time he
Speaker 2: did all of this.
Speaker 1: The military community figured out it was him because one
Speaker 1: of the men who works with Aiden was able to
Speaker 1: recognize him in the photos. In the military, there are
Speaker 1: often communal showers. That's how he recognized parts of Aidan's body.
Speaker 1: When Leona saw the photo, she recognized it too.
Speaker 2: It was Aiden.
Speaker 1: When this happened the first time, Leona believed her private
Speaker 1: messages with Aiden had been hacked. But now there was
Speaker 1: no reason why these women would be receiving nude images
Speaker 1: of Aiden unless he was the one sending them.
Speaker 2: This seems like a joke. What the hell is going on?
Speaker 2: I was just so pissed, and I had to wait
Speaker 2: hours before I could confront him because he was in
Speaker 2: the Middle East again, and so I had to wait
Speaker 2: almost twenty four hours before I could talk to him
Speaker 2: about it.
Speaker 1: Those twenty four hours crawled by slowly. Leona's reality was
Speaker 1: coming apart at the seams.
Speaker 2: I just lost my mind. It felt like someone opened
Speaker 2: my brain and it was spilling onto the floor. Everything
Speaker 2: I had known to be true was just not. She thought,
Speaker 2: back to the moment this all started. A celebration.
Speaker 1: The night before their wedding, her teenage sister received graphic messages.
Speaker 1: Aiden was standing right there pretending to be horrified.
Speaker 2: While we're all together, We're all in the same room.
Speaker 2: I mean, it was right in front of my face,
Speaker 2: and I just didn't even see it.
Speaker 1: Aiden watched Leona and her sister suffer. He even pretended
Speaker 1: to hire a private investigator to stop the hacker.
Speaker 2: All the while he was.
Speaker 1: The one orchestrating all of the chaos. He was the
Speaker 1: source of their pain.
Speaker 2: He knew everything, every step of the way. How have
Speaker 2: I been duped like this?
Speaker 1: The Aiden she knew was calm, rational, and private. The
Speaker 1: texts were volatile, humiliating, and violated their privacy on every level.
Speaker 2: I don't even know who he was. My vision of
Speaker 2: who he was in the moment was just so wildly disconnected.
Speaker 1: Aiden felt like a stranger now, and a dangerous one.
Speaker 1: It's such an evil, black fog feeling. I don't know
Speaker 1: what love feels like, because I thought that was it.
Speaker 1: But someone who loves you doesn't treat you like that.
Speaker 1: The next day, Leona finally got the chance to video
Speaker 1: chat with Aiden. She knew she had to be strategic.
Speaker 2: I got on the skypall with him, trying to just
Speaker 2: stay as calm as possible because he can just hang
Speaker 2: up and be done, so I wanted to lull him
Speaker 2: in before I said anything to him. So we're just
Speaker 2: talking about our normal day. He's asking about the girls,
Speaker 2: and then I told him that I had talked to
Speaker 2: my friend and he was like, oh, how'd that go?
Speaker 2: And I was like, is there anything that you want
Speaker 2: to tell me that she would be upset about? And
Speaker 2: he was like no, I can't think of anything. And
Speaker 2: I was like, you wouldn't know why she's upset and
Speaker 2: he was like, no, I have no idea. I said, Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm going to ask you one more time, and this
Speaker 2: time when I ask you, I'm going to make sure
Speaker 2: that you know that I have hundreds of screenshots that
Speaker 2: tell me otherwise. So again, is there anything that you
Speaker 2: would like to tell me?
Speaker 1: Aiden had been calm before this moment, relaxed, but in
Speaker 1: a split second, his face rearranged into an expression. She
Speaker 1: had never seen.
Speaker 2: This look on his face that has just seared into
Speaker 2: my brain forever, a dearren headlight's look. He starts panicking.
Speaker 1: She asked him one last time, did he do this?
