Speaker 1: Hi everyone, it's Andrea. This week, we're doing something a
Speaker 1: little different. My producer Monique and I spent last week
Speaker 1: at sea with Virgin Voyages, where we produced Betrayal's first
Speaker 1: ever live show. Stacy, Tyler and Michaela from Betrayal Season
Speaker 1: three joined us, as well as Caroline and her kids
Speaker 1: from season four.
Speaker 2: If you listen to our show, you know that.
Speaker 1: Stacy's husband, Justin pled guilty to sexual abuse of a minor,
Speaker 1: including his abuse of his step son Tyler, and in
Speaker 1: season four, Caroline's husband Joel was caught having sex in.
Speaker 3: His police patrol car.
Speaker 1: He had carried on multiple affairs during their marriage, including
Speaker 1: some that happened while he was on duty. Together, we
Speaker 1: had an incredible conversation about Survivor Center true Crime and
Speaker 1: what it's like to have your real life turned into
Speaker 1: a true crime podcast. It's an emotional and in depth
Speaker 1: conversation about the kind of work we do and what
Speaker 1: it means to the people who are at the center it.
Speaker 3: We hope you enjoy.
Speaker 2: Hi everyone, I'm Andrea Gunning. I'm the host and producer
Speaker 2: of Betrayal.
Speaker 4: I'm Monique, I'm a producer on Betrayal. I'm going to
Speaker 4: be moderating tonight so that Andrea can really be in
Speaker 4: the conversation because she has poured her soul into this show,
Speaker 4: and she's also been a leader in the podcast industry
Speaker 4: bringing this show to TV, which we're on season three.
Speaker 4: A betrayal on Hulu.
Speaker 1: Just came out last month. When I started this show
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen, I didn't know if one person would listen,
Speaker 1: if two people would listen. I could have never imagined
Speaker 1: being on a cruise doing our first live show.
Speaker 2: I know, it's really crazy for those of you that
Speaker 2: don't know what Betrayal is.
Speaker 1: It's a project where we focus on families whose lives
Speaker 1: have been upended due to devastating betrayal, and we focus
Speaker 1: on the crime and the aftermath, but it's really a
Speaker 1: show about strength and resilience. Yeah, and so tonight we're
Speaker 1: going to focus on two families. The family from season three,
Speaker 1: which is Stacy Tyler and Mikaela's story, and the family
Speaker 1: from season four about Caroline Brega and her kids.
Speaker 4: For a lot of the survivors we're going to bring
Speaker 4: out tonight, this is their first ever time talking about
Speaker 4: their story to a live audience, and It's a little
Speaker 4: strange to be on stage clapping and cheering for some
Speaker 4: of the worst things that have ever happened to someone.
Speaker 4: It can kind of feel like that, you know, true
Speaker 4: crime cruise. But we're really here to celebrate the survivors
Speaker 4: and the bravery and courage of these families to tell
Speaker 4: their stories, and that's what we're celebrating.
Speaker 1: So, without further ado, let's all welcome Stacy, Tyler, and Mikayla.
Speaker 5: Hey, y'all, how you doing.
Speaker 6: How you feeling good? Good, amazing, A little nervous.
Speaker 4: You know, Stacy, the documentary came out a month ago.
Speaker 4: It seems like a lot of people here are already
Speaker 4: familiar with your story, are listeners of Betrayal.
Speaker 5: So I want to start with what it was like for.
Speaker 6: You to see your I see.
Speaker 4: Your emotional right now, what it was like to see
Speaker 4: your life played back on a true crime documentary.
Speaker 6: I don't think it was something that I ever thought
Speaker 6: would happen. It was just a little different seeing it.
Speaker 6: I know, me and Tyler have had conversations like it
Speaker 6: wasn't our story, Like we were like, oh, what's gonna
Speaker 6: happen next? Like we didn't know, But yeah, there were
Speaker 6: some moments that were tough. I think when they went
Speaker 6: back to the good times or the good times that
Speaker 6: we thought were they were a little hard. We were
Speaker 6: lucky to kind of sit through each other's interviews, so
Speaker 6: the things that we talked about were not new to
Speaker 6: us when the documentary come out because we got to
Speaker 6: sit and be a part of that with each other.
Speaker 6: So that was good. I think that helped us to
Speaker 6: kind of prepare for what was going to be on TV.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Tyler, what about for you? What was it like
Speaker 4: to see it all together watch it back?
Speaker 7: I mean kind of just like similar to what my
Speaker 7: mom said, a lot of just like ooh, this looks good,
Speaker 7: like it isn't our story. But really the biggest thing
Speaker 7: for me was just finally seeing it in person, and
Speaker 7: like knowing that people would see my face with me
Speaker 7: being so young and everything I'd been through. Is really
Speaker 7: big to me that I get my story out there
Speaker 7: and I show a lot of other young men that
Speaker 7: this is not so uncommon and a lot of other
Speaker 7: men go through these struggles. So it was a really
Speaker 7: good moment for me. I was really happy to see
Speaker 7: it in real time.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and you've already experienced people reaching out to you
Speaker 4: after the documentary.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean it's when it first came out, it
Speaker 7: was I couldn't even keep up with all the messages.
Speaker 7: I mean there was hundreds a day, and still what
Speaker 7: two months later? At this point, I probably get at
Speaker 7: least five to ten to day, which is still like
Speaker 7: pretty crazy. I've had businesses hit me with job offers
Speaker 7: to work at a gym as a personal trainer. I've
Speaker 7: had some pretty big celebrities hit me up to continue
Speaker 7: telling my story and do some pretty big things.
Speaker 5: So I'm excited for that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we're all so excited for you.
Speaker 6: I'm proud of you.
Speaker 4: I want to talk about updates since the documentary came out.
Speaker 7: Uh yeah, So my stepfather, who you all saw in
Speaker 7: this documentary, he is currently suing me for defamation. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 7: defamation made it all up. Yeah, suing me for defamation
Speaker 7: because everything I said was a lie. I wish I
Speaker 7: could show you all the papers. It's a bunch of bullshit.
Speaker 5: I'm gonna be real, I'm blunt.
Speaker 7: I'm not gonna hide who I am.
Speaker 8: Thank you guys.
Speaker 7: Yeah, but he he wants to sue me for coming
Speaker 7: out and talking. But I hope he knows. All that
Speaker 7: does is motivate me to keep coming.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Andrea, do you want to talk about that a
Speaker 4: little bit? About the defamation lawsuit and like the ways
Speaker 4: that we see those being used, I think to manipulate
Speaker 4: a lot of times storytellers and try to silence people
Speaker 4: from telling their stories survivors.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just think it was a scare tactic to
Speaker 1: try to keep Tyler from speaking.
Speaker 2: And you know, oftentimes.
Speaker 1: We see perpetrators try to control this story, and I
Speaker 1: think he was used to being in control for a
Speaker 1: really long time. And you know, you've got a great
Speaker 1: attorney and you're working on it.
Speaker 9: Yep.
Speaker 6: You know, his lawyer told me, you have to have
Speaker 6: character to say a defamation of character, and we've clearly
Speaker 6: proven that you don't have character. So you know, everybody's
Speaker 6: a jail house lawyer, so we knew this was going
Speaker 6: to happen. He's filing appeals as well, because he's throwing
Speaker 6: anything at the wall to make it stick and whatever.
Speaker 6: He's trying to appeal his sentence because it was too long. Boohoo.
Speaker 6: We know that this is something that we're probably going
Speaker 6: to have to deal with for the rest of our lives.
Speaker 6: Because that is his right, I've been told. But you know,
Speaker 6: in the end, he just constantly keeps bearing himself because
Speaker 6: the district attorney told me, the more appeals you file,
Speaker 6: the more it looks like you show no remorse. So
Speaker 6: she said, every time he does this, it's another nail
Speaker 6: in his coffin. So we fully intend that he's going
Speaker 6: to put himself there for his maximum sentence.
Speaker 4: We're going to bring your oldest daughter, Mikaela in in
Speaker 4: a second. But I want to talk about the family
Speaker 4: decision to participate in first the podcast and then the
Speaker 4: Hulu documentary.
Speaker 6: When they reached out to me about the podcast, I
Speaker 6: immediately talked to Mikaela and Tyler about it because it's
Speaker 6: not my story, it's all of our stories. I wasn't
Speaker 6: going to exploit my child by going out and speaking
Speaker 6: without his knowledge. So I told him, if we do this,
Speaker 6: we do it all together. And it was just something
Speaker 6: that we felt, I think that we needed to do
Speaker 6: for healing, and just we wanted to take something like
Speaker 6: this and turn it into something good, and we knew
Speaker 6: that that was the only way that we could do
Speaker 6: it was to just make for people more aware because
Speaker 6: I think when you first have this happen to you,
Speaker 6: you have so many people come up to you and say,
Speaker 6: oh my gosh, you know that that happened to me,
Speaker 6: or that happened to my brother or this, and you don't.
