Speaker 1: Welcome to the piked In Massacre, a production of iHeartRadio
Speaker 1: and Katie Studios.
Speaker 2: It's been one year since eight members of the Rodent
Speaker 2: family were found murdered in Pike County.
Speaker 3: Now, surviving members of the family have released a lead
Speaker 3: for information.
Speaker 1: A year after eight members of the Rodent family were
Speaker 1: ruthlessly gunned down in their homes, Ohio authorities are on
Speaker 1: a relentless search for the killers.
Speaker 3: Over eight hundred tips have been called into police.
Speaker 4: We may commit much of the people of Bike County.
Speaker 2: That day, I said, we're not leaving until we solved this.
Speaker 1: Many different facets of law enforcement collaborated to crack the case.
Speaker 2: The people that carried it out were trying to do
Speaker 2: everything they could to make sure that they didn't get caught.
Speaker 1: Law enforcement officials begin tracking down a series of leads
Speaker 1: that point them to another group of potential suspects, the Wagoners.
Speaker 4: The Wagoner shop and local walmarts for ammunition, magazine, cliffs,
Speaker 4: and materials to build brass catchers.
Speaker 1: According to the case indictment, the Wagoners begin conducting what
Speaker 1: seems to be almost like reconnaissance on the Rodents.
Speaker 4: What do you mean a camera was? There was it
Speaker 4: connected to something I still do this day wonder why
Speaker 4: she mentioned that and why that conversation wasn't allowed to
Speaker 4: go any further.
Speaker 1: The revelations leave those closest to the family questioning their innocence.
Speaker 5: I know he was upset, but was he upset because
Speaker 5: she has been murdered?
Speaker 6: Or when he upset.
Speaker 5: Because he's done it?
Speaker 1: This is the piked in Massacre Episode six, the investigation.
Speaker 1: In this episode, we're going to dive into law enforcement's
Speaker 1: investigation into the Rodent murders, how the Wagners allegedly pulled
Speaker 1: off this gruesome massacre, and why. I'm Courtney Armstrong and
Speaker 1: I work at Kat's Studios with Stephanie Leidecker and Jeff Shane.
Speaker 1: We produced a documentary about the case for NBC Universal's
Speaker 1: Oxygen Network in twenty nineteen and have been following the
Speaker 1: evolution of the investigation since then. To understand the crime
Speaker 1: and the possible motivation of the family that may have
Speaker 1: committed it, we want to look at the months leading
Speaker 1: up to the murders and authorities movements after. By any
Speaker 1: objective standard, it was a long, arduous investigation spanning two
Speaker 1: full years. During that time, many different facets of law enforcement.
Speaker 1: The FBI, the DEA, the Pike County Sheriff's Office, and
Speaker 1: the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation all collaborated to crack
Speaker 1: the case.
Speaker 2: Police received over eleven hundred tips, They conducted over five
Speaker 2: hundred interviews, tested about seven hundred pieces of evidence, served
Speaker 2: close to two hundred search warrants, subpoenas and other things.
Speaker 2: So this was something that was huge.
Speaker 1: That's Mike Allen, a defense attorney, former Ohio County prosecutor,
Speaker 1: and legal analyst for Cincinnati news station Fox nineteen.
Speaker 2: The Attorney General the Wine at the time said it
Speaker 2: was a pretty sophisticated operation in the people that carried
Speaker 2: it out. We're trying to do everything they could to
Speaker 2: make sure that they didn't get caught. Attorney General Wine
Speaker 2: and Sheriff Reader, they both said that the investigation was
Speaker 2: going to be a long one and a lengthy process,
Speaker 2: and boy, sure has played out that way.
Speaker 1: But how exactly did investigators circle in on the Wagners
Speaker 1: as suspects and eventually compile enough evidence to make arrests.
Speaker 1: In previous episodes, we discussed some of the conflicts between
Speaker 1: the Wagners and the Rodents In twenty sixteen, there was
Speaker 1: a custody battle between Jake Wagner and Hannah Rodin and
Speaker 1: a physical altercation between Billy Wagner and Chris Roden Senior.
Speaker 1: It seemed like the relationship between the two families was
Speaker 1: reaching a fever pitch in the months leading up to
Speaker 1: the murders, But these two families didn't always have such
Speaker 1: ill will towards one another. Here's journalist Jeff Winkler.
