Episode 1: “The Rabbit Hole”
SARA: -- and remember: all knowers -- our Somebody Knows listeners -- can get a free resumé review from our sponsor when you use the code “FRESHLEAD” . . . Now, summing up our cold case: Redford Churchill hadn’t shown up for work for three days when a worried co-worker asked police to look in on the sixty-two-year-old. They found him -- dead on his kitchen floor, his skull caved in on one side, his condo wrecked. But not one tenant in the building heard anything -- Nobody reported anything and nobody recalled anything unusual when questioned. So here we are, six years later to the day, and Redford Churchill’s killer is still unknown. This episode, we’re going to give it a go with something different -- I’ll put the case to all of you, as we try out our new Zoom setup for call-ins from our live listeners -- sorry, downloaders.
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SARA: Okay, first caller, you’re on Somebody Knows.
CALLER #1: Hello?
SARA: Hello! You’re on.
CALLER #1: First call?
SARA: First call. You got anything to say about the Redford Churchill case?
CALLER #1: Uh, not specifically. I just want to say how much I enjoy the podcast.
SARA: Thank you. That’s an unsolicited endorsement of the podcast, for all of you keeping score.
CALLER #1: I have a question --
SARA: It’s your phone call.
CALLER #1: -- right. Where do you get all your stories?
SARA: Constant and interminable reading. That’s the big secret, knowers. Let’s just say I’m glad my ISP doesn’t charge by the minute, like the one we had where I lived when I was a kid. And, unfortunately, there are way more weird and unsolved cases out there than you’d ever want to believe -- plenty for a weekly podcast.
CALLER #1: Okay. Thanks!
SARA: Let’s try another caller.
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SARA: Hello! You’re on Somebody Knows.
CALLER #2: Is this Sara?
SARA: Right the first time. So what do you have to say on the Redford Churchill case?
CALLER #2: It’s almost never new evidence that breaks a cold case.
SARA: I’d agree with that. A fresh look at old evidence is usually what uncovers the lead that --
CALLER #2: The police need to go over the physical evidence again, check it all for fingerprints.
SARA: I’m pretty sure they already did that, six years ago.
CALLER #2: Nah, they only do the obvious stuff, the stuff killers remember to clean up. I’ll put fifty bucks down right now there’s something in the evidence boxes that the killer picked up or touched that hasn’t been looked at.
SARA: All right, our first suggestion on the case. Thanks.
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SARA: How about our next knower? You’re on.
CALLER #3: You said nobody heard or saw anything?
SARA: That’s what the police reports say.
CALLER #3: Yeah, they were all in on it.
SARA: Wait -- you’re saying the police were in on it?
CALLER #3: No, the other tenants.
SARA: You’re saying the whole condo did it?
CALLER #3: Exactly. Maybe they were all fed up with ’im for some reason. Or maybe he did something they all decided to get ’im for.
SARA: Just like Murder on the Orient Express?
CALLER #3: That’s maybe where they got the idea. If they’re all in on it, none of them can say anything without incriminating themselves. And as long as they all stick together and tell the same story, no one can get caught.
SARA: Right.
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SARA: Well, it didn’t take long for this segment to make that hard turn to questionable. Caller, thank you. How about we try somebody else?
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SARA: Caller, you’re on Somebody Knows.
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: Caller?
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: Caller? Folks this is what you get when the host runs the whole show by herself. Stop by Patreon and maybe with your support I can swing bringing on a producer or at least a tech guy. Let’s move on to our next --
MR. X: Sara.
SARA: There you are. Thought I’d lost you -- you got lucky.
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: You still there?
MR. X: Yes.
SARA: Sooo . . . any thoughts you want to share?
MR. X: Rufus was innocent.
SARA: Redford was the victim’s name. And except for our last caller, I don’t think anybody thinks he did anything to deserve -- wait, did you know Redford? If you have new information --
MR. X: Rufus was innocent. And Petra Novak was lying.
SARA: Petra -- Hold on -- are you talking about Rufus Knobbe? Back in Etta?
MR. X: You should get your friend Petra on your show, ask her questions.
SARA: She wasn’t my friend –- she was a senior and I was in junior high --
MR. X: She was at your house all the time, with your brother.
SARA: That was twenty years ago.
MR.X: Nineteen-and-a-half years next month. And Rufus has been locked up every day of it.
SARA: Who is this?
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: Who is this?
MR. X: There were no witnesses. No DNA. No evidence -- How could have it turned out the way it did? How was he convicted?
SARA: What do you want from me? I was a kid --
MR. X: You ask questions. You’re the one with the podcast --
SARA: You want me to cover this on my podcast?
MR. X: You talk about unsolved mysteries every week -- You want a mystery? You grew up in the middle of one.
SARA: I have no idea -- what are you insinuating?
MR. X: Do some homework. Ask some questions.
SARA: I don’t know --
MR. X: Somebody knows.
SARA: Look, why don’t you call me back after . . .
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: Hello? Hello?
