Speaker 1: School of Humans.
Speaker 2: On Saturday, September twenty ninth, twenty eighteen, neighbors on a
Speaker 2: quiet street in a quiet neighborhood in Clearwater, Florida were
Speaker 2: getting worried. But in this case, the suspicious activity wasn't
Speaker 2: from anything that was actually going on. It was kind
Speaker 2: of the opposite. The neighbors were concerned because things were
Speaker 2: a little bit too quiet.
Speaker 1: They had their eyes.
Speaker 2: On a little, one story white house at ten thirty
Speaker 2: three Flushing Avenue, where eighty eight year old David Swan
Speaker 2: and his wife, eighty year old Minu Swan lived. They
Speaker 2: had lived in that home for the past twenty years.
Speaker 2: Mina had actually lived there for forty years. This was
Speaker 2: a second marriage for both David and Mina. She had
Speaker 2: lived there with her first husband until he passed away,
Speaker 2: and then later made a home there with David, her
Speaker 2: second husband. According to friends and family, David and Mina
Speaker 2: were in a very happy marriage. They had had no
Speaker 2: known enemies, and they had a really regular routine. They
Speaker 2: always came out to get their newspaper. They had a
Speaker 2: neighbor across the street named Joel Locke who lived there
Speaker 2: with his father, John Locke. Now Joel told police that
Speaker 2: he last saw the Swans on Thursday afternoon at around
Speaker 2: three pm. Then on Friday they never walked outside to
Speaker 2: get the paper. Then over the weekend, Joel said he
Speaker 2: noticed that the Swan's lights were on, but again on Saturday,
Speaker 2: there was no sign of either David or Mina. So
Speaker 2: by Saturday he told police he was getting concerned. David
Speaker 2: and Mina had married later in life, so they never
Speaker 2: had any children together, but they had seven children between them.
Speaker 2: Both of them were involved in each other's children's lives.
Speaker 2: The families were close. Finally, on Saturday, a little before
Speaker 2: two pm, Joel got in touch with Mina's daughter, Noel Divine.
Speaker 2: It says in media reports that Noel had a key
Speaker 2: to the house, but in the end she didn't need
Speaker 2: to use it because Noel came to the neighborhood she
Speaker 2: lived nearby, and she and Joel approached David and Mina's house.
Speaker 2: They went in through the back door and it was unlocked,
Speaker 2: and what they saw when they walked in that house
Speaker 2: was horrific. David and Mina were at the kitchen table,
Speaker 2: slumped over in pools of blood. Forensic testing revealed they
Speaker 2: had been dead for at least a day, Joel Loppe
Speaker 2: told WFLA news Channel eight. Quote, Noel could not handle it.
Speaker 2: She ran out the door and I was with her
Speaker 2: right behind end quote. David and Mina were shot execution style.
Speaker 2: They were sitting at the kitchen table. David had been
Speaker 2: shot once, Mina multiple times. There was nothing stolen and
Speaker 2: no sign of forest entry.
Speaker 1: Of course, there.
Speaker 2: Were a lot of media reports after this case because
Speaker 2: it was shocking the murder of two elderly people, And
Speaker 2: what we kept hearing on the news was that this
Speaker 2: shock the town of Clearwater, which is a place probably
Speaker 2: best known for having a large presence of Scientology church members.
Speaker 2: A few early commenters on the case kind of wondered
Speaker 2: if Scientologists could have had something to do with it.
Speaker 2: But let me just say right off the bat, there
Speaker 2: is zero indication that Scientology had anything to do with
Speaker 2: these murders. So before I get a lot of calls,
Speaker 2: I just want to say that upfront, all we heard
Speaker 2: on the news was that David and Mina were this
Speaker 2: super happy older couple, and the headline has basically been
Speaker 2: who would want to kill this nice elderly couple who.
Speaker 1: Had no known enemies? But as hele Gong.
Speaker 2: Listeners know, I always try to look beyond the headlines,
Speaker 2: so I've spent a lot of time doing a deep
Speaker 2: dive into the probate records that followed these deaths. By
Speaker 2: the way, thank you Pinalis County, Florida, because this county
Speaker 2: does have a really good open record system.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: Joel Locke, the neighbor, gave more details to another news organization.
Speaker 2: He said that when he was in that kitchen, he
Speaker 2: saw signs that food had been prepared. He said quote
Speaker 2: she meaning Mina, was face down and he was on
Speaker 2: his back. She was on one side of the coffee table.
Speaker 2: He was on the other side. So at least in
Speaker 2: the beginning, it seems as though they were just hanging
Speaker 2: out at home about to eat dinner when the killer
Speaker 2: walked in and shot them. Their obituaries focused on how
Speaker 2: happy David and Minus Swan were. According to his obituary,
Speaker 2: after retirement, David had fulfilled a lifelong dream of travel.