Speaker 7: I think early on people wanted to paint the sort
Speaker 7: of few between the Rodents and Wagners as something like
Speaker 7: the Hatfields of McCoy's, just because it was sort of
Speaker 7: Hills of Appalachia backwoods kind of thing.
Speaker 8: But I mean, it really wasn't.
Speaker 3: Like it, right, Like people like to say that Hatfield
Speaker 3: and McCoy's. But I think they were probably closer and
Speaker 3: friendlier than that version of it, right, yeah.
Speaker 8: They I mean the fact that they were family, mars
Speaker 8: just split in their time between the two houses, the
Speaker 8: fact that you know, the Wagners had been in the
Speaker 8: area for a long time as well, just as the
Speaker 8: Rodents had.
Speaker 7: It's just you had two families who were intertwined by
Speaker 7: both blood and work.
Speaker 1: We got some more intimate observations from Deray. She's Billy
Speaker 1: Wagner's cousin and Frederica Wagner's niece. Deray spoke to Jeff
Speaker 1: about how she saw the relationship between her family and
Speaker 1: the Rodents.
Speaker 3: Do you know anything about Billy and Chris Roden Senior?
Speaker 9: My aunt said that they were very good friends, and
Speaker 9: of course he was the grandfather of Sophia, and so
Speaker 9: was Billy. Billy is Sophia's grandfather.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's like they're in loss.
Speaker 4: They're related.
Speaker 9: I mean, their two grandfathers of the same little girl.
Speaker 9: She's adorable.
Speaker 3: Did Angela and Dani and I get along in the
Speaker 3: same way?
Speaker 5: Do you know?
Speaker 9: It looked to me like they were clearly getting along.
Speaker 9: And she never said anything bad about the Rodents. She
Speaker 9: never spoke one negative thing about it, just about the
Speaker 9: children about you know, they went fishing and they were
Speaker 9: over at fredericaz and you know, small talk.
Speaker 3: Right, like normal talk you'd have with another mom about
Speaker 3: raising kids.
Speaker 9: Right exactly, and it's just like that's all it is.
Speaker 9: It's just family talk.
Speaker 1: We of course know that Hannah and Jake Wagner had
Speaker 1: an intense relationship, but through the ups and downs. Most
Speaker 1: would say they were in love and their relationship brought
Speaker 1: the two families together. Here's producer Stephanie. When we started
Speaker 1: doing our research, I personally became a bit obsessed with
Speaker 1: better understanding the intersection between these two families and really
Speaker 1: struggle with the motivation. What could possibly cause one family,
Speaker 1: the Wagoners, to allegedly murder eight people that they knew
Speaker 1: so well they knew them intimately. In fact, we came
Speaker 1: across a photograph taken in twenty twelve at George Wagner,
Speaker 1: the eldest son's wedding, and the Rodins and the Wagners
Speaker 1: are both in this photo seemingly so happy. The only
Speaker 1: person not there is Dana Rodin, and she said to
Speaker 1: maybe be taking the photo because she later posted it
Speaker 1: on her MySpace page. But it's mind blowing. The people
Speaker 1: in the photo do not look like killers posing with
Speaker 1: there would be victims, but sure enough, in four years,
Speaker 1: the majority of the people in this picture would be
Speaker 1: dead and the others would be standing trial for their deaths.
Speaker 1: Throughout this series, we've been talking to a relative of
Speaker 1: the Wagners who's chosen to remain anonymous. She spoke to
Speaker 1: Jeff about her family's reaction in the wake of the
Speaker 1: Rodent murders.
Speaker 3: What was the feeling like in the family after that happened.
Speaker 5: Angela was upset because it was the mother of her granddaughter.
Speaker 5: She was just really sad, you know, that that had happened.
Speaker 6: When I talked to Jake and I was telling it.
Speaker 5: I'm so sorry, you know, like, if there's anything I
Speaker 5: can do, please tell me. And Angela she did ask
Speaker 5: me at one point, probably about a month after the
Speaker 5: murders had happened, if I could come down and pick
Speaker 5: up Sothia and Jake and take Sophia to a friend's
Speaker 5: house and stuff. So I did, and in that time,
Speaker 5: you know, me and.
Speaker 6: Jake and Sabilla in the car, and he was an
Speaker 6: absolute wrecked rank And of course I did not know.
Speaker 6: I didn't know how to react. I didn't know what
Speaker 6: to ask him. I didn't know what to say.
Speaker 5: I was kind of just letting him just have his moment.
