Alec Baldwin’s manslaughter charges dropped; Lori Vallow’s son testifies against her – TCD Sidebar
In this episode of True Crime Daily The Sidebar Podcast
Angenette Levy joins host Joshua Ritter to break down the biggest cases making headlines across the nation. They discuss prosecutors’ decision to dismiss Alec Baldwin’s charges in the fatal “Rust” shooting, two Iowa teens pleading guilty to murder for the bludgeoning death of their teacher, and the surviving son of Lori Vallow testifying against his mother in her ongoing murder trial.
Tweet your questions for future episodes to Joshua Ritter using the hashtag #TCDSidebar.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:00:10]
Hello and welcome to The Sidebar presented by True Crime Daily, taking you inside the courtrooms of high profile and notorious cases from across the country. I'm your host, Joshua Ritter. I'm a criminal defense lawyer based here in Los Angeles and previously an LA County prosecutor for nearly a decade. You can find me at Joshuaritter.com. We are recording this on Friday, April 21st, 2023.
In this week's episode, two Iowa teens plead guilty to first degree murder for the beating death of their high school Spanish teacher, allegedly after receiving a bad grade. Also, we continue to follow Lori Vallow's ongoing trial as her surviving son takes the stand against his mother for the murder of her two younger children.
But first, breaking news as prosecutors drop charges against actor Alec Baldwin for his role in the on-set shooting that left Rust cinematographer Halyna Hutchins dead. Today, we are joined by Angenette Levy, a reporter, correspondent and host with the Law & Crime Network. Angenette, welcome.
Angenette Levy:
[00:01:12]
Hey. Thank you for having me, Josh.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:01:15]
We were looking forward to this. For listeners who aren't familiar with your work, could you please tell us a little bit about your background?
Angenette Levy:
[00:01:23]
Well, I started working in news. I'm going to have to say the year, I guess, right? 2002. Yeah. Interned before that, right. Like we all did in college. But I started out working in local news, moved from the Cincinnati Market to the Green Bay Market back to the Cincinnati Market, covered crime in courts for many years.
Really loved covering crime and trials and politics but left local news looking for a new adventure and a new challenge and landed at the Law & Crime Network. So it's been a good fit. And, you know, I just love a good mystery. I love the law, learning about it. So I'm not a lawyer. A lot of people think I am, but I'm still looking to find some time in my life to maybe go to law school one day.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:02:15]
Well, you are one of --
Angenette Levy:
[00:02:18]
Not sure it will happen.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:02:18]
Right. Not sure you want the expense of it all either. But you are one of my favorites on Law & Crime. I always look forward to when you are covering things because you have such an interesting take on these cases. So we're curious to hear what you have to say about the ones that we're talking about today. So let's jump right in.
First, we go to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where less than three months after officially announcing involuntary manslaughter charges against actor Alec Baldwin for the fatal on-set shooting of Rust cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. In a shocking turn of events, Santa Fe officials have announced that all charges against the actor will be dropped.
Baldwin and an actor and producer on the film had vehemently denied any wrongdoing in the fatal shooting, even claiming that he hadn't pulled the trigger, though that claim was later challenged by an FBI forensic investigation of the weapon. More on that later.
The investigation and subsequent prosecution was fraught with difficulties from the onset, with prosecutors taking over a year to bring charges after requesting hundreds of thousands of dollars of emergency funds as they continued to build their case. Shortly after announcing charges, New Mexico prosecutors were forced to amend a firearm enhancement because the charge, get this, wasn't even a part of the state's statute at the time of the shooting.
This was followed just last month by a third party charged in the shooting, Assistant Director David Halls pleading no contest to a misdemeanor charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon. He was sentenced to six months of unsupervised probation, along with 24 hours of community service and was ordered to pay a $500 fine.
Finally, both the special prosecutor who first brought the case and the elected DA stepped down from handling the case, which brings us to this week's surprising announcement. Notably, the film's armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, will still face involuntary manslaughter charges for the cinematographer's 2021 death. Meanwhile, the Rust production has resumed filming this month at Yellowstone Ranch in Montana. All right, Angenette, jump right in. Was this shocking to you?