Speaker 6: You have no idea how many people you know that
Speaker 6: have dealt with the same thing. I think we have
Speaker 6: a lot of broken people in this world, and I
Speaker 6: think it's because a lot of people say silent about
Speaker 6: these things. So I think our hope was that we
Speaker 6: could reach a lot more hurting men and just change
Speaker 6: the world.
Speaker 7: Uh yeah, pretty much second that. But yeah, going into
Speaker 7: all this, it was just about I knew what I
Speaker 7: had been through, you know, searching the web looking things
Speaker 7: up as a child, going through all this, I genuinely
Speaker 7: thought I was the only boy in the world who
Speaker 7: knew what this was like. And I thought I was
Speaker 7: the only boy in the world who had went through
Speaker 7: something like this. And that was a big part of
Speaker 7: the reason why I never talked. I never I never
Speaker 7: did anything to make a change because I thought this
Speaker 7: was just my life, this is where I was stuck.
Speaker 7: No one would understand me. But as I've gone throughout
Speaker 7: this journey, I've shared my story talk to endless people.
Speaker 7: I've realized it's an epidemic. To be honest, it's crazy,
Speaker 7: the amount of men that I've realized to have went
Speaker 7: through the exact same things I have. They say it's
Speaker 7: one in six, but with all the people I've talked to,
Speaker 7: it's probably even higher than that. I wouldn't be surprised
Speaker 7: if it was more one in four one in three.
Speaker 7: You're not alone if you're a man who'd been through
Speaker 7: something like this. And when I was represented the opportunity
Speaker 7: to come through, do this, use my story to give
Speaker 7: other men what I didn't have. I couldn't pass it up.
Speaker 4: Andre, you've worked on the story now two years more almost,
Speaker 4: so you know a big part of production we spend
Speaker 4: hours and hours and hours and hours. A lot of
Speaker 4: those moments never make it to air. Especially with the
Speaker 4: Hulu documentary, you're filming a lot of things that never
Speaker 4: make it to air. So can you tell me about
Speaker 4: some of those moments?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, there was one scene that we shoed
Speaker 1: Tyler and that was my favorite scene to do.
Speaker 2: I hate even calling it a scene, but it was.
Speaker 2: And we were just like working out talking.
Speaker 1: About life and where you are now and I've known
Speaker 1: you for two years and you've grown so much, and
Speaker 1: I think one of the things that you were working
Speaker 1: on is learning to stop thinking about life in the
Speaker 1: conditional way, like if I do this, then I'll be happy.
Speaker 1: If I get here, I'll be happy. If this happens,
Speaker 1: I'll be okay. Because that's what happens when survivors of abuse,
Speaker 1: they go through that, because that exchange is conditional, it's transactional.
Speaker 2: And I feel like you've.
Speaker 1: Come such a long way to just be present and
Speaker 1: figure out who you want to be and do what
Speaker 1: you want to do. And we talked about that in
Speaker 1: the scene and that was like my favorite, and it
Speaker 1: didn't make it to air.
Speaker 2: I think, Michela, you have a scene too that you love.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I had a scene.
Speaker 10: Tyler made a comment to me about how he was
Speaker 10: very thankful that I was like the stronghold for our
Speaker 10: family and that he was very sorry that I was
Speaker 10: kind of put on the back burner, Like it was
Speaker 10: just very sweet, very emotional moment that I think a
Speaker 10: lot of people needed to see.
Speaker 5: And that got cut too.
Speaker 6: Mikayla's kind of I don't want to say his silent victim,
Speaker 6: but I think that you know, all of the focus
Speaker 6: was really on like Tyler and his healing and what
Speaker 6: happened to him, And it was a really good moment
Speaker 6: for us to say to you that, you know, we
Speaker 6: were sorry that you kind of got faded into the
Speaker 6: background a little bit, because that's was never anyone's intention,
Speaker 6: you know, So it was it was a sweet moment
Speaker 6: between everybody, and we were really sad when the documentary
Speaker 6: came out. We were like, man, that was such a
Speaker 6: good moment.
Speaker 4: Yeah, like your mom was saying, you know, you're part
Speaker 4: of the story. Can sometimes get overshadowed, but if it
Speaker 4: was not for you, we might not be sitting here.
Speaker 4: So can you tell me a little bit about reporting
Speaker 4: to the police what that experience was for you.
Speaker 10: Yeah, So, for those of you that didn't listen, Tyler's friend,
Speaker 10: who is I guess we'll call him, for lack of
Speaker 10: better terms, the first victim. He reached out to me
Speaker 10: and disclosed to me that my stepdad had done this
Speaker 10: to him, and like full disclosure. I was driving and
Speaker 10: I opened the message and immediately started like bawling, and
Speaker 10: of course, like forty million things are going through my head,
Speaker 10: one thing being this is why you don't text and drive.
Speaker 1: But.
Speaker 10: I mean, so I pulled over, had like a two
Speaker 10: minute cry, and then I was.
Speaker 2: Like work mode.
Speaker 10: At the time, I worked at an outpatient psychiatry office,
Speaker 10: so I was like a mandated reporter, and so I
Speaker 10: immediately went to work mode and was like, Okay, these
Speaker 10: are the steps I need to do, and I'm going
Speaker 10: to do them. I do not care that he is
Speaker 10: my stepdad. I don't care who the fuck he is.
Speaker 10: And now the scary part, I guess for me was
Speaker 10: that this was different. At work, I just make a report,
Speaker 10: but here he was already under investigation for the cameras,
Speaker 10: and so I was like, okay, I feel like I
Speaker 10: need to talk to a detective or something like.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 10: It was just like something in my brain didn't care
Speaker 10: that he was a father figure to me. It was like,
Speaker 10: let's get this done, let's do the right thing.
Speaker 4: And then that next few hours moved really quickly.
Speaker 10: Yeah, So I drove about an hour and a half
Speaker 10: or so to the police station, and then when I
Speaker 10: got there, I gave them my phone. They took all
Speaker 10: the evidence off of it, all the messages with his friend,
Speaker 10: and then they were like, oh, well, while you're here,
Speaker 10: let's go through this binder. And they opened it and
Speaker 10: it was photos of friends, family, anything you can think of.
Speaker 10: In the bathroom, they had me identify everybody, and then
Speaker 10: they whipped out another binder, and that binder was all me.
Speaker 6: I saw my husband on some.
Speaker 10: Photos, and then.
Speaker 5: After that I left.
Speaker 6: I called mom immediately.
Speaker 10: She's like, I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm
Speaker 10: leaving work.
Speaker 6: I'm grabbing my kids and we're going. And I was like, well,
Speaker 6: I have.
Speaker 10: A tiny, little one bedroom apartment, but you could stay
Speaker 10: with me. Poor Tommy he didn't even know any of
Speaker 10: this because it was like so fast everything's happening that
Speaker 10: I didn't get time to tell him until he was
Speaker 10: already off work. And I was like, hey, by the way,
Speaker 10: mom and the kids are coming to our tiny little guys,
Speaker 10: right like our tiny little nine hundred square foot one
Speaker 10: bedroom apartment. I worked from home for a few days,
Speaker 10: try to help mom with the kids, try.
Speaker 2: To figure life out.
Speaker 4: And then Tyler came forward, Yeah, we're going to talk
Speaker 4: more about that time period and kind of like survival
Speaker 4: mode and how that gets represented in true crime stories.
Speaker 4: But I also want to talk about your position as
Speaker 4: the eldest daughter.
Speaker 5: And Tyler's big sister.
Speaker 4: Can you tell me from your perspective what it's been
Speaker 4: like to watch Tyler's journey of coming forward and then
Speaker 4: getting to the place where he is today.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Absolutely.
Speaker 10: Just watching him help other people is something that I
Speaker 10: can't even explain to anybody, what kind of feeling that
Speaker 10: is inside as somebody who was his caretaker for a
Speaker 10: long time.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, well thank you.
Speaker 4: What about for you, Stacy, watching Tyler go on this
Speaker 4: journey over the past few years with the show, what
Speaker 4: has that been like for you as a mom?
Speaker 6: I don't think anybody can never understand what betrayal did
Speaker 6: for us. You know, we had a lot of people
Speaker 6: say things like, you know, gosh, why would you want
Speaker 6: to share that? Or why do you want to go
Speaker 6: national with that? And this and that? And I had
Speaker 6: those moments, especially when people can be very cruel online
Speaker 6: and judge. But I think seeing him grow and also
Speaker 6: just seeing the men that have came behind him and said,
Speaker 6: you know, I'm fifty some years old and I've never
Speaker 6: told anybody this in my life. There are people that
Speaker 6: are free because of you, And I'm incredibly proud to
Speaker 6: be your mother, and I don't care what anybody says.
