# Relisten to The Girlfriends: Spotlight: Rose Solves, At Least, 86 Cold Cases

An episode of [The Girlfriends: Flight or Fight](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1695875823), 20 Jul 2026, 41 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/c2c81cb2-988e-4194-8382-b02e011bf37a/fe3a542e-cab7-4013-8db3-b47300e103e9/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=289822ba-519c-4151-be1f-b02e011e1914

Re-listen to the best of The Girlfriends: Spotlight: Rose Brady’s job running Baltimore County’s SVU was a frustrating one. The sexual violence crimes she and her team were investigating were just the tip of the iceberg. Her department was sitting on thousands of unsolved rape cases, dating back decades - with little hope of ever finding the perpetrators. That was until Rose made an incredible discovery: At a local hospital, a diligent forensic pathologist had kept in storage all the biological evidence from every rape exam he had ever performed. This could be the key to getting justice for hundreds of desperate women. This is a story of hard work, dogged persistence and a series of incredible coincidences… Rose has her own show with her daughter, Sam: Sgt. Brady's Crime Podcast (not affiliated with The Girlfriends: Spotlight): https://podfollow.com/1560081982 If you’ve been affected by sexual violence, there are organisations which can help. In the US: https://www.nsvrc.org/survivors In the UK: https://survivorsnetwork.org.uk/get-help/ The Girlfriends: Spotlight is produced by Novel for iHeartPodcasts. For more from Novel visit Novel.Audio See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Hey, listener, I just wanted to give you a heads
[0:02] Speaker 1: up that in this episode we tell quite a lot
[0:05] Speaker 1: of stories about rape and sexual assault. If you're affected
[0:08] Speaker 1: by anything that you hear, there are some resources you
[0:11] Speaker 1: can access for support in the show notes, but also
[0:14] Speaker 1: no pressure to listen if you do want to, though
[0:17] Speaker 1: there's lots of really.
[0:19] Speaker 2: Inspiring stuff in there.
[0:20] Speaker 1: You're going to hear one detective's dogged quest to bring
[0:23] Speaker 1: perpetrators to justice.
[0:25] Speaker 2: It's a great listen, all right, take care.
[0:29] Speaker 1: The story starts on a Friday night back in two
[0:32] Speaker 1: thousand and four, and it starts, as it will go on,
[0:36] Speaker 1: with a mind blowing coincidence.
[0:38] Speaker 3: Oh it was like a scene in the movie How
[0:40] Speaker 3: It Happened. I was going to a barescuit bing girl,
[0:44] Speaker 3: and I invaded a couple of my best friends.
[0:47] Speaker 1: Rose Brady is a police sergeant and after years of
[0:51] Speaker 1: working in homicide, she's just been put in charge of
[0:54] Speaker 1: Baltimore County's SVU, the team investigating cases of sexual violence.
[1:00] Speaker 2: It's a frustrating job.
[1:01] Speaker 1: The crimes she's investigating are just the tip of the iceberg.
[1:05] Speaker 1: Her department is sitting on thousands of unsolved cases dating
[1:09] Speaker 1: back decades. So that Friday night, Rose wants to blow
[1:13] Speaker 1: off some steam in the most wholesome way imaginable by
[1:17] Speaker 1: playing basket bingo, which, as far as I understand, it
[1:21] Speaker 1: is the same as regular bingo, only you play it
[1:24] Speaker 1: for longer burger baskets. I've looked into it and it's
[1:28] Speaker 1: a brand of these old timey looking woven baskets.
[1:32] Speaker 3: Longen Burger biskets are a big thing, or they were
[1:34] Speaker 3: back then two thousand and four. I mean, women will
[1:37] Speaker 3: die for these baskets. Well, if you win the bingo,
[1:40] Speaker 3: your prize is a Longenburger basket in they fill it
[1:43] Speaker 3: with all kinds of goodies.
[1:45] Speaker 1: Rose is heading to this basket extravaganza with one of
[1:48] Speaker 1: her best friends, Mary, who happens to work at a
[1:51] Speaker 1: local hospital.
[1:53] Speaker 3: She worked in forensics, and she worked for a doctor
[1:56] Speaker 3: Braknegger who I didn't know who. That was driving her
[2:00] Speaker 3: van and I'm sitting in the front on the passenger's side,
[2:03] Speaker 3: and she said to me, well, when are you going
[2:06] Speaker 3: to come and get doctor B's slides? And I'm like,
[2:13] Speaker 3: what are you talking about? I don't even know what
[2:15] Speaker 3: are you talking about.