Speaker 6: And he was absolutely devastated. I mean, he couldn't talk,
Speaker 6: he couldn't breathe, he.
Speaker 5: Was out of the page attack in my car, and
Speaker 5: I'm like, oh my gosh, you know, I don't know
Speaker 5: what to say. So of course when I find out
Speaker 5: that they were the ones that's done this, I keep
Speaker 5: thinking back to that time and you know, in the car,
Speaker 5: and I'm like, oh my gosh, Like, I.
Speaker 6: Know he was upset, but was he upset for you know,
Speaker 6: the right reason? Like, yeah, was he upset because.
Speaker 5: She had been murdered? Or on the upset because you
Speaker 5: know he's done it and he knew. I don't know.
Speaker 5: It was just an awful, eerie feeling.
Speaker 6: It really truly.
Speaker 4: Was Pike County Massacre.
Speaker 8: It's the title of what has happened out here, the
Speaker 8: tragedy that we've been covering.
Speaker 7: The victims ranged in age from sixteen to forty four.
Speaker 2: Each were shot anywhere from once to nine times. It's just,
Speaker 2: you know, a grisly scene in a gristly situation.
Speaker 1: Let's rewind to summer twenty fourteen. Hannah and Jake's daughter,
Speaker 1: Sophia is eight months old. Here's producer Stephanie.
Speaker 10: This is why this case is so complicated, because just
Speaker 10: when I think the Wagners could be innocent, I read
Speaker 10: something like this. Around this time, according to the case indictment,
Speaker 10: the Wagners began conducting what seems to almost be like
Speaker 10: reconnaissance on the Rodent family. Over the course of the
Speaker 10: next two years, they allegedly began hacking into the Rodent's
Speaker 10: personal computers, their phones, even their social media accounts. They
Speaker 10: even reportedly use surveillance cameras to spy on the Rodents.
Speaker 10: But why would they do that, especially according to most accounts,
Speaker 10: Jake and Hannah were very much still dating and very
Speaker 10: much in love at this time, So why would they
Speaker 10: be spying? Was Angela Wagner the mom obsessed with her
Speaker 10: youngest son, Jake Wagner's relationship with Hannah Rodin. Where the
Speaker 10: dads Chris Roden or Billy Wagner Senior embroiled in something big,
Speaker 10: where the Wagner is simply trying to get familiar with
Speaker 10: the family patterns and better understand the Rodent property, why
Speaker 10: would they possibly be spying.
Speaker 1: Here's investigative reporter Jodi Barr. He's talking about a conversation
Speaker 1: he had with Kendra Rodin, the daughter of one of
Speaker 1: the victims, Kenneth Roden.
Speaker 4: Kendra Roadin brought up with me in our discussions, she
Speaker 4: mentioned a few times that there were cameras set up
Speaker 4: around Chris Senior's home.
Speaker 3: Wow, so Kendra Rodin actually saw cameras on the property
Speaker 3: that now it seems as if allegedly the Wagoners had
Speaker 3: put there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, she told me that at Christian Year's home, that
Speaker 4: there was a camera on that property. And she said
Speaker 4: it was in sort of a not in the wooded area,
Speaker 4: but sort of the field like it hadn't been mode,
Speaker 4: but it was right near the garage at Christi Year's home.
Speaker 4: And of course, naturally you start questioning her about the
Speaker 4: cameras and you know, what do you mean a camera
Speaker 4: was there? Was it connected to something?
Speaker 2: Did you?
Speaker 10: Did?
Speaker 4: You looked at you to try to investigate. It was
Speaker 4: a very strange encounter, you know, when she mentioned that
Speaker 4: and then the conversation wouldn't no further.
Speaker 3: Well, she was probably scared, right, possibly, I.
Speaker 4: Mean, but she's talking to a reporter. That was always
Speaker 4: something that I've wondered about because she never got an
Speaker 4: answer to and it was so strange, and I still
Speaker 4: to this day wonder why she mentioned that and why
Speaker 4: that conversation wasn't allowed to go any further.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I find so like the most screwed up
Speaker 3: thing about it is at that time, the summer twenty
Speaker 3: fourteen has when Jay Wagner and Hannah Rodin were like
Speaker 3: hot and heavy and planning a wedding, and to know
Speaker 3: that he was then also sort of maybe planning her
Speaker 3: murder at the same time, or starting to at least
Speaker 3: spy on her in some way, it's like just very dark.