Speaker 6: And I don't care. You know, if someone thinks I
Speaker 6: did something wrong, I think I did things wrong. If
Speaker 6: I was watching my documentary, I would have been like
Speaker 6: m girl. I would have talked about myself. It's true.
Speaker 6: You know, when you're in those kind of moments, you
Speaker 6: know you're just coming from a place of just sheer chaos.
Speaker 6: But I'm just incredibly proud to be your mom.
Speaker 7: Well, thank you guys.
Speaker 6: He still don't take the trash out enough, though, we
Speaker 6: could work on that.
Speaker 5: She's lying.
Speaker 2: Welcome back.
Speaker 1: We took a short break to bring out Caroline Barrega
Speaker 1: from season four, along with her two kids. Her daughter
Speaker 1: Nicole was on stage and her son participated from the
Speaker 1: audience to protect his anonymity.
Speaker 6: Thank you all so much for being here.
Speaker 5: Thank you for having us.
Speaker 4: Caroline, you know I want to hear a little bit
Speaker 4: in your words about what you went through.
Speaker 5: It was an infamous Monday afternoon.
Speaker 11: I was at work and I opened my laptop and
Speaker 11: I was in an online meeting, and I saw my
Speaker 11: phone go off. There was a chime, and I saw
Speaker 11: that there were cameras around our house, and that there
Speaker 11: was some movement, and as I looked at it, I
Speaker 11: noticed that my now ex husband was dragging up the
Speaker 11: trash cans, and I thought to myself, Oh, that's strange
Speaker 11: what he's doing home so early. Maybe he was out
Speaker 11: on an investigation or something happened and he just ran
Speaker 11: by to grab some lunch. And I continue to watch,
Speaker 11: and then it dawned on me, where's his take home
Speaker 11: cop car? The take home cop car wasn't in the driveway,
Speaker 11: and so I texted him and I said, hey, is
Speaker 11: everything okay? And he didn't respond, and hey, is everything okay?
Speaker 11: I noticed that you're home really early, and I just
Speaker 11: continued to watch the little dots the three ellipses on
Speaker 11: my phone bounce, and finally he respond and he said, no,
Speaker 11: everything's not okay.
Speaker 5: I fucked up the worst I've ever fucked up in
Speaker 5: my life.
Speaker 11: You're going to want to divorce me. And I was scared,
Speaker 11: and I thought, you know what happened, And so after
Speaker 11: several attempts, he finally answered the phone, and he was
Speaker 11: very stoic about it and just let me know what
Speaker 11: he did. And I was able to maintain my composure.
Speaker 11: I gently closed my laptop and then I walked out
Speaker 11: and I made it to a street corner before I
Speaker 11: just completely lost it and I said, what have you done?
Speaker 11: And he just emphasized repeatedly, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Caroline.
Speaker 11: You have to tell the kids. Reporters are going to
Speaker 11: start calling the house. You have to tell the kids.
Speaker 11: And I didn't know what to do.
Speaker 5: I drove home.
Speaker 11: I don't remember driving home, and when I got to
Speaker 11: the house, I was just kind of pacing. And Nicole
Speaker 11: came home and she was very jovial, her typical self,
Speaker 11: and she said, Hey, who doing my job for me?
Speaker 11: Who brought the trash up today? I mean, it's ironic,
Speaker 11: the stuff you remember in times of trauma. And I
Speaker 11: just sat there staring at her, and she said, are
Speaker 11: you okay?
Speaker 5: And I said no, and she said, is daddy okay.
Speaker 5: I didn't even know how to respond, and I just
Speaker 5: said no.
Speaker 11: And she got kind of this shock, because when you're
Speaker 11: a cops kid, you live in fear that something happens
Speaker 11: to your dad.
Speaker 5: And the next.
Speaker 11: Words out of her mouth were, did he get caught
Speaker 11: cheating on you? And I just stared at her. And
Speaker 11: for those of you who have listened to the podcast.
Speaker 11: I can assure you my son graduated with honors from
Speaker 11: a very prestigious university. But she did call him because
Speaker 11: we didn't have the rule book or a handbook on
Speaker 11: how you handle when a disclosure.
Speaker 5: Like this happens.
Speaker 11: And she said, hey, I got to talk to you.
Speaker 5: It's an emergency.
Speaker 11: And he said, hey, I'm getting ready to take a
Speaker 11: chem exam and she's like, no, it's an emergency. So again,
Speaker 11: I can assure you he did pass. Everything is fine.
Speaker 11: Next thing you know, our life was just a whirlwind
Speaker 11: and a snowball, and I went into autopilot and trying
Speaker 11: to make sure that I could have some form of
Speaker 11: normalcy and just get by.
Speaker 12: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I want to talk a little bit about your
Speaker 4: husband's career as a police officer, and you, specifically as
Speaker 4: his partner for twenty five years, sacrifice so much personally
Speaker 4: to give him those advancements in his career, those late
Speaker 4: nights that you were taking care of the house and
Speaker 4: the kids, and a big part of your value system
Speaker 4: was believing in what he did and the institution he
Speaker 4: worked for, and that changed for you overnight. So can
Speaker 4: you talk a little bit about what that experience was
Speaker 4: like and where you're at with that today.
Speaker 5: Absolutely.
Speaker 11: My ex husband was a very decorated service member for
Speaker 11: the community, and we had a room in our home
Speaker 11: our office that were filled with just community and commanders commendations.
Speaker 11: He joked and called it the love Me Room because
Speaker 11: everything in there was all about him, and I showed
Speaker 11: all the love from the community of him. I knew
Speaker 11: when I married a cop what I was getting into.
Speaker 11: I'm not an anomaly of someone who marries into a
Speaker 11: law enforcement family. I made a sacrifice of knowing that
Speaker 11: I was going to have to be with the kids
Speaker 11: alone at night, and I would be the person who
Speaker 11: would be aerating the field when I'm walking across to
Speaker 11: take them to practice and to dance class, and that
Speaker 11: it would be something that would be busy. And I
Speaker 11: didn't sacrifice everything for me. I too have a career
Speaker 11: and do use my brain and my degrees. But I
Speaker 11: knew that I would be the person who would be
Speaker 11: able to have more flexibility to be there for our family,
Speaker 11: and would also be the person who would be able
Speaker 11: to support him in his career as well.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know your.
Speaker 4: Career is something that your job has asked you not
Speaker 4: to talk about Otherwise We would love to have featured
Speaker 4: it in the podcast and have it be a part
Speaker 4: of who you are on the show, but we understand
Speaker 4: and we wanted to keep your job.
Speaker 5: So thank you. I really appreciate that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Dre, can you talk a little bit about Caroline's
Speaker 4: story and why it stood out to you as with
Speaker 4: the season you wanted to produce next.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it started off as a potential story
Speaker 1: for the weekly series, So you were actually working with
Speaker 1: Caroline directly, which is a little bit different.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And we were just talking about it in a
Speaker 2: production meeting.
Speaker 1: And there was research we had to do and we
Speaker 1: had to you know, find these ia.
Speaker 5: Files on Joel Internal Affairs.
Speaker 1: Thank you, and we finally got them back and there
Speaker 1: was so much there and we said to each other,
Speaker 1: this can't just be a weekly We need to do
Speaker 1: ten episodes on this story.
Speaker 4: It's very rare working in media to get internal affarious
Speaker 4: investigations audio files from police investigations, and so we said,
Speaker 4: you know, this is something that we need to follow.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so that was the beginning of everything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you had already had a relationship with Mo and
Speaker 1: I'm like, hi, you know, and you know, we get
Speaker 1: this question a lot, like why this story, and I
Speaker 1: oftentimes especially from law enforcement, like I've seen so much.
Speaker 1: This isn't the worst case ever. You know, it's important
Speaker 1: for Betrayal to focus on stories that really feel like
Speaker 1: the every day, that feel like it could be your
Speaker 1: neighbor or your friend, because it feels accessible and then
Speaker 1: we can understand it. And that's why I thought your
Speaker 1: story was important to share.
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely, so I want to talk to you, Nicole Hi. Hi.
Speaker 4: You're the one who originally found Betrayal, so in a
Speaker 4: lot of ways, you're another reason we're here on stage.
Speaker 5: Yes, you're welcome.
Speaker 4: What has it been like for you to watch your
Speaker 4: mom over the past three years, you know, since your
Speaker 4: dad's actions came to light, but also this past year
Speaker 4: in particular producing the podcast.
Speaker 9: She's always been such a like independent and powerful woman.
Speaker 9: So seeing her go through the twenty twenty two year,
Speaker 9: which was you know, infamous year, that was of course
Speaker 9: really hard because she just wasn't herself. But ever since
Speaker 9: we kind of got our footing as a new family,
Speaker 9: a family as three, she's really grown and to someone
Speaker 9: that people go to, whether that's women that have experienced
Speaker 9: cheating and whatever else, or even women in our own
Speaker 9: police department where this happened come to her as like
Speaker 9: a source of comfort and be a person that people
Speaker 9: can lean on.