Angenette Levy:
[00:04:25]
Not completely and not really. And I'll explain to you why.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:04:30]
Please.
Angenette Levy:
[00:04:30]
From the very beginning, when the prosecutors, the special prosecutor and the elected prosecutor filed this charge, I found it to be very odd because typically prosecutors do not comment on a case unless a charge has been filed. That didn't happen in this case.
There was a media tour in which the two women went on the circuit and granted interviews to a lot of the big networks, the Legacy Media, Fox News, CNN, wouldn't -- declined my request for an interview. Not sure why. But, you know, we had talked about this, Jesse and I did.
And I said to him at the time, why are they doing this? Why? There's no paperwork filed. There's no charge filed. They're announcing that they are going to file charges. That's not the typical order of things. And I'm not sure it's actually even ethical. So that seemed like mistake number one.
Then they filed the charge. And there's a problem with the charge, as you pointed out. So that was strike number two. Then, you know, there's all this questioning about whether or not they really have the goods, whether or not they can prove it.
Then there's challenges to Andrea Reeb, the special prosecutor, being on the case because of a conflict of interest. Alec Baldwin's lawyers bring that up. She's like, I'm out of here. Maybe she saw problems with the case. I don't know. But she ducked out and stepped down.
And now special prosecutors come in and they say, you know, we've got some new information. We've got to take care of this. We have to investigate. We can't meet the time deadline. So maybe they came in and looked at this and said, I'm not so sure about that. There's some reporting out there that I'm trying to confirm that this gun may have actually been altered to malfunction. I don't recall the FBI report on the gun mentioning that.
But if that is the case, because this was a prop gun, that's a big problem for the prosecution and big problem for the state. So I did not find this shocking. Also, Josh, we were hearing rumblings that there may not be a hearing, so we couldn't get anybody to say anything, but that was in the last week and a half or so.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:06:43]
Interesting. Yeah. I completely agree with you about this kind of media blitz that they did. It just -- I don't know if it's unethical, but it seemed unseen.
Angenette Levy:
[00:06:55]
It didn't smell -- yes, it didn't smell right.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:06:57]
Unprofessional. I mean.
Angenette Levy:
[00:06:59]
Yes.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:07:00]
Having been a prosecutor, they scared us to death about talking to the press because they were like, listen, your job is taking place in the courtroom. Let things hash out in there. That's where you have to speak about these cases. Maybe after a case is all done, you can make a comment to media or something.
But routinely, you see large prosecuting offices like Los Angeles that if they're questioned about things, they say, listen, we're going to let this play out in court. We don't want to affect the potential jury pool. We don't want to make comments about a case beforehand.
But they not only made comments about it, but like talked about their strategy, talked about the strength of the case. It just it seemed like they were setting themselves up for this kind of embarrassment that we're now seeing that office experience with the dismissal of this case. I guess that's my next question. Do you think this is a big loss for them? Is this an embarrassment for that office?
Angenette Levy:
[00:07:53]
I think it's a tremendous embarrassment. And even though a special prosecutor was brought in, a new special prosecutor to handle this, the buck stops with the elected prosecutor, Mary Carmack-Altwies. She's the one that went on television along with the first special prosecutor and said, we're going to do this.
I mean, yes, this was a high profile case, no doubt. I mean, everybody wanted to know what the end result was going to be of the investigation. And Halyna Hutchins and her family deserve that. The public deserves to know what happened because it's such a tragedy and it was so preventable, but I thought it was really unseemly. I think she owes her constituents some answers.
And really, if they can't prove the case against Alec Baldwin, it should never have been brought in the first place. And it's not fair to him either. It's not fair to the people of New Mexico who have paid how much money for this investigation. So I think she owes the public an answer, despite the fact that a special prosecutor who is acting independently is handling this because she was in it. She was in it when this charge was filed.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:09:09]
Yeah. Yeah. No, I completely agree with you. I mean, part of what a prosecutor does in making a filing decision isn't, well, let's throw this against the wall and see if it sticks. Let's take a chance on this novel theory that we have of criminal liability and see if anybody buys it.