[2:17] Speaker 1: This is when Rose discovers that Mary's boss, the forensic
[2:20] Speaker 1: pathologist Dr. Rudy Breitnecker, had in storage all the biological
[2:25] Speaker 1: evidence from every rape exam he had ever performed at
[2:29] Speaker 1: the hospital. Alarm bells went off for Rose. It's like
[2:33] Speaker 1: she'd hit on a solution to a problem she hadn't
[2:36] Speaker 1: even realized could be solved.
[2:39] Speaker 3: When she said that, I said, going back to what date?
[2:43] Speaker 3: Because in nineteen seventy seven a friend of mine had
[2:48] Speaker 3: been sexually assaulted by a stranger and had never been cleared.
[2:52] Speaker 3: So I asked her how far back did these slides
[2:55] Speaker 3: go and she said to nineteen seventy seven. I was like,
[2:59] Speaker 3: you have got to be kidding me.
[3:01] Speaker 1: Those slides could contain the DNA of the man who
[3:05] Speaker 1: attacked Rose's friend, which now in two thousand and four,
[3:09] Speaker 1: could be used to solve her friend's case, but not
[3:12] Speaker 1: only that.
[3:13] Speaker 3: And I said, how many do you have? And she said,
[3:17] Speaker 3: we have like probably hundreds and hundred.
[3:21] Speaker 1: Rose has stumbled upon the key to more than one
[3:24] Speaker 1: thousand cold cases of rape.
[3:26] Speaker 3: I knew, and I think I told her this that
[3:29] Speaker 3: there's a gold mine there.
[3:34] Speaker 1: On this week's episode of The Girlfriend's Spotlight, the story
[3:38] Speaker 1: of what happened once Rose and her team set their
[3:41] Speaker 1: sights on doctor Brightnecker's database.
[3:45] Speaker 3: Our game plan was that we were going to get hit,
[3:46] Speaker 3: so we were going to like people up.
[3:48] Speaker 1: They came up with a way to go back in
[3:50] Speaker 1: time and close cases that had lain dormant for decades.
[3:55] Speaker 3: I've never had this feeling before in my life. They
[3:57] Speaker 3: here on the back of my neck is starting to
[4:00] Speaker 3: see up. I mean, it was unbelievable.
[4:05] Speaker 1: In the end, Rose's mission was simple to give justice
[4:08] Speaker 1: to women across Baltimore who thought that they would never
[4:12] Speaker 1: see the day. I'm Annasinfield and from the teams at
[4:20] Speaker 1: Novel and iHeart Podcasts, this is the Girlfriend's Spotlight, where
[4:25] Speaker 1: we tell stories of women winning today rosels at least
[4:43] Speaker 1: eighty six cold cases. These days, Rose Brady is retired.
[4:52] Speaker 1: Her life is a million miles away from the one
[4:54] Speaker 1: she led as a police officer. She actually lives on
[4:58] Speaker 1: a mule farm now out in the Marria Land countryside,
[5:01] Speaker 1: and she rides motorbikes. She doesn't even own a trivial
[5:04] Speaker 1: thing like a computer anymore. She says she's given up
[5:07] Speaker 1: on all that stuff. But back in two thousand and four,
[5:11] Speaker 1: she was on the rise in Baltimore.
[5:12] Speaker 2: County PD.
[5:14] Speaker 1: Before taking over the Special Victims Unit, she led the
[5:16] Speaker 1: homicide team for nine years, and homicide detectives they're kind
[5:22] Speaker 1: of like the jocks of the police department.
[5:24] Speaker 3: And homicide you get whatever you need because you've got
[5:27] Speaker 3: a murderer out there. That was a no brainer. I
[5:30] Speaker 3: got whatever I needed. My detectives got whatever they needed,
[5:33] Speaker 3: whether it was equipment, if I needed bodies to work
[5:36] Speaker 3: on the cases that they needed help with anything, we
[5:38] Speaker 3: got it.
[5:39] Speaker 1: When Rose took charge of the SVU, she instantly felt
[5:43] Speaker 1: a stark contrast.
[5:44] Speaker 3: I go over to sex crimes is what it was
[5:47] Speaker 3: called at the time till we change the name, and
[5:50] Speaker 3: my guys didn't even have the latest equipment. So I
[5:52] Speaker 3: always called this like the red headed stepchild or something.