Speaker 4: I mean, there's a lot of interest obviously still in
Speaker 4: this case. And you know, with every criminal prosecution, you know,
Speaker 4: the state they have their version of facts, and the
Speaker 4: defense will have its version of facts. But if this
Speaker 4: turns out to be true, man, what a story. I mean,
Speaker 4: what a terribly tragic ending to these lives, to everything
Speaker 4: that was going on. If we are to believe that
Speaker 4: the prosecution as alleged, you know, this paints a very
Speaker 4: dark picture.
Speaker 1: We're going to take a quick break here. We'll be
Speaker 1: back in a moment. It seems that the Wagners became
Speaker 1: obsessed with getting soul cussed did of Sophia after Jake
Speaker 1: and Hannah broke up, But how exactly did they think
Speaker 1: they would gain control? As laid out in the indictment,
Speaker 1: the Wagners began methodically plotting a scheme that would take
Speaker 1: several months to actually carry out. Here again, is Jodi Barr.
Speaker 4: So when you read these indictments, you know they were
Speaker 4: talking about the Wagner's movements even months before these murders happened,
Speaker 4: and that the investigators believed that they were planning this
Speaker 4: for quite some time before that. The Adamo says that
Speaker 4: detectives believe that planning began January one of twenty sixteen.
Speaker 4: The murders happened April of twenty sixteen. So you've got
Speaker 4: four months of planning that's alleged to have happened here.
Speaker 4: Four months to plan the South.
Speaker 11: I mean, if that's every.
Speaker 4: Day for four months, that's the full time job.
Speaker 1: So what exactly went into the planning? In previous episodes,
Speaker 1: we talked about how in April twenty sixteen, the Wagners
Speaker 1: presented Hannah Rodin with custody documents. But what Hannah didn't
Speaker 1: know then and what police later uncovered, is that the
Speaker 1: supposedly legal documents were fake, and that Angela Wagner's mother,
Speaker 1: Rita Joe Nucam, was allegedly at the center of the deception.
Speaker 1: I spoke to my Gallon about it. So Rita Nucom
Speaker 1: Angela's mom. She faces three counts of forgery. A kound
Speaker 1: of perjury and she's a notary. Can you speak to
Speaker 1: what power does a notary have or how does that
Speaker 1: come into play?
Speaker 2: In Ohio, notaries don't have a lot of power. They
Speaker 2: are allowed, obviously to notarize signatures. You know, they have
Speaker 2: to make sure that the oath is administered properly when
Speaker 2: they are notarizing something. They're kind of hard to come
Speaker 2: by here in Ohio. But I'm certain that because of
Speaker 2: this she'll probably lose that notary's license, if she hasn't already.
Speaker 1: Moving forward a bit in time, prosecutors ultimately claimed that
Speaker 1: read a lie about the authenticity of these documents to
Speaker 1: a grand jury, But in an unexpected twist, Nucom agreed
Speaker 1: to a plea deal with the prosecution. She pled guilty
Speaker 1: to a misdemeanor charge of obstructing official business in exchange
Speaker 1: felony charges of forgery and perjury were dismissed. Here's Nucomb
Speaker 1: speaking in court.
Speaker 2: I feel that.
Speaker 4: It's not a good crazy thing long and I'm going
Speaker 4: to live with the more.
Speaker 1: It's difficult to hear her because of the recording, but
Speaker 1: she says, I just feel that it's not a good
Speaker 1: Christian thing to lie and I couldn't live with it
Speaker 1: no more. Jodi Barr thinks there could be ulterior motives
Speaker 1: to Newcomb's deal.
Speaker 4: The prosecutor said in court, though, that a hand running
Speaker 4: expert concluded that Rita Nucomb did not sign the documents herself.
Speaker 4: Nukemb admitted to fosterly, telling a grand jury and investigators
Speaker 4: that she did so only because her daughter, Angela Wagner,
Speaker 4: who was among those charged with the killings, told her
Speaker 4: to do so. I mean there were some heavy charges dismissed.
Speaker 4: You know, we're investigators trying to squeeze the grandmothers to
Speaker 4: get some information out of them.
Speaker 1: Mike Allen seems to think so.
Speaker 2: Now there's a lot of speculation, and in the normal case,
Speaker 2: the first thing you'd think of is Okay, you know,
Speaker 2: they gave her a reduced charge in return for cooperation,
Speaker 2: and I would not be surprised if that's not the case.