Speaker 4: Carolyn, Before I want to ask some questions to both
Speaker 4: of your kids. But before we do, I want to
Speaker 4: talk a little bit more about the institutional betrayal of
Speaker 4: the police department, because that was also a place where
Speaker 4: you put a lot of time and energy in and
Speaker 4: I think expected some support back. Institutional betrayal is a
Speaker 4: term we recently learned from this research psychologist doctor Jennifer
Speaker 4: Fried and it's a different experience than the interpersonal betrayal
Speaker 4: you had with your ex husband, And I want to
Speaker 4: talk a little bit about how that felt different, what
Speaker 4: that felt like.
Speaker 11: Sure, it's a phenomena when you're in a lawnforcement family.
Speaker 11: And I can say without making a big disclosure, I
Speaker 11: work in a very closely law enforcement related field, and
Speaker 11: when you're a part of a law enforcement family, law
Speaker 11: enforcement tends to hang out with law enforcement. These were
Speaker 11: people who were at the births of my kids. They
Speaker 11: showed up shortly thereafter with gifts. We did family functions together,
Speaker 11: we celebrated together. There was law enforcement lined up In
Speaker 11: our wedding party, my ex husband's groom's cake was a
Speaker 11: pig with a badge on it. So this was our
Speaker 11: life and it was a big piece of it. And
Speaker 11: I can tell you that you become fiercely protective of
Speaker 11: each other. And I had this big belief that, yes,
Speaker 11: there are bad apples and every organization, but they're few
Speaker 11: and far between. I would chant that to myself. I
Speaker 11: was extremely protective over other law enforcement families, and you
Speaker 11: just become this big unit together. And as my ex
Speaker 11: husband's double life began to unravel, I lost all that.
Speaker 11: So I didn't just lose my nuclear family, I lost
Speaker 11: my extended family within the law enforcement community.
Speaker 5: And it was just vanished.
Speaker 11: My facade of what I had tried to raise my
Speaker 11: kids to believe about law enforcement and trusting law enforcement,
Speaker 11: what I believed about it completely vanished. So it was
Speaker 11: just not grief of my nuclear family, it was grief
Speaker 11: of my community.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, like Andrea said, we first started working together,
Speaker 4: and I remember in the beginning, about a year and
Speaker 4: a half ago, before we did our very first interview,
Speaker 4: you were understandably very cautious about participating in this. So
Speaker 4: can you tell me a little bit about what you
Speaker 4: were weighing when you were deciding do I want to
Speaker 4: tell this story publicly.
Speaker 11: It's not the most comfortable feeling to reveal the most
Speaker 11: private details of your life life, and I was really
Speaker 11: struggling with how I wanted to approach this. I was
Speaker 11: living in this silence and this constant internal thought of,
Speaker 11: oh my gosh, how did this happen to me?
Speaker 5: How did this happen?
Speaker 11: And I think that's really why the podcast drew me
Speaker 11: in so much. There's an episode in season one where
Speaker 11: it's the very first time I ever heard the term
Speaker 11: betrayal trauma, betrayal therapy, and I am not too proud
Speaker 11: to admit it. I listened to that episode at least
Speaker 11: a dozen times. I just resonated with me so much,
Speaker 11: and it was just really, really difficult to really imagine
Speaker 11: putting myself out there. It was scary because I didn't
Speaker 11: want to have this define my kids. It certainly has
Speaker 11: shaped them, but it certainly does not define them whatsoever.
Speaker 11: And I work in a law enforcement related community, so
Speaker 11: this was really difficult for me to in essence call
Speaker 11: out some of my colleagues.
Speaker 5: And put that on blast.
Speaker 11: But you know, I remember those conversations very very well,
Speaker 11: and I would love to go back and tell myself,
Speaker 11: oh my god, suck it up, Buttercup, put your head up,
Speaker 11: throw your shoulders back, and be the damn voice for
Speaker 11: women who are living in terror and shame to discuss this.
Speaker 4: Hell yeah wow. I'm going to pivot to Caroline's son
Speaker 4: in the audience and have you too, talk as her children.
Speaker 4: I mean, you know you have said that this was
Speaker 4: a family decision, and I remember when you were weighing
Speaker 4: if you wanted to do this. A big part of
Speaker 4: it was I got to talk to my kids. I
Speaker 4: got to make sure my kids are okay with this.
Speaker 4: So I want to hear about what those conversations were
Speaker 4: like with y'all as a family, about are we on
Speaker 4: board with this, are we going to participate? Are we
Speaker 4: going to support our mom in this?
Speaker 6: What was that like for y'all? Nicole, do you want
Speaker 6: to start?
Speaker 5: Yeah? So, when my mom.
Speaker 9: First came to us discussing the possibility of us doing
Speaker 9: the podcast and going forward with everything, I of course
Speaker 9: wanted my mom's narrative out there, our family's narrative out there,
Speaker 9: because we were so silent. People just assumed or they
Speaker 9: just flat out told lies about our family, and of
Speaker 9: course my dad's presence in my town didn't help with that.
Speaker 9: So that was the main reason why I wanted to
Speaker 9: do this, or we wanted to do this as a
Speaker 9: family unit, to just put our voice out there and
Speaker 9: say we're solidified in our new sense of reality and
Speaker 9: this is how we're going to move forward. And even
Speaker 9: though all of this happened, we came out on the
Speaker 9: other side stronger.
Speaker 8: I think it boils down to two main reasons. I
Speaker 8: think seeing the effect that the podcast had on both
Speaker 8: with my mom and my sister and the value that
Speaker 8: they got from it, I think that was huge. And
Speaker 8: I also think that it takes courage to platform these stories,
Speaker 8: and it.
Speaker 6: Takes courage to tell these stories, and I.
Speaker 8: Think people need to hear them and the messages that
Speaker 8: we receive on a daily basis of people saying what
Speaker 8: we said listening to the podcast initially, you know this
Speaker 8: could be us, and so I think it's important to
Speaker 8: let people know that you can go through these unfortunate circumstances,
Speaker 8: to say the least, and make it out on the
Speaker 8: other side.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I think that Caroline Son, the way that
Speaker 4: we have navigated your privacy and your participation in this show,
Speaker 4: you know, shows that there are different ways that you
Speaker 4: can incorporate different members of the family that have different
Speaker 4: comfort levels with their exposure. So can you talk a
Speaker 4: little bit about why it was important for you to
Speaker 4: be a voice on the show and participate actively.
Speaker 8: Well, you have these prominent community members and law enforcement
Speaker 8: and other related fields just saying blatant lies about my
Speaker 8: entire family, and obviously that didn't sit right with any
Speaker 8: of us. And so it's not about getting the truth
Speaker 8: where it's not about getting our truth out there. It's
Speaker 8: literally just the truth out to the community. And that
Speaker 8: was a part of it. And I think also just
Speaker 8: this experience brought us closer together. And I think that
Speaker 8: having a unified front, and I'm appreciative of the accommodations
Speaker 8: to my privacy requests and all that, but being a
Speaker 8: unified front was huge and I'm honored to be a
Speaker 8: part of it, and I'm proud of them.
Speaker 1: I think what people often forget is, aside from the affairs,
Speaker 1: what Joel was doing was planting seeds about who you
Speaker 1: were as a person, as a wife, as a mother.
Speaker 2: Behind the scenes, so if he.
Speaker 1: Ever did get caught by a colleague, they would say, well,
Speaker 1: could you blame him? Like he was creating a story
Speaker 1: about you and you know, putting your reputation.
Speaker 2: On the line.
Speaker 1: So it was so much more than just the sexual
Speaker 1: misconduct within the CESPD. It was how he was using
Speaker 1: you and your image and what you've done for your
Speaker 1: family against you so that he could just get away
Speaker 1: with it. And that's I think really important because when
Speaker 1: we started working together, You're like, I want my truth
Speaker 1: to be told because he took that away from you.
Speaker 4: You really did, you know, truth and transparency has become
Speaker 4: a theme of the family that y'all have rebuilt with
Speaker 4: the three of you, And so I want to talk
Speaker 4: about what that looks like when you have two adult
Speaker 4: children and you're saying, now we're pivoting new family and
Speaker 4: we're going to reconvene and make new values. So what
Speaker 4: does it mean to have truth and transparency be such
Speaker 4: a big value in your family. I think I'm going
Speaker 4: to let my kids take that one.
Speaker 9: Well, going off of this like new family, everything happened
Speaker 9: in April, and then after that we recognize that little
Speaker 9: things in our family we just kind of let slide.
Speaker 9: As I'm sure many other families can relate, like certain
Speaker 9: fights that we had, or behaviors.