[5:56] Speaker 1: Rose says she also experienced judges being lenient with sentencing
[5:59] Speaker 1: for perpetrators of sex crimes, and then there were the
[6:03] Speaker 1: general attitudes around sexual violence, which would even seep into
[6:07] Speaker 1: the verdicts juries would deliver.
[6:09] Speaker 3: One of our cases was a prostitute. She was working,
[6:14] Speaker 3: as you know, in a hotel room, but the guy
[6:16] Speaker 3: came in with a gun and not only did he
[6:19] Speaker 3: robb her, but he raped her. And you know what,
[6:22] Speaker 3: I don't care if you're a prosty or not. You
[6:23] Speaker 3: can still be raped. And we've always had that attitude.
[6:25] Speaker 3: But anyway, this woman was brutally raped by gunpoint and
[6:30] Speaker 3: it was a jury trial. So this jury, we're having
[6:35] Speaker 3: problems that a prostitute can't be raped. He should have
[6:39] Speaker 3: gotten like, I don't know, fifty sixty years. And then
[6:43] Speaker 3: we had a charge that was I think he stole
[6:46] Speaker 3: cell phones and stuff like that. The jury comes back
[6:49] Speaker 3: and finds him not guilty of the first degree rape
[6:53] Speaker 3: of the assault. The only thing they would find him
[6:56] Speaker 3: guilty of was the theft of her cell phone, and
[7:00] Speaker 3: the judge did the only thing he could do. He
[7:02] Speaker 3: gave him the maximum sentence for the theft. So you
[7:07] Speaker 3: even had, you know, people on a jury thinking, our
[7:10] Speaker 3: prostitut can't be raped? Are you kidding me? So frustrating
[7:14] Speaker 3: You got me riled up there.
[7:15] Speaker 1: I can understand that you're riled up about that. That's
[7:19] Speaker 1: infuriating and it makes you feel like there isn't really
[7:22] Speaker 1: you know, the system we have in place isn't necessarily
[7:26] Speaker 1: built to.
[7:26] Speaker 3: Serve you just had to educate people.
[7:30] Speaker 1: Another crucial difference between Rose's experience of the two departments
[7:34] Speaker 1: was what would happen to evidence when cases went cold.
[7:38] Speaker 1: In murder investigations, physical evidence would never be destroyed even
[7:42] Speaker 1: decades later, but things were very different in the Special
[7:46] Speaker 1: Victims Unit.
[7:47] Speaker 3: I didn't find out until I went into sex crimes,
[7:49] Speaker 3: but departments all over the country for years had destroyed
[7:53] Speaker 3: evidence because basically, you only have enough room in evidence rooms,
[7:56] Speaker 3: so then they would start getting rid of evidence because
[7:59] Speaker 3: you had new evidents coming in and people didn't know
[8:02] Speaker 3: about DNA. No one ever even knew that there would
[8:05] Speaker 3: be such a thing as the evidence they took from
[8:08] Speaker 3: that victim would actually point to a suspect. So a
[8:12] Speaker 3: lot of the cases were destroyed.
[8:15] Speaker 1: But Dr Brightnecker, the forensic pathologist at Greater Baltimore Medical Center,
[8:19] Speaker 1: was kind of a visionary. Starting in nineteen seventy seven,
[8:23] Speaker 1: he catch all the forensic evidence from every rape exam
[8:27] Speaker 1: he ever did, and he did it all off his
[8:29] Speaker 1: own back.
[8:30] Speaker 3: As a scientist, he was way way ahead of you know,
[8:33] Speaker 3: everyone else, and he always felt that the evidence that
[8:38] Speaker 3: he took from the rape exams would someday lead to
[8:41] Speaker 3: a suspect, and that once he retired his you know,
[8:44] Speaker 3: the friend of mine, who ran the forensic unit in
[8:47] Speaker 3: the hospital. She had literally was going to start destroying
[8:51] Speaker 3: the slides because they didn't need them. They just kept
[8:54] Speaker 3: them because doctor Breitnecker asked them when he retired, he
[8:57] Speaker 3: wanted her to keep it. She didn't know this was
[9:00] Speaker 3: going to happen.
[9:01] Speaker 1: So tell me about these slides, this kind of database,
[9:05] Speaker 1: What does it actually mean?
[9:06] Speaker 2: What do they look like.
[9:08] Speaker 3: It's just like you see on the old TV shows.
[9:11] Speaker 3: So they're a little glass slide and they would do
[9:13] Speaker 3: smears from the evidence from rape. And what you're looking
[9:17] Speaker 3: for on these slides is sperm.