Speaker 2: And he said yes. I'm like, what do you mean,
Speaker 2: how could you do this to me? I have no
Speaker 2: idea who you are. And he was just so like,
Speaker 2: I'm so sorry. You mean everything to me. He's begging
Speaker 2: me not to leave him, trying to make it better.
Speaker 1: There was one question Leona wanted an answer to, why
Speaker 1: did he do this? She couldn't understand the degrading, humiliating
Speaker 1: messages about his own body.
Speaker 2: He told her he has low self esteem, but he
Speaker 2: also enjoys being talked down to. This was his outlet.
Speaker 2: He likes to be humiliated.
Speaker 1: Then, Aiden told her he had an explanation for everything,
Speaker 1: a medical issue.
Speaker 2: He's pretty sure he has a brain injury and he
Speaker 2: just can't control himself when it comes to that type
Speaker 2: of stuff because his brain is messed up from this
Speaker 2: deployment that he went on.
Speaker 1: Specifically, Aiden said he had a TBI, a traumatic brain injury.
Speaker 1: He got it during combat in Afghanistan when an explosion
Speaker 1: threw him against the side of a mountain. Leoner remembers
Speaker 1: the call from his commanding officer when it happened. How
Speaker 1: worried she'd been, but this was the first time she
Speaker 1: learned the accident had caused a TBI. Severe TBIs can
Speaker 1: cause changes in personality, out of character, even inappropriate behavior.
Speaker 1: Aiden told Leona that his brain injury was the root
Speaker 1: of all of his behavioral issues, but this wasn't who
Speaker 1: he really was.
Speaker 2: He wanted to get help. I took some time over
Speaker 2: the next few days to just leave me alone. I
Speaker 2: need to process all of this.
Speaker 1: Leona felt pressure to make her marriage with Aiden.
Speaker 2: Work.
Speaker 1: She had put all of her eggs into this basket.
Speaker 1: They had two young kids together, She didn't have her
Speaker 1: own source of income and was completely dependent on him financially.
Speaker 2: I'm really good at compartmentalizing things, and I was just
Speaker 2: grasping at every straw to like be okay.
Speaker 1: While Aiden finished his deployment, she weighed her options. I
Speaker 1: can't leave because this is my entire life. This is
Speaker 1: my one job to make this work, and I can't
Speaker 1: even do that. So I'm going to double down and
Speaker 1: do what I can. But when Aiden came home, nothing
Speaker 1: about their relationship with the same.
Speaker 2: I didn't want to be around him. I would sleep
Speaker 2: in a different room. It felt like living with a stranger.
Speaker 1: The only thing she could hold onto was the hope
Speaker 1: that Aiden's behavior really was stemming from a brain injury,
Speaker 1: that this was a medical issue beyond his control. So
Speaker 1: she asked Aiden to get a professional opinion.
Speaker 2: And so we start down this path of getting these diagnoses.
Speaker 1: Aiden went in for imaging and testing. When the results
Speaker 1: came back, they confirmed he had a traumatic brain injury
Speaker 1: and PTSD. Leona began doing research about the diagnosis, and
Speaker 1: some of the information she learned lined up with Aiden's explanation.
Speaker 1: TBIs can lead to impulsivity, disinhibition, even inappropriate sexual behavior.
Speaker 2: The day he got his brain injury diagnosis, I was like, okay,
Speaker 2: I can breathe. That's what this was. This It is
Speaker 2: just how the military has shaped him, and this is
Speaker 2: not his fault. I put all of my weight on
Speaker 2: that Eden.
Speaker 1: Was medically retired from the military. Leoda felt like she
Speaker 1: needed to be there for him. She'd made the vow
Speaker 1: in sickness and in health, and she clung to that,
Speaker 1: but deep down she knew their relationship was broken.
Speaker 2: I think in the underlying I was working on my
Speaker 2: way out. I was preparing myself.