You're supposed to make the decision of will. The standard is, will this hold up beyond a reasonable doubt in court? And if you don't reach that standard, then you shouldn't file. So I agree with you. You begin to question at this point whether or not they even should have filed the case to begin with.
When I first heard this report of the case being dismissed, my first question was, well, what changed? You had a year to investigate it. What now has changed?
Angenette Levy:
[00:09:52]
Yes.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:09:52]
And you alluded to this, but The Wall Street Journal this morning reported that according to a person with knowledge of the case, the gun was modified before it reached the set in a way that could have allowed it to fire a bullet without the trigger being pulled. If that is true, that's huge. And do you think that was the deciding factor in dismissing this case, if that's true?
Angenette Levy:
[00:10:15]
And if that is true, that's the key phrase there, the key clarifier. Yes. And why didn't we know about this sooner? Because wouldn't the FBI review of the firearm have shown that? So I think that's part of it. Or maybe there's more to this.
As I told you, I'm trying to confirm that reporting, but there may have been more going on here. We just don't know. But I think it's important that you point out, this was not an overnight decision that was made. This investigation has been going on for over a year. There was no excuse for this.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:10:56]
No. It wasn't like they could say we had a lack of time or resources to get this right, and we were in a rush to get this case filed. They took a year. They had extra funds allocated to them. They had the assistance of the FBI. And still now you're telling us there's this new revelation. My suspicion, and it's a suspicion, I'm not basing this off of anything but me kind of trying to put together the pieces here.
Angenette Levy:
[00:11:23]
You've been around the block. So.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:11:25]
Right. The FBI apparently inspected the weapon and came to these conclusions. But there were reports at the time that they had somehow damaged the weapon in inspecting it. My thinking is that Baldwin's attorneys got a hold of that, said we want to do our own independent analysis and maybe they got an expert to come in and say, hey, by the way, I disagree with what the FBI says. I think this weapon can be fired without pulling the trigger.
And that was enough for these new special prosecutors who are new to the game. You know, not having as much of a dog in the fight, enough for them to hang their hat on and say, you know what, we're wiping our hands of this whole mess before it gets even worse. What do you think?
Angenette Levy:
[00:12:10]
I think that's possible. That's very possible. Or if the gun maybe there was a report earlier that it had been destroyed or damaged in the FBI examination, if you can't turn that over for the defense to examine it, I mean, that's going to really hurt your case as well. So because they should be permitted as the case moves forward, if it was bound over to test the evidence. And Alec Baldwin, let's not mince words, he's a wealthy guy. He can pay for the best defense money can buy.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:12:46]
And I think he did. But you're right. I mean, there are motions the defense can bring that if somehow evidence was destroyed in the investigation, they can move to have that excluded completely. So maybe they saw, you know, like you pointed out, he's got well paid litigious attorneys. Maybe they saw on the horizon that they were going to bring that motion. This whole case would would fall apart if they don't even have the weapon to bring into court. Very, very interesting. Go ahead.
Angenette Levy:
[00:13:13]
Another thing, I do think a lot of people may have to eat some crow because, you know, I spoke with firearms experts, armorers, people like that who said Alec Baldwin's on ABC News telling George Stephanopoulos that I didn't pull the trigger. I didn't pull and he's like adamant. And everybody thought, oh, he's lying, he's crazy.
And, you know, there may have been, I was told, a way that he thought maybe his finger wasn't on the trigger, but that he thought he didn't pull it, but maybe something happened. But if that gun, a prop gun, was modified in order to do that, why? I don't know. And if it was, why even have rounds, even dummy rounds in it? Because you can add that after the fact, you know, that sound effect or whatever.
So I think there's a lot of questions still to be answered. But a lot of people said, you know, oh, he's wrong, he's wrong, he's crazy, he's lying or whatever. But if we find out that he was not lying and that he was not making this up or rationalizing, then yikes.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:14:14]
Yeah. Yeah. You bring me to my last question on this, is, you make an excellent point. Even if that gun was modified, what are live rounds doing in that gun to begin with? And my question then is, do you think this dismissal against Baldwin will affect the armorer's case? Because she's still facing involuntary manslaughter charges. Do you think it weakens their case against her or do they still kind of have a clear path towards her liability?