[9:20] Speaker 1: So after Rose found out about the slides, just weeks
[9:23] Speaker 1: into her new job leading the SVU, she decided on
[9:26] Speaker 1: a plan of action. She knew she couldn't solve all
[9:30] Speaker 1: of the cold cases at once. There are actually over
[9:32] Speaker 1: a thousand of them, and her relatively small team still
[9:35] Speaker 1: had new crimes coming in all the time, so she
[9:39] Speaker 1: told them to look for a very specific kind of
[9:42] Speaker 1: unsolved rape case.
[9:44] Speaker 3: I had my corporal go literally through our log box
[9:47] Speaker 3: and starting at nineteen seventy seven and poor on every
[9:50] Speaker 3: open case that we had, and of course the open
[9:52] Speaker 3: cases were the ones that were stranger cases which were
[9:55] Speaker 3: the ones you wanted to fine.
[9:57] Speaker 1: What Rose calls a stranger case means the victim was
[10:01] Speaker 1: sexually assaulted by someone they didn't know, often didn't even see,
[10:06] Speaker 1: and so they couldn't identify their attacker.
[10:08] Speaker 3: The reason why I wanted to pursue them is because
[10:11] Speaker 3: if they reaped this girl and there's a stranger reap,
[10:13] Speaker 3: then they're still out there. So we still wanted to
[10:15] Speaker 3: pursue it because we still had to find whoever did
[10:18] Speaker 3: it and get them in jail, because they were still
[10:21] Speaker 3: probably raping and they.
[10:22] Speaker 1: Were Rose's idea was to find old unsolved cases like
[10:26] Speaker 1: this and see which of the victims were originally examined
[10:30] Speaker 1: by doctor Brightnecker. Then she'd request the DNA evidence from
[10:34] Speaker 1: the hospital and run it through this still fledgling national
[10:37] Speaker 1: database of criminals. But it was slow and expensive to
[10:42] Speaker 1: get this process up and running. It could be months
[10:44] Speaker 1: before her team would be able to crack one of
[10:46] Speaker 1: the cold cases. Only once again, an incredible coincidence happened.
[10:55] Speaker 2: After the break.
[10:56] Speaker 1: How a stroke of luck put Rose's team on the
[10:59] Speaker 1: trail of a rape who had been evading detection since
[11:02] Speaker 1: the nineteen eighties.
[11:22] Speaker 3: I had only been in the Union as a sergeant
[11:24] Speaker 3: for I went in September of two thousand and four,
[11:27] Speaker 3: so it was Christmas time and I'm actually off. I'm
[11:30] Speaker 3: the sergeant, so usually I can take off, lucky you,
[11:33] Speaker 3: and my corporal was in charge. So I'm home and
[11:39] Speaker 3: we hadn't even started picking up the slides yet. I mean,
[11:41] Speaker 3: this was only four months into it and we still
[11:43] Speaker 3: had to figure out how to get them and do
[11:45] Speaker 3: the subpoenas and stuff. So I wasn't even thinking about
[11:49] Speaker 3: getting call like this. And my corporal called me and
[11:53] Speaker 3: he said, Sorrd, we actually got a code has hit
[11:56] Speaker 3: on one of our cases. And I'm thinking, well, wait
[11:58] Speaker 3: a minute, we haven't even got and picked up the
[12:00] Speaker 3: slide jet. How is this possible.
[12:02] Speaker 1: CODIS is that national DNA database, And this match was
[12:06] Speaker 1: possible because someone in another department had the idea of
[12:10] Speaker 1: running surviving DNA evidence from rape cases through CODIS. It
[12:15] Speaker 1: was a separate effort to use DNA to close unsolved cases.
[12:19] Speaker 1: And what Roses corporal was about to tell her Shot Rose.
[12:23] Speaker 3: He said, in your names in the report. And I
[12:27] Speaker 3: said what And he said, your names in the report?
[12:30] Speaker 3: Let me read this. It's like apparently you were a decoy,
[12:33] Speaker 3: and I said, you have got to be kidding me.
[12:36] Speaker 1: The name that matched on the DNA database was Thaddius Clemens,
[12:40] Speaker 1: and it took Rose right back to the start of
[12:43] Speaker 1: her career.
[12:44] Speaker 3: How I remembered that name from the eighties, eighty six
[12:48] Speaker 3: or whatever it was to two thousand and four, but
[12:50] Speaker 3: it always stuck in my mind. When I got permoted
[12:53] Speaker 3: to corporal, I went to Wilkins Precinct and there was
[12:56] Speaker 3: another corporal there and he had told me about this
[13:00] Speaker 3: rapist that they had, like I don't know how many
[13:03] Speaker 3: cases now, it was like five. He had a whole
[13:04] Speaker 3: booklet on like five or six rapes.