Speaker 2: He and Mina loved to have new adventures. He hiked
Speaker 2: the Appalachian Trail in two thousand and two, and his
Speaker 2: trail name was twinkletoes. Hyked part of it with him
Speaker 2: and her trail name was Artzy because she had been
Speaker 2: an art teacher. David had a private pilot's license. He
Speaker 2: and Mina traveled everywhere. They went to Europe, China, Chile, Argentina,
Speaker 2: the Panama Canal, Australia, New Zealand, the South Pacific. This
Speaker 2: list goes on and on. But again, even though they
Speaker 2: appeared to be living this idyllic lifestyle and apparently David
Speaker 2: had been this very successful CPA who was retired, I
Speaker 2: wondered what the real story was because now the police
Speaker 2: have admitted they're pretty much stumped.
Speaker 1: After these murders.
Speaker 2: They had no time of death and no suspects, and
Speaker 2: over three years later, this case is still unsolved.
Speaker 1: So who could have killed David and Minus one?
Speaker 2: Could it be someone like a tradesperson, Could it be
Speaker 2: a serial killer or someone targeting elderly residents, or could
Speaker 2: it be one of David's former business associates from Chicago,
Speaker 2: or was it some one a lot closer to home.
Speaker 2: I'm Catherine Townsend. This is Helen Gone Murder Line. If
Speaker 2: you have a case you'd like me and my team
Speaker 2: to look into, you can reach out to us at
Speaker 2: our Helen Gone Murder Line at six seven eight seven
Speaker 2: four four six one four five. That's six seven eight
Speaker 2: seven four four, six, one four or five. A week
Speaker 2: after David and Minus Swans were found, Chief Daniel Slaughter
Speaker 2: at the Clearwater Police Department held a press conference to
Speaker 2: talk about the murders.
Speaker 1: This is what he said.
Speaker 3: What I can share in the investigation is that David
Speaker 3: Emina we're seen alive on Thursday September twenty seventh in
Speaker 3: the early afternoon. From the investigation, we are looking closely
Speaker 3: at a twenty four hour window from Thursday September twenty
Speaker 3: seventh around three pm to Friday September twenty eighth about.
Speaker 4: At the same time three pm.
Speaker 3: Although our investigation is looking closely at that window as
Speaker 3: a suspected period of time when this offensive, these two
Speaker 3: murders occurred, the investigators are also looking at deeds outside
Speaker 3: of that window. I could share that David and Mina
Speaker 3: were both shot and killed, and has previously reported our
Speaker 3: homicide victims.
Speaker 4: The evidence does.
Speaker 3: Not indicate that the offender, I'm sorry, The evidence does
Speaker 3: indicate that the offender came with the intent to kill
Speaker 3: David and Miana. This does not appear to be a
Speaker 3: random out being vigilant and following simple common crime prevention
Speaker 3: techniques like locking your old, your car doors, your home doors,
Speaker 3: your garage doors is always a very crudent thing to
Speaker 3: do for safety, but we do not believe there is
Speaker 3: any reason for the rest of the community to be concerned.
Speaker 3: Clear Water Detectives and Penell's County Sheriff's Office friends especialists
Speaker 3: spent over forty hours working in the crime scene, documenting
Speaker 3: the crime scene, processing the crime scene, and collecting trace evidence.
Speaker 3: The collection trace evidence is very time consuming. Any person
Speaker 3: that entered the Swan home would leave trace evidence behind,
Speaker 3: and that would be in the form of pair.
Speaker 4: Fibers, skin cells, touch, DNA, a variety of different things.
Speaker 3: That those traceable substances were the very vitally important for
Speaker 3: our investigation, and so it's very important that we.
Speaker 4: Collect them in a very methodical manner and in a
Speaker 4: very appropriate manner.
Speaker 3: We know that in murder cases there's usually some form
Speaker 3: of a victim offender relationship. Investigators will therefore speak to
Speaker 3: anyone that had a relationship with the Swans.
Speaker 4: Whether it's family, friends, or business dealings.
Speaker 3: We're going to talk to everyone, and then anyone involved
Speaker 3: or connected to the family until we get to the
Speaker 3: bottom of it.
Speaker 2: So let's break down those statements. First, Chief Slaughter kind
Speaker 2: of clarified the window of time when David and Mina
Speaker 2: were killed. The last time the Swans were seen alive
Speaker 2: that was verifiable was Thursday, September twenty seventh at around
Speaker 2: three pm. Remember that's when the neighbors saw them come
Speaker 2: outside and pick up those newspapers. They didn't come out
Speaker 2: of their house on Friday or Saturday when Noel and
Speaker 2: Joel went into the house. So this is why investigators
Speaker 2: were concentrating on the twenty four hour window between Thursday
Speaker 2: at three pm and Friday at three pm. If the
Speaker 2: neighbor's reports are true, if the lights were left on
Speaker 2: all night on Thursday night, Thursday night, in my opinion,
Speaker 2: becomes the most likely time when they could have been murdered,
Speaker 2: especially if we believe Joel. If there was food on
Speaker 2: the counter that looked like they were about to eat dinner,
Speaker 2: the lights were on and the door was unlocked. Also,
Speaker 2: the Tampa Bay Times talked to a neighbor, Bob Anderson.
Speaker 2: Bob said his wife had gone by the Swan house
Speaker 2: on Friday to drop off some pamphlets and that nobody
Speaker 2: entered the door. Noel talked to reporters about her experience
Speaker 2: going into the house. She said, quote, when I heard
Speaker 2: the papers were building up, I just panicked.
