Latest on the show · Episode 11 — streaming now

Like Father, Like Son — The Murder of Ethel Story

A woman burned to death in the storeroom behind her own house in Durant, Oklahoma, behind a door that latched from the outside. Her fourteen-year-old son heard her calling to be let out. A coroner's jury ruled accidental fire twenty minutes after her funeral began across town, and for three hundred and fifty-six days nothing happened at all. What finally reopened it was not a detective — it was the neighbours, counting how many other people in that family had died. Her husband got life. He was never charged over his three sons.

Durant, Bryan County, Oklahoma1880 → 198713 clippings66 people

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On the Show

Every episode · A case file behind it

Ep01

The Honor Slaying — The Merrick-Downs Case

A highway officer empties a .45 into a family houseguest, and Oklahoma weighs the "unwritten law." Oklahoma City, 1933.

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Ep02

Down in the Cellar

Twelve-year-old Novella Winkle vanishes from an isolated Tennessee farm — and is found beneath a nailed-shut trap door. Greene County, 1926.

📖 Now a book — see below

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Ep03

The Confession — The Murder of Vernard Fearn

The "Phantom Gun Woman," a charge never seen before or since — and a grand jury that ignored it all. Canton, Ohio, 1928.

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Ep04

Two Shots Near Adams — The Death of Chief Tod Payne

A beloved police chief dies wrestling two teenage car thieves — then the state charges a heart attack as murder. Wisconsin, 1939.

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Ep05–07

The Trunk Murders — Winnie Ruth Judd

The full three-part series: the murders, the trial, the escapes — and the sixty-seven-year shadow. Arizona, 1931.

3 parts

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Ep08–09

Murder or Nothing — The Death of Officer Delbert Beaman

A policeman, his wife, and five dollars — a dying declaration, a blackout on the witness stand, and a jury with no middle verdict. Oklahoma City, 1952.

Part 1 out nowPart 2 — coming soon

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Ep10

The Rattlesnake Murder

A bride found in the fish pond behind her own house, a coroner's jury that refused to choose — and the last man California ever hanged. Los Angeles, 1935.

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Ep11

Like Father, Like Son

A wife burns to death behind a door that latched from the outside, a coroner's jury rules accident twenty minutes after the funeral begins — and a year later the neighbours start counting the family's dead. Durant, Oklahoma, 1938.

Newest episode

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Ep14

Foul Play Is Not Suspected

A field geologist drives into open desert in the rain and is gone. His Jeep turns up twenty-six days later, rolled, still in drive — and his clothes are scattered up the hillside above it, inside out. Buckeye, Arizona, 2021, and still open.

Open caseCase file up before the episode

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Also in the archive — earlier cases, re-filed here

Ep—

The Sirloin Stockade Murders

Nine dead in twenty-four days, a paper sack full of pistols, and the one person still alive who was standing in that freezer. Oklahoma City & McClain County, 1978.

Parole recommended 8/11/26

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Ep—

Brenda Andrew & James Pavatt — Murder of Rob Andrew

The only woman on Oklahoma's death row, and a landmark Supreme Court ruling over "sex-shaming" tactics. Oklahoma City, 2001.

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Ep—

The Murder of Jenipher "JJ" Gilbert

A 1984 abduction, a hair-and-fiber conviction, and the forensic scandal that shadowed it. Midwest City, Oklahoma.

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The Case Files

The research behind every episode

Open any file to read the full investigation — original newspaper sources, timelines, the cast involved, and the evidence on record.

No. AZ-2021-014

Foul Play Is Not Suspected — The Disappearance of Daniel Robinson

Buckeye, Maricopa County, Arizona2021 → open

Daniel Robinson, twenty-four, drove away from a water well site outside Buckeye on the morning of June 23, 2021 and has never been seen again. A rancher found his Jeep twenty-six days later in a ravine three and a half miles out — rolled, every airbag fired, still in drive, his phone and keys and wallet inside. His clothes were scattered up the hillside above it, inside out, the wallet still in the jeans. The department's position is that foul play is not suspected. The 128-page file explains the driving, the crash, the phone and the timeline. Nobody has explained the hillside.

17 Quotes6 Principals128pp Police file

No. OK-1938-011

Like Father, Like Son — The Murder of Ethel Story

Durant, Bryan County, Oklahoma1880 → 1987

Ethel Story burned to death in the storeroom behind her own house in Durant, behind a door that latched from the outside. The coroner's jury ruled accidental fire twenty minutes after her funeral began. For three hundred and fifty-six days nothing happened — then neighbourhood talk about the other deaths in that family reached the authorities, and a county attorney told the Associated Press he had an airtight case and read out the insurance figures — $2,460 on Ethel, and more than a thousand dollars on each of three dead sons. Her husband was convicted of murder and died in prison. He was never charged over any of the sons.

13 Clippings66 Persons4 Opinions

No. CA-1935-010

The Rattlesnake Murder — The Death of Mary Emma James

Los Angeles County, California1932 → 1942

A barber's wife was found face down in the fish pond behind her own house, and a coroner's jury split five to two rather than call it accident, suicide or homicide. The district attorney's office walked away. Eight months later the case came back — and produced a marriage ceremony that was never legal, rattlesnakes bought from three dealers, an accomplice who talked, and a wife in Colorado who had drowned in a bathtub twelve weeks after her wedding. Robert S. James was the last man judicially hanged in California.