[13:07] Speaker 1: All these rapes were by the same perpetrator using the
[13:10] Speaker 1: same emo.
[13:12] Speaker 3: He would grab the women and they were really from
[13:15] Speaker 3: teens to like twenty one. They would always get off
[13:17] Speaker 3: a bus in a certain area at nighttime, and when
[13:20] Speaker 3: they got off the bus, he would grab them from
[13:23] Speaker 3: behind with a gun and he would put what we
[13:26] Speaker 3: call welder's glasses on them. And the welders glasses are
[13:30] Speaker 3: glasses that go in front and on the sides, so
[13:33] Speaker 3: literally they couldn't It's like a blindfold, honestly, so they
[13:36] Speaker 3: never saw him and he would take him to a
[13:38] Speaker 3: vehicle and they couldn't get out because he had it
[13:42] Speaker 3: fixed so that they couldn't open the door and jump out.
[13:44] Speaker 3: And then he would take these to me young women.
[13:47] Speaker 3: He would drive them to all they could describe was
[13:50] Speaker 3: it seemed like it was a ball field from a school.
[13:53] Speaker 3: Then he would sectually assault them.
[13:55] Speaker 1: The police weren't able to catch the guy because none
[13:58] Speaker 1: of the women ever saw him, and he always drove
[14:00] Speaker 1: a different car. Back in the mid eighties, when this
[14:03] Speaker 1: corporal told young Rose about the attacker, she could tell
[14:06] Speaker 1: he was really concerned.
[14:08] Speaker 3: Sid was really worried that he's going to kill somebody
[14:10] Speaker 3: because he always had a gun and the one of
[14:12] Speaker 3: the victims started to fight him, then he was going
[14:15] Speaker 3: to kill them. So between the two of us we
[14:18] Speaker 3: came up with. I said to him, well, you know what,
[14:20] Speaker 3: I was around the same age. I was in my
[14:21] Speaker 3: twenties at that time, and I said, well, let's do
[14:24] Speaker 3: a decoy operation.
[14:26] Speaker 2: Why would you do that?
[14:27] Speaker 3: Okay? So then I mean, I've seen that on TV.
[14:31] Speaker 3: I said, I know they do this on TV. Then
[14:33] Speaker 3: he said okay.
[14:34] Speaker 1: So one night Rose found herself undercover trying to lure
[14:37] Speaker 1: the attacker in out on the street where he stalked
[14:40] Speaker 1: his victims.
[14:41] Speaker 3: I had officers in the in the trees. I mean
[14:44] Speaker 3: I had so much covered. They were everywhere. And I
[14:46] Speaker 3: was walking up and down the sidewalk right around the
[14:48] Speaker 3: same time and one of the bus routes that he had,
[14:51] Speaker 3: and all of a sudden, I hear all these police sirens.
[14:56] Speaker 3: I thought, what the heck is going on? And one
[14:59] Speaker 3: of the guys pulled up next to me and said,
[15:02] Speaker 3: you're not gonna believe this, but he just grabbed a
[15:04] Speaker 3: woman three streets down. I said, you have got to
[15:07] Speaker 3: be kidding me, and she actually got away from him
[15:12] Speaker 3: and gave a description of a vehicle. They pulled it over,
[15:17] Speaker 3: and they pulled a guy out of the truck and
[15:19] Speaker 3: she couldn't ide him. Now remember this was in the eighties,
[15:23] Speaker 3: so there was no such thing as DNA. So if
[15:26] Speaker 3: you couldn't id a victim of a sexual assault, couldn't
[15:29] Speaker 3: pick him out. They were going to walk. But anyway,
[15:32] Speaker 3: they had to let him go. And his name was
[15:35] Speaker 3: Thaddius Clements.
[15:36] Speaker 1: Twenty years later, as she sat on the phone to
[15:39] Speaker 1: her corporal in the s FORU, Rose remembered Clemens case.
[15:44] Speaker 1: The corporal told her how they finally connected him to
[15:47] Speaker 1: DNA that was still sitting in the evidence room. Thattius
[15:51] Speaker 1: Clemens was arrested for the sexual assault of a little
[15:53] Speaker 1: girl who was a relative of his.
[15:56] Speaker 3: He was arrested for it, he was convicted of it,
[15:59] Speaker 3: and that's what put his DNA into the CODIS database.