Speaker 1: End quote.
Speaker 2: As she drove to her mother's house, she said that
Speaker 2: she was trying to tell herself there could be a
Speaker 2: rational explanation, maybe her mom and stepdad went off on
Speaker 2: a last minute trip. Then once she went into that
Speaker 2: house and saw those bodies, her world fell apart. She said,
Speaker 2: quote it was just a moment that I would never
Speaker 2: wish on anyone.
Speaker 1: It's my mother, and I couldn't help her. End quote.
Speaker 2: At the press conference and also later, law enforcements made
Speaker 2: a point to say this was likely an isolated attack,
Speaker 2: and they said the community did not need to be worried,
Speaker 2: which I think is a little bit misleading because what
Speaker 2: they mean is that this is a person who is
Speaker 2: targeting this one specifically. It's not some random person out there.
Speaker 2: But in my opinion, if someone killed a person, whatever
Speaker 2: their motivation was, and they're still out there, someone could
Speaker 2: find out about those killings, confront that person, and they
Speaker 2: could be in danger. So I get what the police
Speaker 2: are trying to do. Here they don't want the community
Speaker 2: to panic. But I do feel like, and I hear
Speaker 2: this statement often about the public not needing to be concerned.
Speaker 2: I don't think it's always that valid. So let's take
Speaker 2: a closer look at this couple. We're going to see
Speaker 2: very soon that there are two different versions of their
Speaker 2: life story that start to emerge, the official version and
Speaker 2: what I call kind of the unofficial version.
Speaker 1: This isn't meant with any kind of disrespect at all.
Speaker 2: By the way, everyone has secrets, but sometimes if you
Speaker 2: want to find out who killed someone who wanted them dead,
Speaker 2: you have to look behind some of these headlines that
Speaker 2: are just superficial. You have to try and discover some
Speaker 2: of their secrets. So we know the killing was very
Speaker 2: personal and that the Swans were targeted. So the question
Speaker 2: is who could have wanted to kill them and why.
Speaker 2: David Sidney Swann, Junior, and this is from his obituary,
Speaker 2: was born on April fifteenth, nineteen thirty. He was raised
Speaker 2: in Shreveport, Louisiana. He enlisted in the Navy, and after
Speaker 2: his naval service, he went to work for an accounting
Speaker 2: firm called Swift and Company in Chicago. He met his
Speaker 2: first wife, whose name was Eva Sorenson, in Chicago. He
Speaker 2: graduated from Northwestern University and became a CPA. He later
Speaker 2: worked at another firm, and he and his wife had
Speaker 2: four kids, Julia, Janet, Stephen, and a son named David.
Speaker 2: So David and his first wife raised their family. Then
Speaker 2: in the early nineteen eighties, they moved to Clearwater, Florida.
Speaker 2: David set up his own practice doing taxes, and eventually
Speaker 2: David and his first wife retired there. That's what I
Speaker 2: saw in the obituary. But there's something in that part
Speaker 2: of my brain that gets activated when I have insomnia,
Speaker 2: which is often, so one night I woke up and
Speaker 2: started looking through court records. It was like two am
Speaker 2: that night, and I found some court documents that mention
Speaker 2: a woman connected to David Swan named MacEwan. These court
Speaker 2: documents said that David was divorced from this woman. But
Speaker 2: I noticed that this alleged second wife was apparently never
Speaker 2: mentioned in his obituary. So that just got me wondering
Speaker 2: why not, why would that not be mentioned. Again, not
Speaker 2: trying to air any dirty laundry, but in a case
Speaker 2: where money could be involved, someone clearly had a grudge
Speaker 2: against this couple. So we need to try to cover
Speaker 2: all the facts. And these facts are, by the way,
Speaker 2: in public records if you look deep enough. And also,
Speaker 2: I feel like with a lot of these media reports,
Speaker 2: there's this kind of flippant idea that just because these
Speaker 2: people are elderly, that they're just this sweet little old couple.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Maybe it's because I watched The Golden Girls a lot,
Speaker 2: or because I have some very active older Southern women
Speaker 2: in my family, but I reject the notion that just
Speaker 2: because someone is older means they don't have drama or
Speaker 2: conflict or any kind of an inner life, or for
Speaker 2: that matter, that they're not capable of being criminals. Life
Speaker 2: is complicated no matter what age you are. So I
Speaker 2: need to find out more about this woman May and
Speaker 2: try and figure out what happened between her and David
Speaker 2: and where she is now. Mina was an art teacher.
Speaker 2: She taught at a local high school. She was married
Speaker 2: to her first husband, Harold, for many years. According to
Speaker 2: Mina's children, mine and Harold were very happy together.
Speaker 1: They had three.
Speaker 2: Kids, Noel, John, and William, and they were living in
Speaker 2: that home in Clearwater until he passed away in the
Speaker 2: late nineties, David and Mina met in Clearwater. They he
Speaker 2: started dating and married in nineteen ninety nine. Now, according
Speaker 2: to Noel in the deposition, David was actually her parents' accountant.