Angenette Levy:
[00:14:44]
I can't answer that question. Jason Bowles, her lawyer, has been very vocal in defending her since the very beginning. He called this sabotage at one point. I'm not so sure about that. But now I'm like revisiting that thinking and like maybe if this is true, if this is happening, maybe somebody did do something crazy.
But Dave Hall's obviously, the first assistant director, admitted to his culpability. He entered into a plea bargain. He's the one that gave the gun to Alec Baldwin and told him it was okay. So we don't know. I think there's still a lot of questions to be answered with regard to how those rounds ended up in there.
Maybe this woman, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the armorer, was overwhelmed and overworked and a mistake was made, but she's swearing up and down that she didn't put live rounds in the gun. So something happened. We have to know what happened. And Jason pulls a statement after this was very tame and muted. So I kind of got the feeling I'm wondering if he's thinking or hoping that my client's case is going to go away, too, because maybe he's got something to show that she didn't maybe do anything wrong. Maybe somebody did something wrong on set.
Dave Halls grabs the gun, gives it to Alec Baldwin, and we know what happens after that. So I think we have to wait and see. And we're recording this on Friday, late in the day on Friday, there will be a status hearing in New Mexico on both Alec Baldwin and Hannah Gutierrez-Reed's cases. So that's going to happen later in the day.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:16:28]
Interesting. Interesting. My, again, suspicion is that now that Baldwin is out of the case, if it remains that way, that they might just kind of quietly dismiss the case against her down the line, knowing that kind of the media frenzy, that storm may have passed and they can get away with it with less, less scrutiny. But that's kind of a sad state of affairs. But we will continue to watch it to see if we get any updates.
All right. Well, let's turn to Fairfield, Iowa, where weeks before a potential trial, teens Willard Miller and Jeremy Goodale have pled guilty to the 2021 murder of their Spanish teacher, reportedly over a bad grade. The body of Fairfield High School Teacher Nohema Graber was discovered in a local park covered in a tarp after she had been fatally struck with a baseball bat.
After initially pleading not guilty, the teens both pled guilty to first degree murder for their roles in the former teacher's bludgeoning death. Following the murder, investigators were led to the teens after classmates shared Snapchat messages from Miller and Goodale, in which they reportedly, get this, bragged about their involvement.
When questioned by detectives, Miller admitted to confronting Graber the day of her death after being frustrated with the grade he received in Spanish class that lowered his overall GPA. However, he denied any involvement in her death at the time. The teens, who were 16 at the time of the murder, are not eligible for life sentences without the possibility of parole, given their ages at the time of the incident.
Prosecutors have recommended a minimum sentence of 25 years for Jeremy Goodale, who had agreed to testify against Miller at trial. Meanwhile, prosecutors have recommended a minimum sentence of 30 years for Willard Miller. Ultimately, a judge will make the final determination with sentencing hearings scheduled for July 5th for Miller and August 23rd, pardon me, for Goodale.
A lot to unpack here about this case. But the first thing I want to talk about, Angenette, is that you do not often see pleas in first degree murder cases because of the exposure. They're looking at decades in prison. And a lot of times the thinking is people might as well take their chances and see if something happens. What do you think was the difference maker in this case that had them decide to take these pleas?
Angenette Levy:
[00:18:53]
I think rolling the dice in this case would have been very dangerous. These kids can hope one day that they can see the light of day. Of course, they wouldn't have gotten, as you said, life in prison without parole. But I mean, the evidence is overwhelming in this case. There were Snapchat conversations between these two in which they kind of bragged about this. It's so horrific.
I mean, can you imagine beating a teacher, anybody to death? And keep in mind, you might see this in a movie. It kind of makes me think about that scene in Casino at the end where Joe Pesci, you know, is in the cornfield and is beaten to death. I mean, that's not a quick way to go unless you really get somebody unconscious and whack them.