Speaker 1: But while she was finding a way out, he starts
Speaker 1: acting just super bizarre again. He became incredibly possessive about
Speaker 1: his phone. When she asked him about it.
Speaker 2: I'm like, just tell me if you're cheating on me,
Speaker 2: and he looks at me dead in the eyes and
Speaker 2: he goes, yes, I'm cheating on you.
Speaker 1: The next chapter was tumultuous. Getting out of Aiden's grasp
Speaker 1: was not a straightforward path, as is often the case
Speaker 1: with abusive relationships.
Speaker 2: While you're going through this, you're just doing anything and
Speaker 2: everything to just survive, and you're just outside of your
Speaker 2: body the entire time.
Speaker 1: Leona feared leaving Aiden on his own with no one
Speaker 1: to care for him. With his TBI, he was an
Speaker 1: expert at playing the victim of seeming so terrified of
Speaker 1: his own behavior that somehow she ended up trying to
Speaker 1: protect him from himself. Leona would often sleep on the couch.
Speaker 1: Then one night, after Leona fell.
Speaker 2: Asleep, I woke up to him choking me, and I
Speaker 2: remember just like getting him off of me, and he
Speaker 2: gets down into the fetal position and starts crying, and
Speaker 2: he was like, oh my god, I was asleep. I'm
Speaker 2: so sorry.
Speaker 1: She looked at Aiden sobbing on the ground. In that moment,
Speaker 1: it became clear to her it didn't matter if he
Speaker 1: was sick or hurt.
Speaker 2: Either way, she.
Speaker 1: Was in danger.
Speaker 2: Would I want my children to stay in this situation.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 2: So after that she.
Speaker 1: Faced aident and she told him, I'm done with this.
Speaker 2: You are not going to treat me like this. I
Speaker 2: made the decision to leave, and I packed up all
Speaker 2: my stuff and my mom and my sister came to
Speaker 2: get me in the middle of the night and get
Speaker 2: the girls.
Speaker 1: When she was out of their house, the full weight
Speaker 1: of the situation caught up with her. She was twenty
Speaker 1: eight years old and had two young kids.
Speaker 2: I just went off the deep end, like I was
Speaker 2: just so distraught. I didn't sleep for fifty hours after that.
Speaker 2: I didn't know what was up and what was down.
Speaker 2: My life exploded in front of my face. What the
Speaker 2: hell do I do next?
Speaker 1: Leona decided to divorce aident.
Speaker 2: We did an uncontested divorce. I agreed to anything and
Speaker 2: everything to just get it done. Needed to just get
Speaker 2: out of it alive. I was just concerned that it
Speaker 2: was either going to be near him.
Speaker 1: Then she hired an attorney to fight for custody of
Speaker 1: her daughters.
Speaker 2: When I hired my attorney to hear her tell me
Speaker 2: that I was an abuse victim. This was the first
Speaker 2: time anyone had said that to me. I was just like,
Speaker 2: oh my god, this really was abuse. This was very
Speaker 2: serious what I went through, and I'm lucky to be alive.
Speaker 1: Aiden's abuse severely impacted Leona's mental health. She struggled with
Speaker 1: suicidality and it was a long road to regain stability.
Speaker 2: I just like had to pull up my bootstraps and
Speaker 2: be able to afford to take care of my children.
Speaker 1: Aiden's abuse extended beyond Leona.
Speaker 2: Her sister was very much a victim of his two
Speaker 2: I still struggle with that guilt to this day of like,
Speaker 2: I brought this person into our world that my family level.
Speaker 2: I brought this person into our life and he caused
Speaker 2: so much turbulence.
Speaker 1: Leona's sister endured abuse and harassment at the hands of Aiden,
Speaker 1: starting when she was a minor. His abuse has had
Speaker 1: lasting impacts on their relationship as sisters. Growing up, Leona
Speaker 1: and her sister were close, but now we.