Speaker 2: He did some accounting work for Mina and her late husband, which,
Speaker 2: as we will see in a minute, Noel appears to
Speaker 2: have a big problem with. But let's go back to
Speaker 2: the murders. Months go by, and then over a year
Speaker 2: the police have no suspects. But then there's an item
Speaker 2: in a news.
Speaker 1: Report about a lawsuit.
Speaker 2: By the way, David's son, Stephen is the personal representative
Speaker 2: of David's estate and Mina's daughter Noel is the representative
Speaker 2: of her mother's estate. It turns out that Noel is
Speaker 2: suing Stephen and that the lawsuit is all about the
Speaker 2: estate and money. So we're going to try to follow
Speaker 2: that money. We need to answer the question of what
Speaker 2: exactly was going on with David and Minuswan's financial situation.
Speaker 2: We know that Mana owned her home and that David
Speaker 2: had been a successful CPA. The police said that they
Speaker 2: were living in a nice neighborhood and they had some investments,
Speaker 2: but these were not super wealthy people. But the probate
Speaker 2: records give us a lot more detail about what was
Speaker 2: going on behind the scenes with their finances. According to
Speaker 2: court documents, Mina and David Swan did have a prenup
Speaker 2: when they got married, and that prenup basically said that
Speaker 2: they would keep their finances separate, each one would provide
Speaker 2: for their own biological children. Mina's will also discussed her property,
Speaker 2: her house, and the will said if she and David
Speaker 2: stayed married and she died before him, he would have
Speaker 2: the right to live there for another six months, but
Speaker 2: basically he would not inherit it everything went to her children.
Speaker 2: But according to Noel, it wasn't that simple. Now here's
Speaker 2: where it gets a little bit bizarre. Because Noel is
Speaker 2: one of the main spokesperson for her mom and the
Speaker 2: family talked a lot with police. They participated in press conferences,
Speaker 2: and in the early press conferences, Noel would talk about
Speaker 2: her mom and David and how they were soulmates. She
Speaker 2: talked about him in a very endearing way. She said
Speaker 2: that they loved to garden. She talked about how they
Speaker 2: would have wine and cheese in the afternoons and they
Speaker 2: would walk their dog, whose name was Benji, around town,
Speaker 2: and she said something I remember well. She said they
Speaker 2: would end up giving their dog a little slice of
Speaker 2: the cheese, which I completely relate to. So it seemed
Speaker 2: like she believed they were this great match. But behind
Speaker 2: the scenes in twenty nineteen, it became clear that Noel
Speaker 2: was developing a different view of her mom and David's relationship. Now, remember,
Speaker 2: in the press conference, Chief Slaughter talked about all the
Speaker 2: evidence that police took from the scene. They talked about
Speaker 2: DNA testing, But some of the things that law enforcement
Speaker 2: have said since then have continued to lead me to
Speaker 2: believe that Dan probably won't be the key to this case. Now,
Speaker 2: this could be for a couple of reasons. It could
Speaker 2: be because whoever killed this ones wore gloves and was
Speaker 2: super careful. That's a possibility. But it's also possible that
Speaker 2: whoever killed this ones with someone who had been inside
Speaker 2: the home before, maybe a family member or a friend,
Speaker 2: someone who would have had a reason for their DNA
Speaker 2: to be present in there. That's also a possibility I've considered.
Speaker 2: In a later press conference, Detective Kinnicki, who became the
Speaker 2: lead investigator on the case, seemed to allude to this.
Speaker 2: He said, quote some cases are made on DNA or
Speaker 2: fingerprints or ballistics. I think this is going to come
Speaker 2: back to good old fashioned police work end quote. Police
Speaker 2: say several times this was not a random home invasion,
Speaker 2: and Chief Slaughter also said something that alluded to money
Speaker 2: being involved. He said, quote, while they didn't live a
Speaker 2: lavish lifestyle, both of them had investments end quote. So again,
Speaker 2: what was their net worth? Were they an elderly couple
Speaker 2: who lived simply? Was there a ton of money being
Speaker 2: hidden somewhere? What was going on? There are at least
Speaker 2: two versions of the story. David Swan's daughter, Julie Swan,
Speaker 2: publicly spoke out. She said that her dad was quote
Speaker 2: the type of person who was true to his word
Speaker 2: end quote. She said he was a successful accountant and
Speaker 2: he was generous with money. But Mina's daughter Noel, in
Speaker 2: her lawsuit, alleged something very different. She seemed to say
Speaker 2: in her lawsuit that David withheld money, that he was
Speaker 2: kind of cheap, and that he had done some business
Speaker 2: deals that had been, in her opinion, a.
Speaker 1: Little bit shady.
Speaker 2: She alleged that he had been controlling her mother's finances,
Speaker 2: and she said that she had discovered a lot of
Speaker 2: things in David's background that she was not.
Speaker 1: Aware of, so let's take a deeper look.
Speaker 2: At some of these allegations. On June twenty four, twenty nineteen,
Speaker 2: Noel filed her laws suit. She asked for compensation from
Speaker 2: David's estate for fourteen different items she listed there around
Speaker 2: half a million dollars in total. Stephen Swann said from
Speaker 2: the beginning that these allegations were ridiculous, that the estate
Speaker 2: did not owe that money, that his father and Mina
Speaker 2: had kept their finances separate. One of the items Noel
Speaker 2: said she had an issue with was a promisory note.