[16:03] Speaker 3: That's how we got him.
[16:05] Speaker 1: In two thousand and five, Thaddeus Clemens was convicted of
[16:08] Speaker 1: five rapes he committed between nineteen eighty five and nineteen
[16:12] Speaker 1: eighty eight. It seems to me that the case, while
[16:15] Speaker 1: not the result of doctor Brightnecker's database, was a sort
[16:18] Speaker 1: of call to arms to Rose and her team. It
[16:21] Speaker 1: showed that they could use old DNA evidence to close
[16:24] Speaker 1: rape cases that had been open for decades, and there
[16:28] Speaker 1: were thousands of those. It was time to start solving
[16:31] Speaker 1: them using doctor Brightnecker's slides. So once the funding was
[16:35] Speaker 1: in place, they began to extract the DNA and run
[16:38] Speaker 1: it through the database. Soon matches started coming through.
[16:43] Speaker 3: Every time we got a CODIS hit, well, I mean
[16:45] Speaker 3: we were a boom. We were out there looking for
[16:46] Speaker 3: the guy and locking them up. And that was a
[16:48] Speaker 3: good thing. The way they had to handle the cases though,
[16:51] Speaker 3: was totally different from a current case. Totally different.
[16:55] Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm sure, because, yeah, you're not dealing with an
[16:57] Speaker 1: immediate crime scene or immediate report.
[17:00] Speaker 3: No, you literally had to go back twenty and thirty
[17:02] Speaker 3: years and you need to locate the victim. Sometimes they
[17:06] Speaker 3: had to really do some great digging. But my guys
[17:08] Speaker 3: were great with the computers, and so they would locate
[17:12] Speaker 3: the victim.
[17:13] Speaker 1: And it must be really shocking for the victims to
[17:16] Speaker 1: suddenly get a phone call about a case that they
[17:19] Speaker 1: would have moved on from.
[17:20] Speaker 3: Well, and I didn't want phone calls. I wanted my
[17:23] Speaker 3: detectives to see them in person because exactly that. And
[17:28] Speaker 3: most of these people their names have changed, the women,
[17:31] Speaker 3: they've gotten married, and in many cases, their families didn't
[17:35] Speaker 3: even know this had ever happened to them. Wow, you
[17:37] Speaker 3: could be walking in and there could be kids there
[17:40] Speaker 3: and teenagers and they never even knew it happened because
[17:43] Speaker 3: it's so horrific for them and they just wanted to
[17:45] Speaker 3: put it behind them, so they didn't even tell their
[17:46] Speaker 3: immediate family. And I had told my detectives when they
[17:49] Speaker 3: first went there, just to make sure you tell these
[17:52] Speaker 3: women that we've never forgotten you. And the case has
[17:56] Speaker 3: never been closed. It was an open case, so we
[17:59] Speaker 3: never forgotten you.
[18:01] Speaker 1: And were these victims grateful for you guys coming in
[18:05] Speaker 1: and still investigating.
[18:06] Speaker 2: Were they angry?
[18:08] Speaker 3: They were, but they were in shock, like it just
[18:10] Speaker 3: brought it back. You never forget it. And so we
[18:14] Speaker 3: felt bad about We felt like we were re victimizing them.
[18:17] Speaker 3: But then again the comments that we got from them
[18:20] Speaker 3: once they were convicted, found guilty, it relieved them. And
[18:25] Speaker 3: as one of the victims told me a very first
[18:27] Speaker 3: case in two thousand and four was that her entire
[18:31] Speaker 3: last twenty years, she was looking over her shoulder because
[18:34] Speaker 3: she never knew if the guy that walked by her
[18:36] Speaker 3: was the one that raped her. Yeah, it is the
[18:38] Speaker 3: only way to give a victim of a sexual assault
[18:41] Speaker 3: that's a stranger closure is if you find them and
[18:44] Speaker 3: you arrest them, because they never know, they'll never know
[18:48] Speaker 3: who did this to them.
[18:50] Speaker 1: Once a hit in the CODIS database came through on
[18:52] Speaker 1: a case, Rose and her team devised a plan. They
[18:56] Speaker 1: wanted to make sure none of the perpetrators could talk
[18:59] Speaker 1: their way out of the.
[19:01] Speaker 3: When we made an arrest, they wouldn't tell them what
[19:04] Speaker 3: they were arrested for They were just saying, we've got
[19:06] Speaker 3: to take it back to headquarters. So think about twenty
[19:10] Speaker 3: years later. These guys are no way thinking they're getting
[19:13] Speaker 3: locked up for a rape they did twenty and thirty
[19:15] Speaker 3: years ago. They think they're getting locked up for something current.