Speaker 2: But again, you know, we won't know until we get
Speaker 2: closer to trial.
Speaker 1: Can you be compelled to testify for the prosecution?
Speaker 2: Sure, I mean, they receive a subpoena unless there's some
Speaker 2: kind of legal reason why you know they couldn't. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean the prosecutor could issue the subpoena. If there's testimony,
Speaker 2: the prosecutor would probably ask the court to designate that
Speaker 2: person as a hostile witness, and then they can use
Speaker 2: leading questions.
Speaker 1: According to court records, the documents appointed a guardian for
Speaker 1: Jake and Hannah's daughter in the event of their deaths.
Speaker 1: When police later searched the Wagner home, this document was
Speaker 1: found in a box belonging to Angelo labeled important Stuff.
Speaker 1: I asked Mike Gallan about the legal ramifications of these
Speaker 1: forged documents. How does it appear that these documents were
Speaker 1: forged on April third? It was nineteen days before the murders.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you what, I've been doing this for a
Speaker 2: long time and I've never seen anything like this. It's
Speaker 2: strong evidence for the prosecutor. The defense attorney has to
Speaker 2: find a way to explain that away, which is probably
Speaker 2: next to impossible. But yeah, it's that strong evidence from
Speaker 2: a prosecutor's perspective.
Speaker 1: As we've discussed before, it was around this time that
Speaker 1: Chris Ruden Senior and Billy Wagner got into a fight
Speaker 1: as well. Here's Mike Allen recapping that confrontation back.
Speaker 2: In mid April twenty and sixteen, supposedly there was a
Speaker 2: fight between Chris Senior and Billy Wagner. Nobody seems to
Speaker 2: know what the fight was about or what caused it.
Speaker 1: Things were obviously becoming strained between the two families, but
Speaker 1: the beginning of April also brought a lot of joy
Speaker 1: for the Rodent film. That month, Hannah celebrated her nineteenth birthday.
Speaker 1: Here's rodin family friend Stephann.
Speaker 2: It was a happy occasion, you know.
Speaker 4: It was family get together and lots of fun, you know,
Speaker 4: because they were fun. They were always having you know,
Speaker 4: get together's, birthday parties, anything like that.
Speaker 2: They were a great family unit.
Speaker 1: But as the Rodent family was celebrating, the Wagners allegedly
Speaker 1: were busy planning their murders. The Wagners already had a
Speaker 1: cachet of firearms, but around this time they began making
Speaker 1: their own silencers. If the Wagners did do it, it
Speaker 1: seems likely that these would have been used on the
Speaker 1: night of the murders. The family also bought ammunition, a
Speaker 1: magazine clip, a bug detector, and materials to build brass catchers.
Speaker 1: Jodi Barr filled us in on what some of this
Speaker 1: equipment is used.
Speaker 4: For The brass catcher is a bag that hooks on
Speaker 4: the side of a fire arm. It will catch spent cartridges,
Speaker 4: so every time you pull the trigger, cartridges is ejected.
Speaker 4: And if you were really interested in not leaving anything
Speaker 4: behind as far as ballistic evidence to sound like a
Speaker 4: great story, this bag will collect the shell casing, so
Speaker 4: there's no evidence left behind. The bug detector, so purely
Speaker 4: that helps someone find listening devices and sometimes create blat
Speaker 4: noise to muffle sounds or discussion.
Speaker 1: The indictment also includes a reference to a specific pair
Speaker 1: of shoes that the family purchased from Walmart. But why
Speaker 1: would they need a particular pair of shoes to pull
Speaker 1: off a murder? Here's Stephanie.
Speaker 10: One such theory is that the Wagners were trying to
Speaker 10: frame data Rodin's brother, James Manly. He's significant because if
Speaker 10: you recall, Dana Rowden's sister, Bobby Joe, made the first
Speaker 10: discovery of bodies and called nine to one one. She
Speaker 10: also called her brother, who rushed to Dana Roden's house
Speaker 10: and also found their bodies. His prints were allegedly at
Speaker 10: the crime scene. However, just one day before the murders.
Speaker 10: The Wagners drove two and a half hours to a
Speaker 10: specific Walmart to buy a particular pair of boots. They're
Speaker 10: seen on surveillance buying these boots and they're the same
Speaker 10: kind of boots known to be worn by James Manley.
Speaker 10: Why would they do that?
Speaker 1: Here's reporter Jody.