Speaker 2: Have a very strained relationship. We've had conversations about it
Speaker 2: that have been very tearful. I would love for it
Speaker 2: to be resolved, and I know she would too. But
Speaker 2: we're just completely different because of this. You know, we
Speaker 2: were essentially abused by the same person.
Speaker 1: As far as Leona knows, Aiden really did have a TBI,
Speaker 1: but the incident that caused it happened after he had
Speaker 1: already started his online harassment, and he never mentioned the
Speaker 1: impact the TBI had on his behavior until he was caught.
Speaker 2: This betrayal is recent.
Speaker 1: As of today, Aiden has not been charged with any crimes.
Speaker 1: Their daughters live with Leona nearly full time, but Aiden
Speaker 1: still sees them some weekends. Leona is still fighting for
Speaker 1: full custody of her daughters, and she plans to tell
Speaker 1: the court the full story of Aidan's harassment and abuse.
Speaker 2: I will make sure my children are raised in a
Speaker 2: way that they will not be abused this way, but
Speaker 2: it's hard to do when they still have to have
Speaker 2: communication with their dad. I give them the pieces to
Speaker 2: be able to recognize when things are not right. I
Speaker 2: can't ever get away from it as much as I
Speaker 2: would like to, but now how I handle him is
Speaker 2: much different. She's slower to trust others. I really have
Speaker 2: trouble giving my full trust to anybody, having to remind
Speaker 2: myself that not every single person is out here to
Speaker 2: try to take advantage of me learning to trust yourself,
Speaker 2: as well as a completely different piece of this puzzle
Speaker 2: that I still haven't figured out.
Speaker 1: She has fought hard for her independence, instability. She savors
Speaker 1: the life she's built.
Speaker 2: I learned how to be grateful for the little things
Speaker 2: like curling up in bed next to my children while
Speaker 2: we're reading, the time that I spend with the people
Speaker 2: around me. Those moments hit way harder and I'm not
Speaker 2: just blasting through life trying to survive.
Speaker 1: We end every weekly episode with the same question, why
Speaker 1: do you want to share your story?
Speaker 2: Because this podcast changed the view that I had with
Speaker 2: what I was going through, and it finally got me
Speaker 2: to the point where I felt healed enough and came
Speaker 2: out the other end. It feels like a poison when
Speaker 2: you are not talking about it. The more you talk
Speaker 2: about it, the better it gets.
Speaker 1: On the next episode of Betrayal Weekly.
Speaker 3: I was trying, wailing, sobbing. I didn't think that he
Speaker 3: could take anything else from me, but I was wrong.
Speaker 3: That was the last thing that he could do to me.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to share your story on Betrayal, please
Speaker 1: email betrayalpod at gmail dot com. That is Betrayalpod at
Speaker 1: gmail dot com. Please note that we are not a
Speaker 1: mental health organization. If you are in crisis or currently
Speaker 1: experiencing domestic violence, we encourage you to seek local help
Speaker 1: or dial nine to one one. Please contact organizations that
Speaker 1: offer immediate support. In our show notes, we've included a
Speaker 1: list of US based resources. You can follow us on
Speaker 1: Instagram at Betrayal Pod or find me at It's Andrea Gunning.
Speaker 1: To access our newsletter and additional content, and to connect
Speaker 1: with the Betrayal community, join our substack at Betrayal dot
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Speaker 1: thank you to all of our listeners. Betrayal is a
Speaker 1: production of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group
Speaker 1: and partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show is executive produced
Speaker 1: by Nancy Glass and Jennifer Fason, hosted and produced by
Speaker 1: me Andrea Gunning, written and produced by Olivia Hewitt. Our
Speaker 1: story editor is Monique Lebord. Also produced by Ben Fetterman.
Speaker 1: Our associate producer is Leah Jablo. Production management by Kristin Melcurie,
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Speaker 1: Perry Andtreessica. Crimecheck Audio editing by Tanner Robbins with additional
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