[19:18] Speaker 3: So when my detectives go in there, the first thing
[19:22] Speaker 3: they ask them and they'll show them a picture do
[19:26] Speaker 3: you know this person? And they'll look at it and
[19:28] Speaker 3: they'll say no. So they'll be adam and saying I've
[19:32] Speaker 3: never seen her before. So and they'll say a nine,
[19:34] Speaker 3: you know this name first before they show the picture. No,
[19:36] Speaker 3: I've never heard that name, never seen her in my life.
[19:39] Speaker 3: Now this is recorded because by the time we get
[19:42] Speaker 3: to court, their defense attorneys trying to say that they
[19:46] Speaker 3: were girlfriend, boyfriend, or they you know he was she
[19:49] Speaker 3: was a prostitute, horrible stuff. And then in front of
[19:52] Speaker 3: a jury, we'd play the taped video and here he is,
[19:57] Speaker 3: you know, looking at this saying I've never seen her
[19:59] Speaker 3: in my life. So that was so important because it
[20:02] Speaker 3: also helped the victim if we had such a good case,
[20:06] Speaker 3: which DNA to me, is awesome. If the victim didn't
[20:09] Speaker 3: have to testify that was a good thing. Yeah, And
[20:12] Speaker 3: most of our cases they end up pleading, and they
[20:14] Speaker 3: end up pleading till like they would get thirty forty
[20:16] Speaker 3: to fifty years.
[20:18] Speaker 1: Roses detectives would repeat this process over and over again
[20:21] Speaker 1: across the years.
[20:23] Speaker 3: Every time we got another hit, I couldn't wait to
[20:25] Speaker 3: tell them, and they were just so excited, and it's like, Okay,
[20:27] Speaker 3: put your case together, let's go get them. And we
[20:29] Speaker 3: didn't wait. I mean, as soon as we got the hit,
[20:32] Speaker 3: you know, I'm thinking, I'm not waiting. I mean, these
[20:34] Speaker 3: guys they're still out there raping. We have to get them.
[20:37] Speaker 3: I was not going to have another rape on my watch.
[20:40] Speaker 3: When we knew that this guy was a rapist, we
[20:42] Speaker 3: got hits on him.
[20:43] Speaker 1: So that's okay, ass And tell me how the first
[20:47] Speaker 1: signs of the next huge serial rapist case started appearing.
[20:51] Speaker 3: When we started submitting the slides. I started getting hits,
[20:56] Speaker 3: like I the first one I had. I had two
[20:57] Speaker 3: hits from like two different case, two different victims in
[21:02] Speaker 3: the suspect Unknow.
[21:03] Speaker 1: The DNA didn't trace back to a specific name. Instead,
[21:07] Speaker 1: it came back as a match to another one of
[21:09] Speaker 1: the slides in Doctor b's database.
[21:12] Speaker 3: So the same suspect raped these two women, and then
[21:16] Speaker 3: we got another hit and it was the same guy,
[21:20] Speaker 3: and it was all we called the lock raven corridors
[21:22] Speaker 3: on the same area. And when I was up to
[21:24] Speaker 3: the fourth hit, I was beside myself.
[21:28] Speaker 1: Rose could tell that these four DNA matches, which showed
[21:31] Speaker 1: that four seemingly unconnected rapes were committed by the same man,
[21:35] Speaker 1: could turn into a huge case, and.
[21:38] Speaker 3: So I went to my major. I pretty much wore
[21:41] Speaker 3: out the carpet from my office to his, and I said,
[21:44] Speaker 3: I need help. I need somebody. My detectives don't have
[21:46] Speaker 3: time to do this. I need a help to start
[21:49] Speaker 3: going through all their cases, because after I had four,
[21:52] Speaker 3: it's like, well, if there's four, there's got to be more.
[21:55] Speaker 1: These four cases spanned from the nineteen seventies all the
[21:59] Speaker 1: way to the early two thousands. Tell me about your
[22:05] Speaker 1: personal connection to this case.
[22:07] Speaker 3: When I first came on, a friend of mine was
[22:09] Speaker 3: sexually assaulted in it was never cleared.