Speaker 2: It was signed in two thousand and six by David. Apparently,
Speaker 2: Mina Swan had homeowner's insurance on her home and David
Speaker 2: wanted her to drop the homeowner's insurance policy.
Speaker 1: He thought it was too expensive.
Speaker 2: So what happened was he signed this promissory note in
Speaker 2: two thousand and six saying he promised to pay twenty
Speaker 2: five hundred dollars to Mina every year and to put
Speaker 2: that money in an account so that if anything ever
Speaker 2: did happen, they would have money to do the home repairs.
Speaker 1: She agreed to.
Speaker 2: This, and they signed an agreement. He said he would
Speaker 2: deposit money every year that would equal what the premium
Speaker 2: would have been. If they ever needed that money, they
Speaker 2: would take it out of that fund, and David agreed
Speaker 2: to cover any amount that was in excess of that. Now,
Speaker 2: there's nothing necessarily alarming about that at all. David may
Speaker 2: have been totally right, it may not have been worth
Speaker 2: the money to have that insurance policy, but it's obvious
Speaker 2: from what Noel said in her lawsuit that she believed
Speaker 2: this was about more than that. She obviously had issues
Speaker 2: with David controlling her mother, so at first those payments
Speaker 2: were put into an account Noel said her mom had
Speaker 2: access to it. Then in June of twenty eighteen, the
Speaker 2: balance was transferred into a new Charles Schwab account. Mina
Speaker 2: was the joint owner of that account, but later Noel
Speaker 2: claimed the money was moved into another account, an account
Speaker 2: that only David had access to, and that wasn't Noel's
Speaker 2: only complaint. Noel also alleged that David failed to make
Speaker 2: payments that he agreed to make to her mother. Basically,
Speaker 2: she claimed David had been trying to hide money from
Speaker 2: her mother. Again, Steven Swann.
Speaker 1: Said this entire lawsuit was bogus.
Speaker 2: And in the end the court appeared to side with
Speaker 2: him because Noel's lawsuit was dismissed. But I want to
Speaker 2: dive into this a little bit because through Noell and
Speaker 2: Stephen's depositions we get two drastically different versions of this
Speaker 2: marriage that it seemed so perfect to the outside world.
Speaker 2: It's one of the only ways I can think of
Speaker 2: of really getting behind closed doors and finding out what's
Speaker 2: going on. Noel and her sister were both deposed, and
Speaker 2: they said David made their mother feel unsafe. They painted
Speaker 2: a completely different picture of the relationship between David.
Speaker 1: And Minus Wan.
Speaker 2: And again, I have no idea if any of this
Speaker 2: is true. They could be completely wrong. We just don't know.
Speaker 2: All I'm saying is that when we're trying to figure
Speaker 2: out victimology, it is crucial to understand how family members
Speaker 2: and friends view this relationship between David and Mina. Remember
Speaker 2: what I said about David's obituary and there being another
Speaker 2: woman who showed up in court records but who was
Speaker 2: not mentioned to the obituary. Well, the deposition seemed to
Speaker 2: confirm that, according to Noel's deposition, David was actually married
Speaker 2: to someone else when he got together with Mina. Noel
Speaker 2: alleged that David had moved in on their mom very
Speaker 2: quickly after their father's death. So it's interesting because the
Speaker 2: initial financial dispute that Noel had seemed to be solved
Speaker 2: pretty quickly. According to the information that Steven Swan provided
Speaker 2: the court, Noel had made a mistake. She had been
Speaker 2: double counting on certain accounts. She thought there was money
Speaker 2: there that didn't exist. He also said that even if
Speaker 2: there was money in a homeowner's insurance account that belonged
Speaker 2: to Minus one after David and Mina's death, he said
Speaker 2: Noel would have had no right to that money. The
Speaker 2: money was for homeowner's insurance and in the end they
Speaker 2: didn't need to use it for that reason. And again,
Speaker 2: the fact that there was fighting over potential inheritance money
Speaker 2: is not uncommon unfortunately. So in the end, David Swan's
Speaker 2: estate was settled, but the court cases involving minus estate
Speaker 2: are still ongoing. I found something else interesting in this lawsuit.
Speaker 2: I found out Minus Swan's estate was frozen by police. Now,
Speaker 2: apparently this has something to do with Florida's slayer statute,
Speaker 2: and that's a law that's on the books. That basically
Speaker 2: prevents anyone who is related to the deceased from profiting
Speaker 2: off of the death if they are believed to have
Speaker 2: had anything to do with it. I don't know all
Speaker 2: the legalities of that law, but it is mentioned in
Speaker 2: the deposition, and that is the reason why the estate
Speaker 2: was frozen. So meanwhile, while all this stuff is going
Speaker 2: on in the background, the family has publicly appealed for help.
Speaker 2: Stephen has told reporters that he does believe that these
Speaker 2: murders were about money. He said, quote, I already have
Speaker 2: six theories of the case. Don't know if any of
Speaker 2: them are correct, But what do you always hear? Follow
Speaker 2: the money end quote. Seven months after the murders, police
Speaker 2: reached out again again. The detective in charge of the investigation,
Speaker 2: Brian Kinicki, told the Tampa Bay Times that they had
Speaker 2: multiple detectives looking at the case.