Speaker 4: Barr from the Dyingment. I mean, there's a lot of
Speaker 4: assertion by the prosecution that they have evidence that, you know,
Speaker 4: these boots were purchased to frame James Manley a family
Speaker 4: member for the murder, and that James lived the closest
Speaker 4: to Dana, and that James ended up being one of
Speaker 4: the first to discover Dana and you know in Hannah's
Speaker 4: bodies that morning.
Speaker 3: Right, So the idea is that they went and bought
Speaker 3: these specific boots knowing that James Manley wore them, and
Speaker 3: then they would in theory, wear them the night of
Speaker 3: the murder. So it looked to police like he was
Speaker 3: the one walking around.
Speaker 4: And it sounds like for a period of time investigators
Speaker 4: might have believed that to be the case, because James
Speaker 4: Manley was one of the first people rough in and interrogated.
Speaker 4: Given a polygraph, I mean, if you're to believe what's
Speaker 4: written in that indictment. It sounds like that you may
Speaker 4: have been pretty close to pulling this all off.
Speaker 3: It was so detail oriented.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and you wonder this too. It's like it seemed
Speaker 4: like a lot of detailed planning to pre plan that.
Speaker 4: I don't really know what to think of it. Again,
Speaker 4: I don't know anybody who's capable of doing that, and
Speaker 4: we know it happened. It was pulled off by somebody.
Speaker 4: But I mean, if they really bought boots to try
Speaker 4: to frame James manly Man again, this is a heck
Speaker 4: of a story. Who drinks us up? Who thinks this up?
Speaker 1: In April twenty sixteen, the same week as Hannah's birthday,
Speaker 1: her mother Dana threw a baby shower to celebrate the
Speaker 1: upcoming birth of her new baby girl, Kylie. It would
Speaker 1: be the last time the Rodent family all gathered in
Speaker 1: one place. Becky Ryder was a close friend of Dana Rhaden's.
Speaker 1: She told Jeff about the excitement surrounding the baby's.
Speaker 9: The Dana felt overwhelmed with joy and happiness because she's
Speaker 9: getting another grand baby that she can love and spoil
Speaker 9: as she always loved her grandkids, you know, deeply.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And like Hannah must have been happy too, because
Speaker 3: she was she had a new boyfriend at that point
Speaker 3: who was not Jake Wagner, and she was about to
Speaker 3: have a new baby and kind of start a new
Speaker 3: chapter of her life.
Speaker 5: Right, Oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: In photos from this event, Hannah smiles with her daughter Sophia.
Speaker 1: We also see other family members in the photo, including
Speaker 1: Frankie and his fiance Hannah Gilly. In just a few days,
Speaker 1: eight members of the Rodent family would be dead. But
Speaker 1: Deray's recollection of the events leading up to the birth
Speaker 1: of Kylie is different. She says at that point that
Speaker 1: things were still going well between Jake and Hannah.
Speaker 9: I believe they may have disagreements, and I think there
Speaker 9: was disappointments, but I don't think there was any any hate.
Speaker 1: We've discussed in previous episodes how the people have piked
Speaker 1: in were immediately affected by the murderers and the shroud
Speaker 1: of fear that hovered with the small town.
Speaker 2: I just don't understand why it happened here.
Speaker 4: You have a really wondering thing, like, is it like
Speaker 4: mafia or anything like that, because it is crazy. If
Speaker 4: I lived down there, I wouldn't stay there.
Speaker 11: I would be so afraid.
Speaker 3: But in the wake of the murders, many news outlets
Speaker 3: were portraying Jake Wagner as almost a sympathetic figure. This
Speaker 3: is how the Cincinnati Inquirer described him in a July
Speaker 3: twenty sixteen article, a full time single dad with mounting
Speaker 3: legal bills, with a new job that pays half of
Speaker 3: what he was making to ensure he is close to Sophia,
Speaker 3: but close still means the twenty three year old makes
Speaker 3: a daily commute to Cincinnati, a two and a half
Speaker 3: hour daily drive.
Speaker 4: Anybody who was connected to this family, you know, there
Speaker 4: was a lot of emotion from the public involved your
Speaker 4: because of these children. So it's no surprise that Jake,
Speaker 4: you know, a lot of people felt for Jake. Means
Speaker 4: he's lived there with with that very young daughter, and
Speaker 4: he's fighting to get her back.