And I hate to be graphic. But think about what a horrific way that would be to die over you didn't like the grade you got in Spanish class. So I think that there was overwhelming evidence. There was no need to take this to trial. A lot of people will just fight a case no matter what, but sometimes you're better off just admitting to what you did and. And doing what? Accepting responsibility. It would be different if they didn't have a good case.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:20:11]
Yeah. Yeah. You know, as you were talking, I wonder if part of the reason, at least played a role in their brains about why they made this decision was, you imagine sitting through this as jurors, how inflamed you would become by this whole thing?
You're right. Yes, it is graphic. But taking somebody's life with a baseball bat is not as simple as a couple of whacks over the head. You're involved personally in that person's death.
Angenette Levy:
[00:20:47]
And you have time to stop after the first or second if you're in a rage or what have you. There is time to dial it back and say, my God, what did I just do?
Joshua Ritter:
[00:20:56]
What are we doing?
Angenette Levy:
[00:20:57]
It didn't happen.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:20:57]
Right. No, didn't happen. The fact that they were lying in wait to commit this crime, the fact that they bragged about it afterwards, the fact that this whole thing was over a bad grade, all of that. The more you talk about it, you can imagine how jurors would react and how a sentencing judge might react after having heard all of that play out.
And they might have thought to themselves, like you're saying, they've got us dead to rights. And I don't want all of this being played out in a court over several weeks. Let's get ourselves about a good a deal as we can now. The more I think about it, that probably was a big motivating factor.
Angenette, we've seen cases in the past of teens committing unspeakable crimes. But talk a little bit, and I've kind of already gotten into it, but there was something especially heinous about this because in other crimes that we see with young people, it's kind of impulsive. And we talked about this a little bit before we started to record that, you know, this isn't like a teenager pushing someone into oncoming traffic because they had a momentary kind of loss of their emotions. This was planned. They were waiting for her. What do you think about that?
Angenette Levy:
[00:22:12]
I think you're right. You know, who knows what was going on in the lives of these children. I mean, if you're that worried about a Spanish grade, are you being abused at home? Are your parents so hard on you that you get your GPA brought down, your parents are going to have a serious freak out on you.
But this kind of, to me, goes beyond the pale and goes beyond that because -- and who knows what one person's impulsive is versus another person's impulsive. I mean, kids like, you know, the prefrontal cortex, you hear, is not developed until you're in your early 20 seconds, especially for boys, in young men. So I don't know.
But it's certainly not like I have no impulse control. Like I have an eight-year-old. He literally has impulse control issues. He does stuff, and then he comes back to me like 20 minutes later and he's like, mommy, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I did that. So it's not like that. As you pointed out, this was plotted out and planned. It's sickening. So there's something going on with these kids. I don't know what it is, but there's something very wrong.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:23:19]
Yeah. Yeah. We use that phrase cold blooded. This is just cold-blooded murder. This is just I'm unhappy with you for the most trivial of things and I'm going to take your life in this brutal way. Just really disturbing.
Last question I have on this is there's been a lot of debate in this country lately about whether or not it's ever appropriate to charge minors as adults. I think about that because infamously here in Los Angeles, the current DA, George Gascon, has or had a blanket policy against ever charging a minor as an adult, no matter the circumstances. If that person is 17 or younger, never will be charged as an adult. But then you see cases like this. What are your thoughts, I guess, on those blanket policies? Should there always remain room for kind of discretion on the part of the prosecutors?
Angenette Levy:
[00:24:14]
I do have mixed feelings about that. I really do. And I often think prison just punishes people and doesn't really help them. You know, they always call these places, these state prison systems, the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation or what have you. I mean, I don't know. I've talked to a lot of people who've done time, they didn't feel like they were rehabilitated or corrected very much. I mean, they might be scared straight, per se, but I think we just warehouse people.
So that's what -- I hate to see somebody who may have possibly made a mistake be placed in prison under adult penalties for the rest of their lives or even for 30 or 40 years, because when they get out, it's going to be like, to me, Red. And I'm sorry for all the movie references, but Red in Shawshank Redemption. What are you going to do? What's he going to do when he gets out? Really? I mean, is he going to go work in a grocery store? You've just ruined your life.
So I have mixed feelings about it. I think that there probably should be room. I think there are some people that are just damaged and there's may not be much that can be done for them. So I could get into a whole different conversation about mental health as well because I feel like basically our prisons are mental health institutions essentially because so many people who are mentally ill end up there because they've done things where their mental health or their mental illness was not being treated. But that's just a whole another conversation.