Speaker 1: They looked at.
Speaker 2: Hundreds of pieces of evidence, and he said, quote, we're
Speaker 2: kind of at a point right now where we're really
Speaker 2: reaching out to our community and the communities that our
Speaker 2: victims were previously from to see if anybody has any
Speaker 2: information about their backgrounds, family issues, business issues that might
Speaker 2: be pertinent to our investigation.
Speaker 1: It's very very rare for.
Speaker 2: Us to have an elderly couple or any type of
Speaker 2: homicide occurring where we don't have an obvious suspect right away.
Speaker 2: You know, typically they're domestic related or drug gang related
Speaker 2: end quote. This is interesting to me for a couple
Speaker 2: of reasons. First of all, I just want to say
Speaker 2: I think it's great that the police department continues to
Speaker 2: provide updates even if they don't have that much information,
Speaker 2: just keeping it in the public eye, allowing the families
Speaker 2: of boys. I think it's a great thing because a
Speaker 2: lot of police departments don't do that. Secondly, though, I
Speaker 2: think it's very telling police are admitting they're basically to
Speaker 2: dead end. They're saying they need help. I wonder how
Speaker 2: many of their detectives have experience with what I call
Speaker 2: fraud detection homicides. I've talked a lot on my other
Speaker 2: podcast about red collar cases, and one of the most
Speaker 2: important things in a potential fraud detection homicide is finding
Speaker 2: out everything that you can about the finances of the
Speaker 2: deceased and finding people who are close to them, who
Speaker 2: they have financial relationships with. And the question ask is
Speaker 2: not necessarily always what would a potential killer gain from
Speaker 2: someone's death. But at the time of death, did they
Speaker 2: have a desperate financial situation?
Speaker 1: What did they believe that they were about to lose?
Speaker 2: So that's what I've been trying to figure out. So
Speaker 2: let's take a closer look at some of David and
Speaker 2: Mina's other family relationships. Noel has been deposed multiple times
Speaker 2: for the litigation, and she's actually shed a lot of
Speaker 2: light on the relationship between David, her mother, and her siblings.
Speaker 2: Noel said both she and her husband worked in the
Speaker 2: banking industry. Several years before the killing, she moved back
Speaker 2: to an area of Florida near her mom, so she
Speaker 2: saw Mina a lot. She got to spend a lot
Speaker 2: of time with her. David's children lived in Chicago and Oregon,
Speaker 2: so farther away, but both of Mina's other sons, William
Speaker 2: and John, also lived in Florida. In her deposition, Noel
Speaker 2: said she had learned that David Swan was not, according
Speaker 2: to her, everything he appeared to be, even with really
Speaker 2: simple things. For example, David was a serious bridge player.
Speaker 2: She said in her deposition that when David went to
Speaker 2: play bridge every day that he quote lied to my
Speaker 2: mother for twenty years about where he was every day
Speaker 2: end quote. So now I'm wondering what was he supposedly
Speaker 2: lying about that. She believed he was playing bridge somewhere else.
Speaker 2: Was there something else going on there? According to the depositions,
Speaker 2: there were also other issues between this perfect couple and
Speaker 2: some of their other children. In two thousand and nine,
Speaker 2: David Swan apparently had an issue with his son, David A. Swan,
Speaker 2: and they weren't speaking as a result of that, and
Speaker 2: according to the court documents, this dispute they had was
Speaker 2: about money. During the deposition, something else came out. Noel
Speaker 2: apparently told people that the police considered her and possibly
Speaker 2: one of her siblings suspects. At one point, the attorney
Speaker 2: questioning Noel asks you did volunteer that you were aware,
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, remaining as a suspect by the Clearwater
Speaker 2: Police Department in this matter. She answers, we heard it
Speaker 2: from a neighbor, didn't hear it from the police, And
Speaker 2: we talked before about the freeze that police had put
Speaker 2: on these funds. Noel talks about trying to remove the
Speaker 2: freeze from those funds and get access to them. She said, quote,
Speaker 2: so it sounds like to remove the freeze. I need
Speaker 2: to solve the case that the police are incapable of solving.
Speaker 1: End quote.
Speaker 2: I can completely understand her frustration here because it's been years,
Speaker 2: and naturally I can understand why she would want access
Speaker 2: to her mother's estate. At the same time, I can
Speaker 2: see the other side, the police don't want to get
Speaker 2: this wrong, and they want to keep those funds locked
Speaker 2: down until they know exactly what happened. It also emerged
Speaker 2: in the depositions that Mina's son, John Wolfe, was terminally ill.
Speaker 2: Noel said John had stage four cancer non Hodgkins lymphoma,
Speaker 2: and that over the years, David and Mina had been
Speaker 2: helping him financially. Noel said that John had a lot
Speaker 2: of health issues they had left him basically unable to work.