Speaker 1: But it's what the family did in the wake of
Speaker 1: the murders raised some suspicion. We know that just six
Speaker 1: days after the Rodents were killed, Jake Wagner filed for
Speaker 1: custody of two and a half year old Sophia, his
Speaker 1: daughter with Hannah Rodin. In a previous episode, we talked
Speaker 1: to Ohio criminal defense attorney Mike Allen about how this
Speaker 1: looks from a legal perspective.
Speaker 2: That's extremely strong evidence for the prosecution. I mean six days,
Speaker 2: less than a week after the killings. To go ahead
Speaker 2: and file. It can take months, you know, maybe a year,
Speaker 2: a little bit more, a little bit less. It's not
Speaker 2: something that goes quickly at all, and I think that
Speaker 2: that is going to be some evidence that's problematic for
Speaker 2: the defense doing it that quickly after the murders.
Speaker 3: It was around the same time that Angelo Wagner suggested
Speaker 3: her son create a GoFundMe campaign to help cover the
Speaker 3: custody expenses to the tune of twenty thousand dollars. Jack
Speaker 3: wrote a personal message on the page saying these were
Speaker 3: not expenses. I was supposed to have supposed to be
Speaker 3: able to spend time with her and give her a
Speaker 3: happy childhood. Sophia and I are just asking enough to
Speaker 3: settle the fees that we acquired due to the horrific
Speaker 3: tragedy to her mommy. He finished, I hate seeing my
Speaker 3: daughter cry. We want to get our lives back.
Speaker 1: But these legal actions seemed unusual to many in the community.
Speaker 1: He was an investigative reporter Jodi Byr.
Speaker 4: I do remember seeing that in the Rodent massacre Facebook group,
Speaker 4: you know, people talking about that and just you know,
Speaker 4: there were there was a lot of angry comments about
Speaker 4: it that you know a lot of people in those
Speaker 4: groups have already convicted the Wagoners. They already believed they
Speaker 4: did it and they're guilty, and you know, so to
Speaker 4: see that and that and how vocal the Wagners were
Speaker 4: on social media, it seemed to rubble people in that
Speaker 4: group the wrong way that that was the wrong message
Speaker 4: that they believe the Wagoners should have been sending at
Speaker 4: that point in time. But you know a lot of
Speaker 4: people sowing as the brazenness of the people wrapped up
Speaker 4: in this to make a move like that to ask
Speaker 4: for help.
Speaker 1: Let's stop here for another quick break. We'll be back
Speaker 1: in a moment. In May twenty seventeen, with the investigation
Speaker 1: in full swing, officials searched the farm of a piked
Speaker 1: In resident named Bernard Brown. Mike Allen filled us in
Speaker 1: on why police may have been interested in the property.
Speaker 2: Agents searched his farm. I guess he's a friend of
Speaker 2: the Wagoners and knew them for a long time. I
Speaker 2: guess they fixed cars together, A lot of cars on
Speaker 2: the lot. I guess Jake had stored some cars and
Speaker 2: some other things on the property. And I'll tell you
Speaker 2: what cars and vehicles and equipment are all over these
Speaker 2: farms that have been searched. So I mean maybe something
Speaker 2: could have been hidden somewhere, as somebody must have given
Speaker 2: law enforcement a tip that there could possibly be something
Speaker 2: there or they wouldn't have searched it.
Speaker 1: Bernard Brown was not charged with anything. Authorities searched two
Speaker 1: large trailers and took one smaller utility trailer owned by
Speaker 1: the Wagners from his property. According to Brown, Jake Wagner
Speaker 1: sometimes worked for him fixing cars. Brown said that the
Speaker 1: Wagners had dropped items off at the property a week
Speaker 1: prior to the search. It was clear that investigators were
Speaker 1: becoming more interested in the Wagners. By the spring of
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen, the family had been interviewed several times by authorities.
Speaker 1: It should be noted that Jake and Angelo were interviewed
Speaker 1: five times, Billy three times, and George once. Deray spoke
Speaker 1: to Jeff about a conversation she had with Angela Wagner.
Speaker 1: As police narrowed in on her family one day.
Speaker 7: She goes, I can't believe that they just won't leave
Speaker 7: us alone.
Speaker 9: They just will not leave us alone.
Speaker 2: She goes, it's terrible.
Speaker 9: She goes, We're starting to get really worried that we're
Speaker 9: going to be arrested.
Speaker 3: So they felt that coming because.
Speaker 2: They wouldn't leave everybody alone.