So I think there has to be some room to allow that. But you get these people who are elected, and they are elected, they get elected on these platforms and I'm going to be tough on crime or I'm going to say kids shouldn't be prosecuted as adults and have blanket policies. I don't think the world is not black and white. It's often gray. So I think there has to be some nuance there.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:26:08]
Yeah. No, I completely agree. The point that I see you making is the point that I share that this has to be done on an individual basis. Because you're right, there are so many factors, mental health, the age of the person, their development level, all of those other things need to play a role that sometimes, yes, that person shouldn't be charged as an adult and then other times maybe, you know what, they're committing adult crimes and they should be held responsible because this wasn't about their youth playing a role in it. But this is just about a cold-hearted crime murder, which I think is demonstrated in this case.
But anyhow, let's turn to Boise, Idaho, and our last case where the surviving child of alleged doomsday killer Lori Vallow took the stand this week, testifying against his mother in Vallow's ongoing murder trial in Boise, Idaho.
Lori Vallow and her fifth husband, Chad Daybell, stand accused of the murders of her seven-year-old son, JJ Vallow and 16-year-old daughter Tylee Ryan. Lori's eldest son, Colby Ryan, testified as a prosecution witness in a highly tense moment for the already emotionally charged trial.
Before Colby took the stand, jurors heard a jailhouse phone call between Vallow and Colby after the discovery of his younger siblings' bodies. In the call, Colby can be heard confronting Vallow about the murder of Colby's two younger siblings, with Colby asking his mother if she thought she could continue to hide from him and accusing her of withholding knowledge of her siblings' deaths.
Vallow pushes back in the phone conversation, telling her oldest son that he couldn't know what transpired between her and the children before asserting that JJ and Tylee were happy and that everything would become clear in the afterlife. The bodies of JJ and Tylee were found buried on Chad Daybell's Idaho property in 2020, and the couple were arrested in connection with the deaths.
JJ and Tylee were last seen alive in September of 2020, and prosecutors allege that Lori and Chad collected Social Security survivor benefits nearing $6,000 per month in the children's names. In addition to the murder and financial crimes allegations surrounding Vallow's children, Lori and Chad face charges of conspiracy and murder for the mysterious death of Chad's late wife, Tammy Daybell. The trial against Lori is expected to last several weeks with a judge ruling to remove the possibility of the death penalty if Vallow is convicted.
Angenette, I know you've been following this case closely. How damaging do you think this testimony was? You have a son testifying. I mean, it's hard to put this all together to imagine this moment, a son testifying against his mother for the mother's responsibility and the murder of his two younger siblings. What do you think was the impact on the jurors?
Angenette Levy:
[00:29:07]
I think it probably was devastating. I think these jurors probably listened to this call and watch this testimony and watch the reaction of Lori Vallow Daybell and of Colby and probably thought, I have to imagine they thought, what on earth?
Usually, you see, and I know you've covered enough cases, Josh, and you've been involved in enough cases as an attorney to know that a lot of times families stick together. They stand unified depending on the relationships in the family. Colby is calling out his mom on a recorded call and basically is telling her that he knows she's lying or that she did something with these children and that it would all become clearer in the afterlife. Are you kidding me?
I mean, obviously she bought into this. She was delusional. I think we can say that quite clearly. But she's buying into whatever she and Chad Daybell are selling or, you know, they're believing their own stuff. So to think that it was going to all become clear and everything was okay, I just, part of me, you know, she obviously knew, to me, I think she knew something was wrong or that it was not right. Because when you just tell people like, oh, they were zombies and we had to do this for the afterlife and I'm going to lead the 144,000, I'm the goddess and all of this stuff.
So I have a lot of really mixed feelings about this case. I think that as a mom, if you're a mom or a dad on that juror, you're going to say to yourself, I know where my kids are every minute of the day. And maybe if I don't know where they are every minute of the day, it's nearly every minute of the day. And she had a responsibility and a duty and she did nothing to try to find those children when they were missing.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:30:55]
And if I didn't know where my kids was, were, I'd be an absolute wreck until they were found. But I certainly wouldn't be in Hawaii getting married and acting like everything's fine.