Speaker 2: She said he'd had the lifetime maximum of chemotherapy over
Speaker 2: the years, and eventually his illness meant he got put
Speaker 2: on disability. So for several years John lived at a
Speaker 2: property that was owned by Mina on New York Avenue
Speaker 2: in Clearwater. Noel said John didn't pay rent, but for
Speaker 2: a long time he did a lot of work on
Speaker 2: the property. She said it really wasn't in very good shape,
Speaker 2: and since he did construction type work, he helped fix
Speaker 2: it up. Noel said that they needed to sell the
Speaker 2: home at some point, and also John was getting sicker
Speaker 2: and he couldn't really keep up with the physical labor
Speaker 2: that he needed to do on that property. So Noel
Speaker 2: said she found John an apartment for around one thousand
Speaker 2: dollars a month. She gave him emergency distributions from their
Speaker 2: mother's estate to pay for his rent and his moving costs,
Speaker 2: which meant that as of January twenty twenty two, ninety
Speaker 2: two thousand dollars had been taken out of Minus one's estate.
Speaker 2: Just over fifty seven thousand dollars of that was emergency
Speaker 2: distributions to John. In the deposition, Noel said police have
Speaker 2: told her that they believe that her brother John is
Speaker 2: faking his cancer. She said, quote, the police have accused
Speaker 2: him of not being sick, which is insulting to those
Speaker 2: of us who live with this every day watching him.
Speaker 2: Were focused on keeping him alive.
Speaker 1: End quote.
Speaker 2: She also says that to her knowledge, John is still
Speaker 2: a suspect, but she says that her brother William apparently
Speaker 2: is not what emerged during this deposition was a picture
Speaker 2: of John's finances, and we know that he lived in
Speaker 2: Minuswan's house for several years with his son. His son
Speaker 2: was sick at one point and had to go to
Speaker 2: children's hospital. But Noel said that a year or two
Speaker 2: before David and Mine's deaths, circumstances started to change. She
Speaker 2: said that there was apparently a buyer who was interested
Speaker 2: in the New York Avenue house, the one that John
Speaker 2: was living in. She said that a couple days later,
Speaker 2: after this buyer contacted David and Mina, David went over
Speaker 2: to John's house and quote started screaming at him and
Speaker 2: telling him he had to leave and move out in
Speaker 2: seven days end quote. Now, at this point in the deposition,
Speaker 2: the attorney questioning Noel starts asking her about her mom's will.
Speaker 2: Noel said that her understanding was that David would take
Speaker 2: care of her mother they would keep their finances separate,
Speaker 2: as we've discussed. But Noel alleged that she'd learned a
Speaker 2: lot about David since her mom's death. She said what
Speaker 2: she had learned had changed her.
Speaker 1: View of him.
Speaker 2: She said that before Mina got involved with David, that
Speaker 2: her mom had a long time financial broker, but Noel
Speaker 2: said David allegedly pressured her mom to get rid of
Speaker 2: this woman, who Noel said was a family friend. She
Speaker 2: said that in twenty twelve, this woman had witnessed David
Speaker 2: put his hand over Miya's mouth and that he would
Speaker 2: throw huge temper tantrums every time they would get in
Speaker 2: arguments about money. Noel said that David tried to control
Speaker 2: her mother financially, and Noel said since David's death, she
Speaker 2: looked into some court records.
Speaker 1: She said that she had.
Speaker 2: Found records from Illinois that showed a lot of loans,
Speaker 2: mortgage foreclosures, and what she called unusual behavior in David's records.
Speaker 2: Noel said she had a bad feeling about David because,
Speaker 2: in her opinion, he had kind of taken advantage of
Speaker 2: her mother when she was in a vulnerable position after
Speaker 2: her father passed away. She said, quote he moved into
Speaker 2: mom's house weeks after Dad's funeral end quote. So, reading
Speaker 2: between the lines from Noel's deposition, it appears that she
Speaker 2: believed that David did kind of a bait and switch
Speaker 2: on her mom, that he had presented himself as this
Speaker 2: amazing businessman who was going to love Mina and take
Speaker 2: care of her, and that he swept Mina off her
Speaker 2: feet and took her on trips. I must her this
Speaker 2: great life, but then in the end turned out to
Speaker 2: be very controlling with money. Noel claims her mom was
Speaker 2: not allowed to have a cell phone, or to open
Speaker 2: the mail or to answer the phone. She claimed that
Speaker 2: David had isolated her mother from her friends. Now, again,
Speaker 2: this is only one side of the story. David's son,
Speaker 2: Steven Swan has said publicly and in court documents that
Speaker 2: these allegations are completely ridiculous and obviously this is only
Speaker 2: one person's view of what was going on in this relationship.
Speaker 2: But in my opinion, we absolutely need to find out
Speaker 2: more about what was actually going on in that marriage.
Speaker 2: We really need to talk to the family and Minuswan's friends.
Speaker 2: Six months after Minah and David were found dead, the
Speaker 2: families and law enforcement did a public update. Noel made
Speaker 2: a plea for new information.
Speaker 4: We are looking very very much for answers. We know
Speaker 4: that there's answers out there.
Speaker 5: We know that you know someone out there knows something,
Speaker 5: and I hope they'll share that information. It's extremely important
Speaker 5: to us. We wanted to be worn out there as
Speaker 5: a reminder that Mom was loved and.