SFX: MOUSE CLICKS
SARA: Hello? Okay, um, I think we lost that, uh, caller. First time trying out the call-in number and we were bound to have some, uh, hiccups. We’ll get those wrinkles ironed out, I’m, uh, sure. So, thanks for listening. If you’re new to the podcast, check out our previous fifty-three episodes, all available for download. And remember, no crime has to go unsolved -- somewhere, out there, somebody knows.
SFX: DOOR UNLOCKING, OPENS
SFX: SOUNDS OF GROCERY BAGS
SFX: DOOR CLOSES
DEBBIE: Oh! Sara! You’re up early.
SFX: KEYBOAD CLACKING
SARA: I’m not up early, Mom. I’m up late.
SFX: CANS AND BAGS, GROCERIES ON THE COUNTER
SARA: Here. Let me help you with the groceries.
DEBBIE: If I’d thought you were up already, I would’ve called to ask you how much cereal we have left.
SARA: We’re fine on cereal. Any more of the residents drop off last night?
DEBBIE: That what you’re going to say when I’m in a retirement home someday?
SARA: No . . . that was a bad joke. I’m tired.
DEBBIE: You didn’t go to bed at all last night? You okay?
SARA: I started some research and stayed up.
DEBBIE: And you had to do it at the kitchen table because . . . ?
SARA: I couldn’t work at my desk downstairs. Did you listen last night?
SFX: CABINETS OPEN/CLOSE, STUFF PUT AWAY
DEBBIE: WiFi sucks at the home. I always download it and listen in the morning.
SARA: There was this caller --
DEBBIE: That’s right, you were starting that Zoom thing --
SARA: Yeah. But this caller . . .
DEBBIE: Your hands are shaking.
SARA: I’m fine.
DEBBIE: What did this caller say?
SARA: The way he talked . . . He knows me.
DEBBIE: You’ve been doing the show for a year.
SARA: Not listener stuff. He knows us.
SFX: CABINET CLOSES
DEBBIE: Us? You and me us?
SARA: Yeah.
DEBBIE: I knew it! All this putting yourself on the internet -- you attracted a stalker! You should’ve stayed in your HR job --
SARA: Benefits management was killing me, mother.
DEBBIE: Now you’ve got somebody who can do it for you literally.
SARA: You’re being dramatic!
DEBBIE: You don’t know if this freak’s gotten obsessed listening to you every week -- he could be following you --
SFX: MINI-BLINDS RATTLE
SARA: I don’t think he’s on our back steps, Mom. Not at seven-fifteen in the morning.
DEBBIE: You don’t know! You don’t know what he wants --
SARA: I think I do.
DEBBIE: Why do you think that?
SARA: When he called in, he started talking about Rufus Knobbe.
DEBBIE: That was back in Indiana, twenty years ago. Why would he call about that? Your show’s about unsolved crimes.
SARA: The caller brought it up.
DEBBIE: What? What do you mean?
SARA: I mean he brought it up. My show last night was about a cold case in Dayton. This guy calls and the first words out of his mouth are “Rufus was innocent.”
DEBBIE: Sara, there’s more than one Rufus in the world.
SARA: No, I misunderstood him at first. And then he clarified -- He said “Rufus Knobbe was innocent.” I’ve never mentioned anything about Etta or even Indiana on the podcast.
DEBBIE: We should call the police.
SARA: And tell them what? That a listener called my true crime podcast to talk about a true crime?
DEBBIE: It can’t be a coincidence.
SARA: Oh, I’m sure of that. The way he spoke, the things he said . . . He knows me. Knows us.
DEBBIE: You’re scaring me, Sara.
SARA: Yeah, well now you’re caught up with me.
SFX: CABINETS OPEN, CLOSE, PUTTING STUFF AWAY
DEBBIE: You know, sometimes people can say things that we just think means something, that they know something, when it’s just our own minds filling in the gaps.
SARA: That’s not it. He said . . . what he said --like, he knows Lindy was friends with Petra.
DEBBIE: He said that?
SARA: And he said Petra was lying.
DEBBIE: Rufus Knobbe abducted and stabbed Petra! She was lucky to get away alive!
SARA: The caller said there was no real evidence against Rufus Knobbe.
DEBBIE: They convicted him, Sara.
SARA: He wouldn’t be the first fall guy framed for something somebody else did.
DEBBIE: But the evidence --
SARA: That’s what I stayed up all night researching.
DEBBIE: If you looked all night, you must have found --
SARA: -- Almost nothing.
DEBBIE: Nothing?
SFX: CABINET CLOSES
DEBBIE: That was the biggest thing to hit Etta since the Civil War! Nothing?
SARA: Zip. I researched for hours and I came up with exactly two newspaper articles --
DEBBIE: -- Only two? --
SARA: -- Both less than ten column inches, both mostly quotes about how “stunned and overcome” the community was over the whole thing. News from anyplace neighboring Etta just repeated that content.
DEBBIE: But it was all anybody talked about.