Speaker 5: Or whatever else we just didn't want to bring up.
Speaker 2: And so moving.
Speaker 9: Forward with my mom, my brother, and myself, we realize
Speaker 9: that we just want to be our authentic selves, and
Speaker 9: to do that comes truth and accountability and recognizing each
Speaker 9: other's paths and really just being each other's advocates.
Speaker 8: And we had to go through this process of healing together,
Speaker 8: and it's a nonlinear process. It doesn't get better every
Speaker 8: single day. There's good days and bad days. We still
Speaker 8: have good days and bad days. We're still healing. But
Speaker 8: I think it's the understanding of we're in it together
Speaker 8: and we're gonna go through this together for the rest
Speaker 8: of our time here. And I think that was important too.
Speaker 8: And part of that after facing so many lies and
Speaker 8: such profound deception and having that all come to light,
Speaker 8: obviously truth and transparency has to be a bedrock of
Speaker 8: a new foundation after you face that.
Speaker 11: The other piece that I had to face was the
Speaker 11: fact that certain things I tried to not say, and
Speaker 11: at one point, this one here looked at me and said,
Speaker 11: do not lie to me anymore. He lied to us enough,
Speaker 11: and it's our turn to be able to make choices
Speaker 11: on if we're going to show up to something or
Speaker 11: do something.
Speaker 5: Do not lie to me like he did. So I said,
Speaker 5: you have my word from here on out, no more.
Speaker 4: Andrea, I want to talk a little bit about institutional courage,
Speaker 4: which we as a production team encountered this term this year,
Speaker 4: and we've seen it in both of these families.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, family is an institution and it takes
Speaker 1: courage to lead with truth and transparency to make sure
Speaker 1: these things don't happen in the future. And so I
Speaker 1: think by you guys sharing and knowing what was actually
Speaker 1: happening so you can make your own choices, that takes
Speaker 1: institutional courage. And you know, obviously there's the CSPD of
Speaker 1: it all. There are a lot of people inside CSPD
Speaker 1: that has known what Joel has been doing for a
Speaker 1: really long time, but we're too afraid to speak out
Speaker 1: because they didn't want to throw a name out there
Speaker 1: and have backlash. So I mean, it takes courage to
Speaker 1: come forward. But what's happening and what we researched at
Speaker 1: CSPD is that's not happening, And so Hopefully by bringing
Speaker 1: awareness of what's going on with the misconduct, someone will
Speaker 1: do the right thing.
Speaker 2: Welcome back.
Speaker 1: We're sharing the audio from our first ever Betrayal live show.
Speaker 1: We're talking with Stacy Tyler and Mikaela from Betrayal season
Speaker 1: three and Caroline Borega with her two kids from season four.
Speaker 1: One of our Betrayal Pretty there is. Monique moderated the event,
Speaker 1: so I'll throw it back to her.
Speaker 4: All right, So I want to transition to talking as
Speaker 4: a big group, and I want to start just by
Speaker 4: talking about what it's like to be in person together.
Speaker 4: This was a little experiment that we were asked to
Speaker 4: participate in and we didn't know how it would go.
Speaker 6: So what has it been like?
Speaker 4: You know, you've had very different experiences, but you've also
Speaker 4: had a core similarity.
Speaker 11: I can tell you that after the first episode aired,
Speaker 11: I received an email from one of the producers who said, Hey,
Speaker 11: Stacy wants to talk to you, and she's asking if
Speaker 11: we can share your information.
Speaker 5: Is that okay?
Speaker 11: And I said sure and fast friends and sisterhood in
Speaker 11: this camaraderie in this crazy ass way, and it was
Speaker 11: like trial by fire and she was like.
Speaker 5: Don't do x Y and Z don't read X Y
Speaker 5: and Z do.
Speaker 11: She did, and it's been I felt like I knew
Speaker 11: her before we even stepped on the ship. It's been
Speaker 11: incredible and I'm very grateful for you.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I feel the same way. We you know, we've
Speaker 6: had a bond that I think will always you know,
Speaker 6: will always have I'm sure Ya Ashley and Jen and
Speaker 6: all of them feel the same way. There's a lot
Speaker 6: of these get this shit text message, you know, and
Speaker 6: you can't make this up, like you know, especially with
Speaker 6: a lawsuit.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 6: I was like, oh my god, girl, get this. But yeah,
Speaker 6: it's been it's been incredible and we've we've made some
Speaker 6: really great, great memories on this trip and just really
Speaker 6: incredible people.
Speaker 4: What's it been like for you, Drey to see everyone
Speaker 4: come together and also meet listeners.
Speaker 1: I think it was you who mentioned we should do
Speaker 1: it like a retreat or like a girls weekend, and
Speaker 1: I was like, hell yeah. But then this came about
Speaker 1: like a few weeks later, so maybe this is a
Speaker 1: trial run.
Speaker 2: And it's actually really great because you.
Speaker 1: Understand betrayal, you understand deception and how that can really
Speaker 1: fundamentally change your sense of reality and make you question
Speaker 1: yourself and the decisions that you made, especially in moments
Speaker 1: of survival and just trying to get through the next day,
Speaker 1: like I just need to wake up, get my clothes on,
Speaker 1: and get out the door, and those little things you
Speaker 1: guys can relate to on a very specific level.
Speaker 2: And so I knew you guys would hit it off.
Speaker 1: This has been such a joy, and I think it's
Speaker 1: just a testament to our community and it growing.
Speaker 6: It was either going to be this or we were
Speaker 6: going to crash Andrea's wedding. I was like, I don't
Speaker 6: know if you know, but I'm coming, even if I
Speaker 6: got to sit in a little table outside just peek in.
Speaker 6: She was like, oh no, we're having a whole betrayal table.
Speaker 4: I want to talk about the experience of actually living
Speaker 4: through what y'all have been through versus the product.
Speaker 6: That we see at the end.
Speaker 4: You know, what is it in total five hours of
Speaker 4: audio or three hours of video that is so different
Speaker 4: from what you actually lived through. And so I want
Speaker 4: to open it up to y'all to talk about what
Speaker 4: was a surprise to you and what was difficult to
Speaker 4: see or maybe really rewarding to see, but a little
Speaker 4: bit more about what it was like to see the
Speaker 4: things you had really gone through turned into a true
Speaker 4: crime podcast, a true crime docu series.
Speaker 6: I think I could.
Speaker 10: Start with that it actually wasn't too bad, because I
Speaker 10: have to be honest, nothing beats actually living through it,
Speaker 10: so it's almost like you're a little desensitized. But I
Speaker 10: think the hardest part for me was the recreation of
Speaker 10: the scene where Tyler tried to kill himself. He had
Speaker 10: called me at the time and I was two and
Speaker 10: a half hours away, and so like watching the re enactment,
Speaker 10: which I am well aware was dramatized and there was actors,
Speaker 10: but like just feeling that again that I could have
Speaker 10: lost him, that really messed with me for a little bit.
Speaker 6: I think for us it was it was an incredibly
Speaker 6: healing experience that I don't think we realized was going
Speaker 6: to be what it was even when we watched it
Speaker 6: or listened to the week's episode, because like I said,
Speaker 6: it's almost like you're listening to someone else's story even
Speaker 6: though it is yours. And we would just sit down
Speaker 6: afterwards and we'd be like, that is crazy. These questions
Speaker 6: that they think of that just would get you thinking
Speaker 6: of things and then we would go on these almost
Speaker 6: therapy sessions, you know, our car rides home, because we
Speaker 6: went up to Pennsylvania to film, it's about a three
Speaker 6: hour drive. These three hour car rides we would spend
Speaker 6: having like our own little therapy session, you know. So
Speaker 6: for us, you know, we're incredibly thankful to you, because
Speaker 6: I think healing started with betrayals. So you know, you
Speaker 6: may not have thought that it was going to do anything,
Speaker 6: or one people or two people was going to listen
Speaker 6: to it, but I can tell you that it's been
Speaker 6: instrumental in all of our healing. Completely, I don't know it.
Speaker 6: You know you probably feel the same way.
Speaker 5: Absolutely.
Speaker 4: Has participating in Betrayal in this production changed the way
Speaker 4: you think about true crime content, Like when you go
Speaker 4: to consume a podcast, watch a podcast, and watch a podcast,
Speaker 4: listen to a podcast, or watch something. Has it changed
Speaker 4: the way you approach that and think about it.
Speaker 5: I know, for me, it definitely has.
Speaker 10: I grew up watching Dateline twenty twenty true crime. Mom's
Speaker 10: been joking all weekend or well however many days we
Speaker 10: are now in, but she's been joking this whole time,
Speaker 10: Like you know, oh, kids, watch Barney Michaela's watching Dayline.
Speaker 6: She wanted to be Keith Morrison. Baby don't.