36 Clippings4 Principals2 Opinions

No. OK-1978-009

The Sirloin Stockade Murders — Nine Dead in Twenty-Four Days

Oklahoma City & McClain County, Oklahoma1978 → 2026

Three drifters faked a breakdown on Interstate 35 and shot a family of three who stopped to help. Twenty-four days later they shot six restaurant workers in a walk-in freezer in south Oklahoma City. Nobody connected the two crimes for nearly eight months — until a ten-year-old boy found three pistols in a paper sack. Roger Dale Stafford was executed in 1995; his brother died in a motorcycle wreck six days after the massacre and was never charged. Verna Stafford is the only person still alive who was in that freezer, and the only reason anyone knows what happened in it.

24 Sources43 Persons19 Evidence

No. OK-1952-008

Murder or Nothing — The Death of Officer Delbert Beaman

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma1950 → 1954

Scoutcar officer Delbert Beaman was shot with his own .38 in his garage apartment during a quarrel over $5 — and died naming his wife, while asking that nothing happen to her. Her defense: epileptic since eleven, she blacked out at the moment of the shot. Asked to tell the jury what happened, she froze on the stand. With manslaughter taken off the table — "murder or nothing" — a jury of seven women and five men acquitted her in three hours. Then his family sued her for his life insurance.

21 Sources21 Persons21 Evidence

No. AZ-1931-007

The Trunk Murders — Winnie Ruth Judd

Phoenix → Los Angeles1931 → 1998

Two leaking trunks in a Los Angeles baggage room held the bodies of Ann LeRoi and Sammy Samuelson. Winnie Ruth Judd was condemned to hang without ever speaking at her trial — and when she finally named lumberman Jack Halloran from the stand, a judge freed him because he believed her: trying him would be "an idle gesture." Found insane 23 days before the rope, she spent 40 years in the state hospital and died in 1998 — 67 years to the day after her surrender. All three episode parts on one file.

23 Sources21 Persons75 Evidence

No. WI-1939-006

Two Shots Near Adams — The Death of Chief Roland "Tod" Payne

Adams County, Wisconsin1939 → 1944

A beloved police chief who spent 21 years talking wayward boys straight died of a heart attack wrestling two teenage car thieves in the back of a prisoner car — his body unmarked, the survivor handcuffed to him in a ditch. After a two-state manhunt ended with bloodhounds and deer hunters in the snow, Wisconsin charged a 17-year-old with murder for a heart that gave out. Then the state walked away from its own charge.

22 Articles14 Persons27 Evidence

No. OH-1928-005

The Confession — The Murder of Vernard Fearn

Canton & Waco, Ohio1928 → 1929

The "Phantom Gun Woman" shot coal operator Vernard Fearn at his own front door, lived seven days as a contented housewife, and killed herself with the same Colt .38 as her husband drove her to surrender — minutes after he said she "might get the electric chair." Prosecutors answered with a charge never seen before or since: "moral murder." The grand jury heard forty witnesses, and ignored the case.

10 Articles13 Persons11 Evidence

No. OK-1984-003

The Murder of Jenipher 'JJ' Gilbert

Midwest City, Oklahoma1984 → 2004

Twelve-year-old JJ Gilbert was abducted after a 1984 football game in Midwest City and found murdered near Harrah. Repeat offender Dewey George Moore was convicted on hair-and-fiber evidence and sentenced to death plus 999 years — a conviction later shadowed by the Joyce Gilchrist forensic scandal and DA Bob Macy's misconduct.

12 Persons13 Evidence7 Notes

No. OK-2001-002

Brenda Andrew & James Pavatt — Murder of Rob Andrew

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma2001 → 2026

Estranged wife Brenda Andrew and her lover James Pavatt — the insurance agent who sold Rob Andrew an $800,000 policy — were each convicted and sentenced to death for the 2001 shotgun murder of Rob in his garage. Brenda, the only woman on Oklahoma's death row, won a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2025 over the prosecution's "sex-shaming" tactics.

15 Persons10 Evidence8 Notes

No. OK-1933-001

The Honor Slaying — The Merrick-Downs Case

Oklahoma City, OklahomaApr → May 1933

Highway officer E. Percy Merrick empties a .45 into family houseguest Henry Downs at a filling station. The press called it an "honor slaying," but the judge reminded the jury that "the unwritten law is not in effect in Oklahoma." Merrick was convicted of first-degree manslaughter.

11 Articles14 Persons11 Evidence

No. TN-1926-004

Down in the Cellar

Greene County, Tennessee1926 → 1927

Twelve-year-old Novella Winkle vanished from the isolated Tipton farm near Middle Creek; days later her body was found beneath a nailed-shut trap door in a potato cellar under the house. Alma Tipton confessed she "always wanted to kill somebody" — she and husband Bob were both convicted at Rogersville and sentenced to 23 years, and Alma was later declared insane and sent to the asylum.

24 Articles24 Persons22 Evidence

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Down in the Cellar — The Murder of Novella Winkle, by Trevor Shelby (book cover)

New · In Print

The Book

Down in the Cellar

The Murder of Novella Winkle · Forgotten True Crime · Book One · by Trevor Shelby

In August 1926, wire services across America gasped over an isolated log house in the hills of Greene County, Tennessee — a potato cellar, a nailed-shut trap door, and a twelve-year-old girl who vanished beneath the floorboards. Then the news cycle moved on. The press couldn't even preserve her name.

Built from the same archive as Episode 2 — period newspaper coverage, trial reporting from Rogersville, and family records — the book tells Novella's story in full: the crime, the manhunt, the trial, and the bright, living child the headlines forgot.

"This book was written so that you would know her differently."— from the foreword

Get it on Amazon Open the case file Hear Episode 2

Available in Kindle & paperback

About Section 29

Section 29 is the research desk behind Forgotten True Crime. Every episode starts here — deep-dive archival research from primary court records, coroner inquests, period newspapers, and vital records, focused on the victims whose stories were lost, overlooked, or distorted by time.