Angenette Levy:
[00:31:09]
And not talking to anybody who asked you where your kids were.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:31:12]
Yeah, yeah, I agree with you. We talk a lot about her mental health and this kind of cult-like influence that she was under and everything else. But you're absolutely right to point out that there are glimmers of consciousness of guilt in a lot of what she's saying. She knows this. She's not proud of what took place. She knows that something bad took place, that they're about to get caught, that this is all about to unravel.
And even in that conversation with him in the jailhouse call, legally we would call it an adoptive admission that he's accusing her of all of this stuff. And she's pushing back a little bit, but she's not flat out saying, Colby, you know I had nothing to do with this but that a lot of her silence can be viewed as in adopting his admission of what she's saying about the death of those two young kids.
Let's talk about jailhouse calls in general. My thinking, and I want to hear yours because I know you cover a lot of cases that involve these, is that they're incredibly powerful because I think jurors naturally always want to hear from the defendant, whether that's the defendant taking the stand, whether that's them in a recorded interview with police. And here you have a jailhouse call. They want to hear what is the defendant have to say about any of this and they got that here. What do you think about this type of evidence?
Angenette Levy:
[00:32:45]
You know, I've covered cases where somebody is in custody and the defense argues, well, the judge has set such a high bail, nobody could ever post that. And so you're basically in jail. And this is a way for the state to manufacture evidence or just have potential inculpatory evidence just handed over to them in a case.
And I understand that argument to a degree, but I think that this is very powerful evidence and she knows she's being recorded. I've been on jail calls with inmates before. And typically, periodically, the call is interrupted, and it reminds you that you're being recorded and that the calls can be monitored or are being monitored. So you know what's going on.
And sometimes, the mask falls down a little bit and your guard, you let your guard down and you hear an inmate say something on a jail call. I think they're hearing from Lori Vallow Daybell. I've kind of thought all along, and I don't know this to be true at all, but for several weeks now, I've been thinking to myself, is she going to take the stand and try to explain this?
A lot of people tell me I'm nuts when I suggest that. But if this -- I mean, she never talked to the cops, so maybe she won't take the stand. But it doesn't sound like they're going to put up much of a defense from what we're hearing. The defense is barely cross-examining any witnesses.
So what is the defense? I don't know. Is it the potted plant defense where your lawyers just don't do much? You've got to put up a defense for your client, right? So these calls, I think, are a way for the jury to hear from the defendant. You always want to hear from the defendant. And I don't think they're hearing things that make her look very good on these calls.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:34:33]
No, no. And you bring me to my last kind of point on this. Actually, one thing I wanted to touch on that you pointed out that I think maybe listeners don't appreciate in these recorded calls is, yeah, this is not being done secretly. I'm most experienced with calls coming out of L.A. County Jail. Every 30 seconds or so, there is an announcement that comes over, a recorded announcement that is very clearly heard saying this call is being recorded and it can be used.
And so there's no hiding the ball on whether or not these people are aware that they're being recorded. And even in spite of all of that, it's amazing some of the things you will hear people talk about on these calls. So that's my first point.
But you started to talk about what is the defense going to do? And they are playing this almost like the death penalty still on the table because sometimes you see this in cases where there's a guilt phase and then a penalty phase where they're contemplating death. And in the guilt phase, they're kind of soft handed about all of it because they just want to kind of preserve their credibility with the jurors so that when they get to the penalty phase, they can say, please don't put this person to death.
And you understand that strategy. But here this is it. There is no death penalty on the table. This is the only shot they have at this defense. And I'm not trying to criticize them, but it is curious that there doesn't seem to be a defense mounted. Do you have any idea of what they might have in store? Have you heard anything?