Speaker 10: Yeah. So, you know, growing up as a teen early
Speaker 10: twenties all that, you know, I watch these true crime
Speaker 10: documentaries and I'm like, oh, come the fuck on, like
Speaker 10: you knew, like, don't get out of here, and I
Speaker 10: would judge. And now I wouldn't go to social media
Speaker 10: and talk about it, but I would think that. And
Speaker 10: then as this started to unravel, I was like, oh
Speaker 10: my god, people are thinking that about me. And so
Speaker 10: now when I watch true crime documentaries or listen to
Speaker 10: podcasts like I have, my mindset is so different because
Speaker 10: in reality, you guys only get, you know, this tiny
Speaker 10: little sliver of what happened.
Speaker 5: And on top of.
Speaker 10: That, like you're getting all the information, you know, detectives, policemen, judges,
Speaker 10: you know, the whole family.
Speaker 5: Like everybody's giving stories.
Speaker 6: But we didn't have.
Speaker 10: That, you know, we were day by day figuring it out.
Speaker 10: And so now like when I watch these shows, I
Speaker 10: have to remember, like they probably didn't know, they didn't
Speaker 10: have all this ready made, you know, little Kraft mac
Speaker 10: and cheese cup ready for them. You know, they had
Speaker 10: to go out and make the noodles, and so I
Speaker 10: think it's just really changed so much of like how
Speaker 10: I view other true crime docuseries.
Speaker 1: One of the questions I get a lot, were there
Speaker 1: really any red flags any?
Speaker 2: Huge part about our project is really.
Speaker 1: Explaining that there often are none, because perpetrators like Justin
Speaker 1: Joel really good at hiding who they really are. And
Speaker 1: so I think when audiences watch true crime and they
Speaker 1: have those thoughts, Mikaela, I think it's a form of
Speaker 1: safety of like I would see that if it happened
Speaker 1: to me, and.
Speaker 2: That's often not the case.
Speaker 1: And that's why we are so open about like not
Speaker 1: knowing because you didn't and why would you even think
Speaker 1: that your husband could do what he did? Why would
Speaker 1: your brain go there? So that's a huge part about betrayal.
Speaker 6: Ashley put it really good in hers and it became
Speaker 6: so clear to me when she said it. She said,
Speaker 6: you know, it's like this puzzle and you have all
Speaker 6: these pieces and in twenty fifteen you might have got
Speaker 6: this red flag that in twenty seventeen you might have
Speaker 6: got this, and when you're taking it over a course
Speaker 6: of the you know, Justin and I were together seven years.
Speaker 6: I don't think you didn't think back to something like, oh,
Speaker 6: let me put together with that red flag, you know,
Speaker 6: let me start collecting the flags. You know when when
Speaker 6: you get to the end, then you're like, oh, and
Speaker 6: then the puzzle it becomes it becomes clear, it becomes
Speaker 6: a puzzle. But you know, in this moment you have
Speaker 6: a blue piece and a red piece and a yellow
Speaker 6: piece and nothing matches. And then they start to make
Speaker 6: you think that you're crazy for feeling this way. And
Speaker 6: I know, for me, justin would you know, do things
Speaker 6: to me like if there was something I was bothered by,
Speaker 6: you know, by him, it would just be like, well,
Speaker 6: you know, if that's the kind of husband you think
Speaker 6: I am, maybe we should get divorced. And for anyone
Speaker 6: who knew me personally, being a wife was something I
Speaker 6: took pride in. I took pride in being a good wife.
Speaker 6: I loved being a good wife. And when he would
Speaker 6: say those things to me, instantly I would kind of
Speaker 6: crawl inside myself and think, think, you are a terrible,
Speaker 6: terrible wife. How can you think this about this man
Speaker 6: who's great to your kids, provided a good home to you,
Speaker 6: gave you this life. And so he would take that
Speaker 6: and manipulate it. So there's so much more than just oh,
Speaker 6: well you know you missed red flags. Well yeah, there's
Speaker 6: red flags now now that you've told me. I mean, like,
Speaker 6: you know, I look at photos now that when I
Speaker 6: took them, I was just like, oh, these are such
Speaker 6: sweet moments, and they make me sick now because I
Speaker 6: see them in a different way. It was that was
Speaker 6: probably one of the hardest things for the documentary was
Speaker 6: to see the photos of him and Tyler hugged up
Speaker 6: together that I used to think, we're sweet moments of
Speaker 6: just a man loving my kids, you know, like a
Speaker 6: father should to now realizing how disgusting they were. So
Speaker 6: it's you know, you have to give a little bit
Speaker 6: of grace. I think I'm saying way with Mikayla as
Speaker 6: now you know, I've read my mouth I don't know
Speaker 6: how many times, and now if I'm watching TV, you know,
Speaker 6: a documentary, and I'm like and then I like sit back,
Speaker 6: and I'm like, wait a minute. You know, I don't
Speaker 6: know her story. I don't know his story, you know.
Speaker 6: So I think we I think we got to give
Speaker 6: people a little bit of grace and realize that in
Speaker 6: these moments when you're trying to navigate. You know, there's,
Speaker 6: like you Caroline said, there's a part of my story
Speaker 6: no one knows as well that I wasn't really allowed
Speaker 6: to share, and I don't give a shit about sharing
Speaker 6: right now is I was also sued civilly by the
Speaker 6: boys parents who found the camera. So while this was
Speaker 6: all going on, you know, civil attorney, criminal attorney, divorce attorney.
Speaker 6: I lost my home, you know, And you're literally just
Speaker 6: going from one thing to another every day of trying
Speaker 6: to put out fires and make sure that your children
Speaker 6: are still eating and not just only bop tarts, you know.
Speaker 6: I mean it's the truth. You just cannot You make
Speaker 6: the best decision you can at the moment. And did
Speaker 6: I Did I screw up? Yeah?
Speaker 11: I can tell you that first year was autopilot, just
Speaker 11: absolute autopilot. I just wanted to get by. I am
Speaker 11: at you know, anyone who's posted anything on Reddit or
Speaker 11: anything else. You can't beat me up anymore than I
Speaker 11: beat up myself. I have questioned myself. I question everything
Speaker 11: about every decision I ever made. You know, there's an
Speaker 11: episode called it's essentially the split screen episode Revisionist History,
Speaker 11: and you hear my entire twenty five year relationship with
Speaker 11: my ex husband in the span of thirty eight minutes.
Speaker 11: And I tell you every single thing now in those
Speaker 11: thirty eight minutes that now I have a concern about
Speaker 11: and I question all the time. And I did that
Speaker 11: for that first year, and you don't really know. It's
Speaker 11: like the analogy of the frog in the pot. You
Speaker 11: don't know that it's boiling until you're out, and I
Speaker 11: can see that it's boiling now that I'm out.
Speaker 4: I want to talk a little bit more about survival
Speaker 4: mode with you, Dre, because that's something we talk about
Speaker 4: all the time, and to trying to understand and tell
Speaker 4: these kind of stories, we often have to tell the
Speaker 4: story of that. We have to tell that story of
Speaker 4: the survival mode year and all the choices that were
Speaker 4: made in that year. But it is so difficult to
Speaker 4: convey that experience that you all had. We can't make
Speaker 4: a year long podcast, we can't really be in your head.
Speaker 4: But can you talk about like the survival brain, the
Speaker 4: logic brain, and the ways that we try to make
Speaker 4: content that helps people understand that survival mode.
Speaker 1: I think one of the first questions I asked you, Stacy,
Speaker 1: when I came to visit you, was like when you
Speaker 1: would wake up in the morning after everything happened, Like
Speaker 1: what was your first thought? Because when something horrible happens
Speaker 1: and your life is falling apart, just opening your eyes
Speaker 1: and realizing, no, I'm actually here, this is actually happening,
Speaker 1: this is my real life, and I now have to
Speaker 1: get up and face the day. And so that's I
Speaker 1: remember talking to you about that, and I think it
Speaker 1: is important to give people grace and know that when
Speaker 1: this happens, they are literally just trying to get through
Speaker 1: their day and make a ton of decisions legally financially,
Speaker 1: groceries on the table, like it is really hard. And
Speaker 1: then with space and if you work at it and
Speaker 1: you see a psychologist and you have your community and
Speaker 1: your family, you can slowly transition into the analytical brain
Speaker 1: and really sit with what happened, think through how it's
Speaker 1: occurring for you. And we just want to show our
Speaker 1: audience that those are two different experiences and that the
Speaker 1: majority of these individuals are living in survival mode for
Speaker 1: a year two years, you know, and then with time
Speaker 1: and healing you can look back and really start to process.