SARA: But nobody wrote about it. There’s nothing about the investigation, not one thing about the trial besides the guilty verdict.
SFX: CABINETS OPEN/CLOSE, STUFF PUT AWAY
DEBBIE: Etta’s small. They don’t cover news the way they do here or somewhere like Chicago. You remember what it was like --
SARA: Remember? I was a kid. All I remember was talk about my brother’s girlfriend and my friends and I never getting to go anywhere because you and all the other moms went all Marlin from Finding Nemo and never let any of us out of your sight.
DEBBIE: Damn right, after what happened.
SARA: Even though they had the guy in custody?
DEBBIE: Didn’t mean they necessarily had the right guy.
SARA: Now I see where I get it.
DEBBIE: Rufus Knobbe was dangerous.
SARA: Not according to his police record.
DEBBIE: Sara, don’t be ridiculous. I remember seeing him on the street in Etta. He was scary --
SARA: He was homeless half the time. Most of the charges against him were for vagrancy or drunk and disorderly --
DEBBIE: There was that bar fight at that dive, the Hard Water, when he stabbed somebody.
SARA: See? This is how these stories get perpetuated. I read the court record on that. It wasn’t a fight, and it wasn’t at the Hard Water. It was outside the Three Bells Tavern --
DEBBIE: Like that hole’s any better.
SARA: -- It was behind the Three Bells, and Rufus was arrested for brandishing a knife. He said the other two guys were trying to rob him and they said he was trying to rob them.
DEBBIE: That’s not enough? He carried a knife.
SARA: Outside of that, Rufus only ever got in trouble when he was caught sleeping in abandoned farmhouses or in somebody’s barn without asking. There’s something to this . . .
DEBBIE: I’m going to put some water on. Do you want --
SARA: I’m fine.
SFX: WATER RUNNING, KETTLE FILLING
DEBBIE: Sweetie, I still think you need to contact the police or somebody.
SARA: We just went over this --
DEBBIE: They might be able to tell you who it was.
SARA: I tried that last night. He spoofed the number, made it show up as a job recruiter out of New Jersey.
DEBBIE: He’s smart.
SARA: He watched a YouTube video on how to do it -- You don’t have to know things to pull off stuff like that anymore.
DEBBIE: I don’t like that he’s hiding who he is.
SARA: Maybe he has a reason.
SFX: WATER SHUTS OFF
DEBBIE: If this was something legitimate, he wouldn’t care who knew.
SARA: Unless he has a reason. I want you to listen to the recording.
DEBBIE: Of last night’s show?
SARA: Yes.
SFX: KETTLE SET DOWN SUDDENLY
DEBBIE: What -- Why?
SARA: He changed his caller ID, but it didn’t sound like he did much to change his
voice --
DEBBIE: I don’t want to -- I don’t know if I can --
SARA: -- Maybe you’ll recognize him. Or at least hear something I didn’t.
DEBBIE: Recognize . . . You think I might know him?
SARA: It’s somebody who knows us.
DEBBIE: Okay.
SFX: BASEMENT DOOR OPENING
SARA: Oh, no -- no need to go downstairs. I’ve got the recording here.
DEBBIE: On your phone?
SARA: I downloaded it, to keep it . . . handy.
DEBBIE: Your equipment -- your headphones -- that’s all in the basement.
SARA: This’ll be fine, I have it queued up --
DEBBIE: But if I’m trying to hear details, your studio headphones --
SARA: I just don’t want to go down there right now, okay?
SFX: BASEMENT DOOR CLOSING SLOWLY
DEBBIE: Okay.
SFX: KITCHEN CHAIR GROANS AS IT’S PULLED ON FLOOR
SARA (RECORDED): Caller, you’re on Somebody Knows.
SFX (RECORDED): LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA (RECORDED): Caller?
SARA: Let me get the volume up.
SARA (RECORDED): . . . . swing bringing on a producer or at least a tech guy. Let’s move on to our next --
MR. X (RECORDED): Sara.
DEBBIE: I don’t like him already.
SARA: Just listen --
DEBBIE: PAUSE IT.
SFX: BEEP
DEBBIE: It’s been fifteen years since we left Etta.
SARA: So?
DEBBIE: So why is this coming up now?
SARA: Let’s figure that out.
DEBBIE: Okay . . . Let me change and take a shower and I’ll be able to focus more.
SARA: Sure. I’ll get your tea going for you while you do that.
DEBBIE: I’ll be down in twenty minutes.
SFX: STOVETOP BURNER CLICKING, IGNITING
SARA: Probably should have asked her what kind she wanted. . . .
SFX: SARA’S PHONE RINGTONE
SARA: Yeah, hello?
MR. X: Sara.
SARA: You?
SFX: KETTLE SET DOWN QUICKLY ON STOVE
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: How’d you get this number?
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: Who are you and how did you get this number?
SFX: LONG, UNCOMFORTABLE DEAD AIR HUM
SARA: I asked --
MR. X: What are you going to do for Rufus?