Speaker 4: Very much missed.
Speaker 6: And now the one thing that could not help, excuse me,
Speaker 6: the one thing that could help is finding the answers
Speaker 6: to what happened. So please, if anyone knows something, if
Speaker 6: anyone hears anything, if they've seen anything, please please call
Speaker 6: it tipline.
Speaker 5: It's very important, dumbhele back. We would really love to
Speaker 5: find the answers in this case.
Speaker 4: We would like to have our piece. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Noel and her brother William have spoken up during these
Speaker 2: press conferences also made a brief statement. He said, I'm
Speaker 2: very ill and I need some closure before I pass.
Speaker 2: If you know something, say something. Billboards have been posted
Speaker 2: across the Tampa Bay area asking for information, and there's
Speaker 2: been several rewards offered. Right now, the reward is up
Speaker 2: to fifty three thousand dollars. In twenty twenty, there was
Speaker 2: another update in the case. Again, this was a little
Speaker 2: bit bizarre. This is something I'd not seen before, because
Speaker 2: in September of twenty twenty, the Clearwater Police Department released
Speaker 2: crime scene photos in an attempt to help the case.
Speaker 2: It was on the second anniversary two years no arrests.
Speaker 2: These photos, though, are a little bit bizarre because they're
Speaker 2: not actually of the crime scene. They're of the exterior
Speaker 2: of the house, and they're these very mundane photos. I'm
Speaker 2: going to provide a link to those because I'm really
Speaker 2: hoping that someone out there will look at these and
Speaker 2: they will see something that I miss or that the
Speaker 2: police miss. One of the photos is a close up
Speaker 2: shot of the Swan's front door of their house. You
Speaker 2: can see the newspapers in front of their residence. There's
Speaker 2: a Tampa Bay Times newspaper on top and some other
Speaker 2: papers in a clear plastic bag. I noticed, though, that
Speaker 2: the newspapers are neatly lying one on top of the
Speaker 2: other next to the door. My first thought was usually
Speaker 2: paper boys throw things in the yard in a kind
Speaker 2: of crazy way, So who stacked those papers there that neatly?
Speaker 2: There could be an explanation for it. It could be the
Speaker 2: woman who knocked on the door to try to get
Speaker 2: the Swan's flyers, or one of the neighbors.
Speaker 1: But why would police not say that.
Speaker 2: I zoomed in on the headline and the newspaper on
Speaker 2: top was the Tampa Bay Times. I couldn't see the date,
Speaker 2: but I googled the headline to figure out this was
Speaker 2: the Tampa Bay Times from Saturday, September twenty ninth, twenty eighteen,
Speaker 2: So we have Saturday's newspaper, presumably on top of Fridays.
Speaker 2: Another photo shows the swan's mailbox, a white wooden box
Speaker 2: with the address ten thirty three printed on it in
Speaker 2: black letters. There's another picture of the open mailbox with
Speaker 2: letters inside it. It's just a couple of envelopes and
Speaker 2: what appears to be jump mail. I can't read what's
Speaker 2: on the envelopes, and I've really tried. I've zoomed in
Speaker 2: a lot. Then there's a photo of a car in
Speaker 2: a garage and pictures of the screened in back porch
Speaker 2: are what we call in Florida the lunai with the pool.
Speaker 2: But there's nothing in the picture that I can see
Speaker 2: that stands out, just a screen door and a closer
Speaker 2: look inside a screened in porch. The water is blue
Speaker 2: and clear in the pool. I go back to what
Speaker 2: Chief of Police Dan Slaughter told media. Based on the
Speaker 2: time they were last seen, it's likely that David and
Speaker 2: Minus one were killed between three pm on Thursday and
Speaker 2: three pm on the following day.
Speaker 1: Friday.
Speaker 2: Officers are asking neighbors and friends of the couple to
Speaker 2: focus on that twenty four hour window. They say if
Speaker 2: anything unusual stands out, regardless of how small it is.
Speaker 1: They want to hear from you.
Speaker 2: If you know anything about this case, please contact the
Speaker 2: Clearwater Police. The number to call there is seven two
Speaker 2: seven five six ' two four one four one. In
Speaker 2: the meantime, I'm going to keep following up on this
Speaker 2: case because I absolutely believe that the answers are out there.
Speaker 2: There's something that someone miss There's a missing piece of
Speaker 2: the puzzle, and we just have to work together to
Speaker 2: try and figure it out. I'm Catherine Townsend. This is
Speaker 2: Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen Gone Murder Line is a
Speaker 2: production of School of Humans and iHeart Podcasts. It's written
Speaker 2: and narrated by me Catherine Townsend and produced by Gabby Watts.
Speaker 2: Music is by Ben Sale. Executive producers are Virginia Prescott,
Speaker 2: Brandon Barr, and Elsie Crowley. If you have a case
Speaker 2: you'd like me and my team to look into, you
Speaker 2: can reach out to us at our Helen Gone Murder
Speaker 2: Line at six seven eight seven four four six one
Speaker 2: four or five that six seven eight, seven, four, four, six, one,
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Speaker 1: School of Humans,