Speaker 2: But those are two different states of mind.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah. I mean you you wake up and it's just,
Speaker 6: you know, life doesn't stop, your bills don't stop, your
Speaker 6: work doesn't stop, you know, so you're navigating all this
Speaker 6: stuff while still having to make sound rational decisions, and
Speaker 6: you open your eyes and you're like Jesus another you know,
Speaker 6: like it's another day, and all you do is try
Speaker 6: to get through to get to bed that night. You know,
Speaker 6: I just if I can make it to bed, if
Speaker 6: I can just make it to you know, where I
Speaker 6: can go to sleep, I'll just go to sleep and
Speaker 6: I'll wake up and it'll be different tomorrow. And then
Speaker 6: you wake up and it's another day, and it's just yeah,
Speaker 6: it's just but it's a vicious cycle. And living in
Speaker 6: that survivor moment, you know, you don't make the greatest
Speaker 6: of decisions. I mean, you just can't. You can't. You
Speaker 6: do the best you can with what you have at
Speaker 6: the moment.
Speaker 4: I think that's one thing that makes the online comments
Speaker 4: feel so unfair and so hard for us. We have
Speaker 4: to track them as part of our job, as though
Speaker 4: we're attracting the comments we get, and some of them
Speaker 4: are so personal and so vitriolic, and I think obviously
Speaker 4: it says more about the commenter than any of y'all.
Speaker 4: So you know, I'm curious how you handle that, because
Speaker 4: I think that would make me short circuit.
Speaker 6: At this point, we make it a joke.
Speaker 10: But like somebody at one point made a comment at
Speaker 10: one like on I don't know, TikTok or something and
Speaker 10: said like, oh, that sister of his, she's just so
Speaker 10: conceited and you know, she thinks like she's the shit.
Speaker 10: And I was like, well, first, you know, yeah, I'm confident,
Speaker 10: but secondly like, okay, you know, not trying to sound ridiculous,
Speaker 10: but if I was so conceited and you know, didn't
Speaker 10: care about my brother, he wouldn't have gotten no whole
Speaker 10: arm tattoo for me.
Speaker 5: So good for you that you thought that.
Speaker 6: What sit each other messages? I'll be like, how you
Speaker 6: doing today? You can seated bitch?
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 10: So you know, now it's like we just turn them
Speaker 10: into jokes and it's just a way to, you know,
Speaker 10: just laugh about it, because you know, hurt people hurt people, and.
Speaker 5: It's nothing we can do.
Speaker 10: I can't help them, but instead we can just laugh
Speaker 10: about it. And I know, Tyler and I even made
Speaker 10: a whole TikTok video addressing a lot of the questions
Speaker 10: and mean comments that we were getting, specifically about our mom,
Speaker 10: and I think that helped a lot clear up a
Speaker 10: lot of things.
Speaker 7: Really, about ninety five percent of the comments so on
Speaker 7: like the stuff I make, are pretty positive, and then
Speaker 7: there's like the five percent like troll. But to be honest,
Speaker 7: about eighty five ninety percent of the time that troll
Speaker 7: has about third grade grammar or or you can tell
Speaker 7: they didn't finish the show because they don't know shit
Speaker 7: about what's going on and they're just saying whatever. So
Speaker 7: I just kind of ignore the trolls. If it's something
Speaker 7: that bad, I'll delete the comment, like if it's on
Speaker 7: my own stuff, just because I don't want like other
Speaker 7: survivors to see that them to be discouraged. But me
Speaker 7: and myself, I just tell them, you know, you can
Speaker 7: go fuck yourself.
Speaker 3: That's me.
Speaker 8: I don't care.
Speaker 6: Yeah, we we have a lot of I don't know
Speaker 6: if y'all notice, we have a lot of dark humor.
Speaker 6: Humor is what carried us through a lot of this.
Speaker 6: Some people are uncomfortable with that. But the comments on
Speaker 6: the podcast really really got me, and I decided when
Speaker 6: the documentary was gonna come out, that if I had
Speaker 6: to be the martyr you know, in this, and if
Speaker 6: people had to hate me for his story to get
Speaker 6: out and for his healing to come, that I was
Speaker 6: okay taking that, and that I really didn't give a
Speaker 6: shit because I know my truth and you know, we
Speaker 6: have an incredible really relationship. You know. I know Caroline
Speaker 6: got a lot of shit about, you know, telling her children.
Speaker 6: I think it was out, you know, noble, that you
Speaker 6: made it a point not to lie to your children.
Speaker 6: We have to be honest with our children. We have
Speaker 6: to tell our children things that hard things. I know,
Speaker 6: I questioned myself a lot, did I tell did I
Speaker 6: talk about hard things with my children when they were little?
Speaker 6: Of you know that people can do these kinds of
Speaker 6: things to you. So I was incredibly proud of you
Speaker 6: for telling your children and being truthful. I know I
Speaker 6: had a lot of people with my littles that was
Speaker 6: just like just telling me died. I'm like, I wish
Speaker 6: he would die. I wish that was the truth, but
Speaker 6: it's not the truth. And I'm not gonna lie to them.
Speaker 6: You know, I tell them in little bits, but you know,
Speaker 6: so I mean going back to the comments. But you know,
Speaker 6: at the end of the day, Yeah, you just have
Speaker 6: to you just kind of have to separate that. But
Speaker 6: our way of dealing with that is joking, and we're
Speaker 6: we could be pretty nasty, like like tellers. So we're like,
Speaker 6: they're probably in their mom's basement in a bean bag,
Speaker 6: charity and Cheetos. You know, like we just have to
Speaker 6: you just have to do it. It is what it is.
Speaker 11: Yeah, I didn't listen to their advice, and uh, you
Speaker 11: know some of the things that were said. It is
Speaker 11: just very evident that there's a lot of people who
Speaker 11: clearly have read a manual that I haven't. I mean,
Speaker 11: whatever the title of that book is that says, Hey,
Speaker 11: when your high ranking police officer husband blows up your
Speaker 11: lives and reporters are getting ready to come to your door,
Speaker 11: and then he moves out to the family RV, loses
Speaker 11: his job and relocates, here's what you should do. Is
Speaker 11: that noble that carries that Amazon Prime. So I didn't
Speaker 11: have that, and I, you know, how to make decisions
Speaker 11: quickly financially, personally, emotionally. I had to make decisions as
Speaker 11: a parent, and I was doing the best I could
Speaker 11: with it. I didn't have a three and four year old,
Speaker 11: so this wasn't like I could somehow make a story
Speaker 11: up and you know, discuss it like the Toothpaerrier Santa
Speaker 11: about why Dad didn't live with us anymore he was
Speaker 11: no longer a police officer, and that we were preparing
Speaker 11: for reporters to show up at the door. I didn't
Speaker 11: have the ability to be able to make something up
Speaker 11: and lie to them or tell a story or dance
Speaker 11: around it. I had to be very direct, very very
Speaker 11: very direct, and that's something that was difficult.
Speaker 5: It was hard.
Speaker 11: It wasn't easy for me by any stretch of the means.
Speaker 11: And it wasn't easy to have these really blunt discussions
Speaker 11: with my kids. And I will tell you on a
Speaker 11: different note, you know, we do cope with dark humor.
Speaker 11: We were my son and I were golfing not too
Speaker 11: long ago before we came on the cruise and he
Speaker 11: just he hit this ball of country mile and it.
Speaker 6: Just was gone.
Speaker 5: And he was like, yep, that ball left me like
Speaker 5: my dad.
Speaker 11: So I mean, we say sideway stuff all the time,
Speaker 11: and that's how we cope with it. And that's really
Speaker 11: dark for a lot of people and hard for people
Speaker 11: to hear, but it's what we did. And you know,
Speaker 11: there are a lot of things that occurred in our
Speaker 11: lives where it was so hard to have these tough
Speaker 11: discussions with them, but we had to have the discussions
Speaker 11: in order for us to get through. And having them
Speaker 11: both say, do not lie to me. If something's going on, Preparius,
Speaker 11: do not lie to me.
Speaker 6: It was hard.
Speaker 11: It wasn't easy. It was not It was not something
Speaker 11: that I would wish on anyone. So, you know, for
Speaker 11: those of you or anyone who you know who does
Speaker 11: have that manual, tell them I'm proud of them and
Speaker 11: I'm so grateful that they're able to navigate it a
Speaker 11: lot better than I did.
Speaker 5: I did the best I could.
Speaker 11: And the other thing I'll say about it is that
Speaker 11: there in some of the comments, people were like, I
Speaker 11: am horrified, you know that she had this discussion with
Speaker 11: her kids. I'm horrified I had to have the discussion
Speaker 11: with my kids.
Speaker 6: Absolutely, let's be horrified at the people who did the crime.
Speaker 9: Yep.
Speaker 6: I want to know, let's be horrified exactly.