Speaker 1: Rumors of the Wagner's potential involvement in the Roadent massacre
Speaker 1: quickly spread, and soon they were being targeted not only
Speaker 1: by police, but by Pike County residents as well.
Speaker 5: Everybody had started basically attacking then the community, accusing them
Speaker 5: of murdering those people, like if they were in town
Speaker 5: and people identified their vehicle, they would throw pot bottles
Speaker 5: at them. Angela had actually went into a store one
Speaker 5: day and some woman had actually flewed up behind Angela.
Speaker 5: She was coming back out of the store and through
Speaker 5: a glass key bottle affor and it busted her in
Speaker 5: the back.
Speaker 1: In May twenty seventeen, as the community continued to turn
Speaker 1: against them, Angela Wagner took to social media to publicly
Speaker 1: declare her family's innocence. Here's Jeff reading from her post.
Speaker 3: Okay, decided to tell you all a couple of things
Speaker 3: about me and my family. What has happened to us
Speaker 3: in the past few weeks has been devastating and it
Speaker 3: will follow us for the rest of our lives. Hannah
Speaker 3: was a daughter to me. I loved her dearly. Her
Speaker 3: loss still hurts to this day, especially when I see
Speaker 3: her every day and my granddaughter. We did not do
Speaker 3: anything to hurt Hannah's family. We want justice just like
Speaker 3: everyone else. It is real disturbing if you really want
Speaker 3: to know what you guys are doing. Your accusations now
Speaker 3: will hurt Sophia later in life when she really understands
Speaker 3: what happened. Let's try to find the real monsters who've
Speaker 3: done this.
Speaker 10: So let's really unpack this for a moment. Because if
Speaker 10: Angela Wagner is in fact a martyr and had been
Speaker 10: targeted by the town, I mean having a bottle thrown
Speaker 10: at you, if you did not commit these crimes would
Speaker 10: be hideous, especially the town that you love so much.
Speaker 10: Angela and her husband lived there for generations, that had
Speaker 10: to be really difficult. However, if they did it and
Speaker 10: they just went about their lives speaking to the press openly,
Speaker 10: you know, when I look at her photo, I've said
Speaker 10: this before. She looks like a mom, but then she's
Speaker 10: also grimacing in her mugshot and even during her pre
Speaker 10: trial hearings, there's something sort of smug about the way
Speaker 10: she presents herself. It also makes me wonder could she
Speaker 10: possibly be at the center of this. Facing violent backlash
Speaker 10: from locals and increasing attention from authorities, the Wagoners did
Speaker 10: something that left everyone and piked and stunned. Here's Jef
Speaker 10: Winkler again.
Speaker 7: Their lawyer had said that they were the primary suspects,
Speaker 7: and so it was around that time to May twenty
Speaker 7: seventeen that the whole family emptied out a few cargo
Speaker 7: facilities that they had, some sheds and whatnot, loaded all
Speaker 7: up and then up and moved to Alaska.
Speaker 6: When they left for Alaska, I was like, oh, wow,
Speaker 6: they're running, And then I thought they.
Speaker 4: All get away with it.
Speaker 9: I'm the one that told them go to Alaska. Ohio
Speaker 9: can not afford to extradite you from Alaska back home.
Speaker 1: But the Wagner's relocation didn't hinder the investigation.
Speaker 12: Investigators rated three properties in Adams and Pike Counties the
Speaker 12: middle of May. We had previously reported those properties are
Speaker 12: connected to the Wagner family. Now, investigators say they believe
Speaker 12: the family recently moved to Alaska. Investigators want any information
Speaker 12: the public has about the family.
Speaker 11: They moved to Alaska. But then the very following month,
Speaker 11: law enforcement actually finally searches the properties where the Wagners lived.
Speaker 11: That started to tighten the noose in terms of the Wagner's.
Speaker 1: More on that next time. Reach out to us on
Speaker 1: our social media outlets with questions. We're on Instagram, Facebook,
Speaker 1: and Twitter at piked in Massacre. We look forward to
Speaker 1: answering your questions and upcoming bonus episodes. Piked In Massacre
Speaker 1: as executive produced by Stephanie Leidecker and me Courtney Armstrong.
Speaker 1: Editing and sound designed by executive producer Jared Aston. Additional
Speaker 1: producing by Jeff Shane and Andrew Becker. The Piked In
Speaker 1: Massacre is a production of iHeartRadio and Kati Studios. For
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