Angenette Levy:
[00:36:07]
I have no idea. And we've been hearing through the grapevine that they may not even call any witnesses. So what is going on? I mean, and I think it's interesting what you point out a lot of times in a death penalty case, which this is no longer a death penalty case. So there is no penalty phase where you can present mitigating evidence. There will be no mitigation in this case. So I don't know what they're doing. But who knows? Maybe they just feel so overwhelmed by this and feel that the evidence is overwhelming that there's not much they can do.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:36:41]
Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I mean --
Angenette Levy:
[00:36:43]
They're not blaming Chad.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:36:45]
No, no, which is surprising because you would have thought that would have been the entire case, given that he's also a co-defendant not sitting there in court but --
Angenette Levy:
[00:36:55]
Or Alex Cox, her brother, who's dead, that could be an easy fall guy.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:37:01]
They kind of alluded to that. Yeah, they alluded to that, I think, in their opening, at least to some extent, that the police were kind of myopic in their investigation, blah, blah, blah. You thought you --
Angenette Levy:
[00:37:10]
We hear that in every case. Right.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:37:13]
Yes.
Angenette Levy:
[00:37:14]
Sometimes it's true.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:37:15]
Yeah. And then you think about, well, this is very high on motive, high on consciousness of guilt type of case. Maybe they'll go after the forensics of it. Nothing can actually place her there at the time, but it does not seem as though we've seen that light bulb moment as to understand what the defense actually is.
Angenette Levy:
[00:37:39]
Nope.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:37:40]
Interesting.
Angenette Levy:
[00:37:40]
I do not know. And Lori Vallow Daybell, from everything we know loves Chad Daybell still and obviously is not willing to roll him under the bus or her late brother under the bus. So I don't know. But if you're the defense attorney, I mean, you would know this better than I would, Josh. Can't you just sit your client down, even if they have mental health issues and say, we're going to have to roll your brother under the bus on this one, we're going to have to figure this out and you're just going to have to deal with it.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:38:13]
Yeah.
Angenette Levy:
[00:38:13]
Can't you do that?
Joshua Ritter:
[00:38:15]
You know, it's an interesting question because the law says that for the most part, the attorney has control over strategy, over kind of legal strategy, and that it shouldn't be the client entirely steering the ship when it comes to those types of decisions that you point out, but I don't know.
They've got this client that she might just be telling them, under no circumstances are they to do that. And they might feel that they have some sort of duty to listen to her on that. Which to your point, that same type of client may say, I'm going on the stand and there's nothing they can do to stop her. So I don't think she will. But if, you know, this is one of those cases where you could see you've got this kind of unhinged, mercurial sort of client that might just decide that that's what she wants to do. I don't know.
Angenette Levy:
[00:39:06]
Or is she like looking at herself since she's this goddess of 144,000, if she truly believes that, is she a martyr? I mean, I don't know. I mean, I've kind of thought about that, too.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:39:18]
Yeah. Is this her time to give her sermon in front of the world? I don't know. Well --
Angenette Levy:
[00:39:24]
Yeah, I just think about that. Like, is she thinking in the afterlife she's going to be like in the books. Like she is going to be somebody. I've kind of wondered that, too. Just a theory.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:39:36]
I will say her demeanor in court does not seem like somebody who's on murder for trial of their own children. It does seem like she, whether or not, she's still suffering from mental health issues or not, she does not seem like somebody who's facing the kind of charges, heinous, heinous crimes that she is.
Angenette Levy:
[00:39:53]
Yeah. I would agree. Yeah.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:39:56]
Angenette, this was a pleasure. Thank you so much for coming on this week. Where can people find out more about you?
Angenette Levy:
[00:40:02]
Well, I'm on Twitter quite a bit, @Angenette5 is my handle. Instagram, @Angenette. Hit me up. I'm on Facebook too, but I'm mostly on Twitter. And I'm on Law & Crime, most every day on YouTube, on the network, our Law & Crime Network Sidebar, which I'm hoping you'll come on sometime soon.
Joshua Ritter:
[00:40:22]
I look forward to it. And I'm your host, Josh Ritter. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter at @JoshuaRitteresq, or you can find me at Joshuaritter.com. You can find our Sidebar episodes wherever you get your podcasts. And we want to hear from you. If you've got questions or comments you'd like us to address, tweet us your questions with the hashtag #TCDSidebar. And thank you for joining us at The True Crime Daily Sidebar.