Speaker 11: And I do want to say that that you know,
Speaker 11: Stacy's saying that. I do want to say The part
Speaker 11: that makes me so sad about some of those comments
Speaker 11: and some of the feedback that I've received from women
Speaker 11: who have thanked me for us telling our stories, is
Speaker 11: that it's comments like those that keep people silent. Yeah,
Speaker 11: so you are a part of the problem and you
Speaker 11: are damning the solution.
Speaker 4: Wo.
Speaker 5: I like that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, what advice would y'all give to someone who was
Speaker 4: considering becoming the subject of a true crime podcast?
Speaker 11: Don't read the comments, I would have to say, don't
Speaker 11: be afraid.
Speaker 10: As I started seeing messages that Tyler was getting and
Speaker 10: I was getting, and Mom was getting, and the betrayal
Speaker 10: podcasts were getting, you know, I'm like, Wow, if we
Speaker 10: all would have lived in fear, these people may not
Speaker 10: have ever had that and may not have ever come forward, Ford,
Speaker 10: may not have ever said their peace. And that's really sad.
Speaker 10: And so don't be afraid. Tell your story. Scream it
Speaker 10: from the mountaintops. You know, it's better to do it
Speaker 10: that way instead of living fear.
Speaker 7: People might say stuff online, but like I said, that's
Speaker 7: like the very odd select few I can tell you,
Speaker 7: not a damn person face to face has made fun
Speaker 7: of me for what has happened to me. And I
Speaker 7: don't think anybody has the balls too, because they know
Speaker 7: that's not right. So really, I don't think that's something
Speaker 7: you have to worry about.
Speaker 1: Let's take another quick break and we'll come back to
Speaker 1: finish the conversation.
Speaker 4: We wanted to take some audience questions. Are there any
Speaker 4: audience questions? We have a few that have been brought in.
Speaker 6: Oh, have one, yes, So.
Speaker 12: This is more for Carolyn. I listened to the whole
Speaker 12: podcast and CSPD is probably the second biggest betrayal. How
Speaker 12: can they get away with it? And it's not just Joel,
Speaker 12: it's the other people in the department, and they came
Speaker 12: forward with it and they still I mean, how it
Speaker 12: got to the point where he was able to retire
Speaker 12: even now? How do you even get past that?
Speaker 11: I wish I had a solid answer for that, and
Speaker 11: I looked over at Andrea when I when you were
Speaker 11: asking that question. There's so much more to the story
Speaker 11: that you would just fall out if you knew.
Speaker 5: I can tell you.
Speaker 11: One of the scariest things on the internal Affairs tapes
Speaker 11: without broaching legal.
Speaker 5: Concern is that a very very high.
Speaker 11: Ranking female in the police department actually turned my ex
Speaker 11: husband in for sexual harassment and nothing was done.
Speaker 5: It's sickening to hear. It's really really sad.
Speaker 12: We can move to any place we want in the country.
Speaker 12: That's one place we would never move to.
Speaker 5: It is beautiful, though.
Speaker 13: Hi, I have a question for Stacy, how has your
Speaker 13: definition of trust changed?
Speaker 6: I trust very few. I work on that a lot.
Speaker 6: I know that I have a really filthy mouth. I
Speaker 6: call myself a spicy Christian. I love Jesus, but a
Speaker 6: cuss and it's the truth. It's something that I think
Speaker 6: I have had to pray about because I don't trust people.
Speaker 6: And it's really hard for me because I am such
Speaker 6: a trust I was such a trusting person. But you know,
Speaker 6: when people tell me things, most of the time, I'm like,
Speaker 6: you're lying or you know. I always kind of think,
Speaker 6: like what next, you know, I analyze kind of what
Speaker 6: people say and stuff. It's hard. It's hard to ever
Speaker 6: trust somebody again. I mean, you lay next to somebody
Speaker 6: for seven years that you think you know, and you
Speaker 6: roll over one day and they're completely someone that you
Speaker 6: had no idea, you know. So it's hard. I think
Speaker 6: someday there'll be somebody that'll come along, maybe, you know,
Speaker 6: I pray for money instead of a husband. These days,
Speaker 6: I really would just rather have money, so I'm going cruises.
Speaker 6: But yeah, you know, it's a daily task to work on.
Speaker 1: HI.
Speaker 13: First of all, I want to say thank you for
Speaker 13: coming out here and sharing your story. It's very, very courageous.
Speaker 13: But I want us to ask the siblings, So, being
Speaker 13: so young and naive to how evil people can be,
Speaker 13: have you ever been guilt tripped for cutting your father
Speaker 13: off or no longer speaking to your father?
Speaker 6: Has anybody ever said.
Speaker 5: Oh, give them a second chance to your father, et.
Speaker 8: Cetera, et cetera, only in the comments of Spotify.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I think I like what people don't realize is
Speaker 9: like our dad was a funny human being and we
Speaker 9: liked being around him. So when it first all happened,
Speaker 9: like my brother and I were calling him up and
Speaker 9: asking all these sorts of questions, and then it came
Speaker 9: to the point where like he didn't come to my
Speaker 9: high school graduation, and he didn't come to this and
Speaker 9: that and this. So I was like, if he wasn't
Speaker 9: going to come to the big events, he's not going
Speaker 9: to come to the daily events.
Speaker 6: And so then it's like, why worth trying?
Speaker 9: HI?
Speaker 6: This is for Stacy.
Speaker 14: This is not really a question, it's more of a comment.
Speaker 14: I just want to tell you that I think you
Speaker 14: were a leacing mother. My mom did not believe me,
Speaker 14: and when I watched the episode, I was screaming at
Speaker 14: the TV because I was like.
Speaker 6: Yes, Mama, yes you go.
Speaker 14: So I just want to tell you, thank you, thank
Speaker 14: you for.
Speaker 6: Being thank you for that, thank you for that. I
Speaker 6: appreciate that. Yeah, I can't imagine not believing my children.
Speaker 6: I mean, people gave me shit online like what took
Speaker 6: her so long to leave? I was like, shit, it
Speaker 6: happened on a Saturday. I filed for doors on Tuesday, like,
Speaker 6: with no proof. No, the abuse had not even come out.
Speaker 6: He had not even come forward yet, and I was
Speaker 6: just like, that's some whack ass shit. That's not happening
Speaker 6: in my house. We can file for divorce. It was
Speaker 6: three days that I was just like I was willing
Speaker 6: to give everything up. And it was never about the money.
Speaker 6: It was never about the nice house we lived in.
Speaker 6: I didn't give a crap if you worked at sheets. Yeah,
Speaker 6: you know. It was three days before I was just like,
Speaker 6: you know, I'm believing what I'm being shown, right, now
Speaker 6: you know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, our time is over, and I wish we
Speaker 4: could stay talking in front of this group because it
Speaker 4: feels really, really wonderful to be here and to have
Speaker 4: this out in the public.
Speaker 6: It feels really special.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you guys for coming.
Speaker 1: This show means so much to everyone here on stage
Speaker 1: and it's been a joy.
Speaker 2: So thank you so much for coming.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Thank you guys.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I to good.
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening.
Speaker 1: A special thank you to the listeners who came with
Speaker 1: us on the cruise.
Speaker 2: Meeting all of you is such a delight.
Speaker 1: Thank you to iHeart and Virgin Voyages, and as always,
Speaker 1: thank you to our storytellers.
Speaker 2: On the next episode of Betrayal Weekly, this was.
Speaker 15: My best friend. This was somebody who was in my
Speaker 15: house every single day. This is somebody who I told
Speaker 15: all my secrets to. She did this because she wanted to.
Speaker 15: She did this because.
Speaker 6: She likes to manipulate.
Speaker 15: She did this because she likes the control.
Speaker 1: If you would like to reach out to the Betrayal
Speaker 1: Ta or want to tell us your betrayal story, email
Speaker 1: us at Betrayalpod at gmail dot com. That's Betrayal Pod
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com, or follow us on Instagram at
Speaker 1: Betrayal Pod. You can also connect with me on Instagram
Speaker 1: at It's Andrea Gunning. To access our newsletter, view additional content,
Speaker 1: and connect with the Betrayal community. Join our substack at
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Speaker 1: One way to show support is by subscribing to our
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Speaker 1: big thank you to all of our listeners. Betrayal is
Speaker 1: a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment
Speaker 1: Group and partnership.
Speaker 2: With iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 1: The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Jennifer Fasin,
Speaker 1: hosted and produced by Me Andrea Gunning, written and produced
Speaker 1: by Monique Leboard, also produced by Ben Fetterman. Associate producers
Speaker 1: are Caitlin Golden, Olivia Hewes, and Kristin Melcury. Casting support
Speaker 1: from Curry Richmond. Our iHeart team is Ali Perry and
Speaker 1: Jessica Krincheck.
Speaker 2: Audio editing and mixing by Matt del Vechio. Additional audio
Speaker 2: editing by Tanner Robbins.
Speaker 1: Betrayal's theme composed by Oliver Baines Music Library provided by
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