[22:13] Speaker 1: This friend, an old colleague of Roses, was the one
[22:16] Speaker 1: she instantly thought of that night she heard about Dr
[22:19] Speaker 1: B's database, and Rose thought of her friend again when
[22:22] Speaker 1: this unknown attacker's DNA got connected to several different cases,
[22:26] Speaker 1: all in the same area. It was exactly the same
[22:30] Speaker 1: place where Rose's friend had been raped back in the
[22:32] Speaker 1: nineteen seventies. When Rose ran her friend's slide, it came
[22:36] Speaker 1: back as a match to the unknown serial rapist DNA.
[22:40] Speaker 1: Now the investigation was personal.
[22:47] Speaker 2: Coming up.
[22:48] Speaker 1: The matches keep mounting, but then a long forgotten TV
[22:52] Speaker 1: interview gives Rose's team their big break.
[23:03] Speaker 4: Glad you, How glad you?
[23:06] Speaker 3: Glad you?
[23:07] Speaker 4: How glad you.
[23:10] Speaker 1: One day in the late seventies, Rose's friend, a fellow
[23:14] Speaker 1: police officer, had returned home to her apartment. There was
[23:17] Speaker 1: a stranger, a man hiding out in the bushes near
[23:20] Speaker 1: the entrance. When Rose's friend opened her door, the man
[23:24] Speaker 1: forced his way in and sexually assaulted her. Over the
[23:28] Speaker 1: span of two months, in nineteen seventy eight, two other
[23:31] Speaker 1: women in the same apartment building were attacked and raped
[23:34] Speaker 1: by a stranger. And now in two thousand and seven,
[23:38] Speaker 1: Rose had discovered that her friend's case was connected via
[23:41] Speaker 1: DNA location and m O to what appeared to be
[23:45] Speaker 1: the same serial rapist who had also attacked many other
[23:48] Speaker 1: women in the same area. Over nearly thirty years. This
[23:53] Speaker 1: was already a huge case, but now it was personal
[23:57] Speaker 1: for Rose.
[23:57] Speaker 2: Two.
[23:58] Speaker 1: If she was going to find the rapist and get
[24:01] Speaker 1: justice for her friend, she needed more people on her team.
[24:04] Speaker 1: So Rose marched into her boss's office to make her demand.
[24:08] Speaker 3: So he actually gave me a detective who was on
[24:12] Speaker 3: light duty because she was pregnant Eve, and she loved
[24:15] Speaker 3: it because I think she was stuck like answering phones
[24:18] Speaker 3: or something. And I had got a civilian. I gave
[24:21] Speaker 3: him the four cases we had, and I said, Okay,
[24:24] Speaker 3: go back from this time, all the way up till current,
[24:27] Speaker 3: this area in this mo and pull every case that
[24:30] Speaker 3: you can find that's similar to this. Well turned out,
[24:34] Speaker 3: we ended up with I think eleven or twelve cases
[24:37] Speaker 3: that we had slides.
[24:38] Speaker 2: Oh wow.
[24:39] Speaker 3: And then I'd get another hit in another hit, and
[24:42] Speaker 3: I was beside myself because we're spanning nineteen seventy eight
[24:46] Speaker 3: to two thousand, so you know he's still out there somewhere.
[24:49] Speaker 3: So I think she pulled twenty some cases. Her and
[24:53] Speaker 3: the civilian pulled twenty some cases that could be this guy.
[24:57] Speaker 1: Rose's team had uncovered a rapist who, from what they
[25:02] Speaker 1: could estimate, was even more prolific than Thaddeus Clemens. Now,
[25:07] Speaker 1: something you need to know about eve the pregnant detective
[25:10] Speaker 1: on light duty who was helping out with the case,
[25:13] Speaker 1: is that she also happened to be a trained forensic
[25:15] Speaker 1: sketch artist.
[25:17] Speaker 3: One day, she had gone through the files and she
[25:19] Speaker 3: came into my office because I had her work in
[25:21] Speaker 3: next door, and she said, Sorge, I've actually got a
[25:23] Speaker 3: composit in one of these folders from a victim.
[25:26] Speaker 1: I said, really, a composite, meaning a sketch of the
[25:29] Speaker 1: attacker from the recollection of one of the victims. This
[25:33] Speaker 1: surprise Rose. She didn't think any of the victims had
[25:36] Speaker 1: seen the guy.
[25:37] Speaker 3: The ones I had been reading. They didn't wake up
[25:39] Speaker 3: until he was already on top of them. And you know,
[25:42] Speaker 3: if it was inside, he covered him with a blanket
[25:44] Speaker 3: outside it was nighttime. She said, yeah, it was one
[25:48] Speaker 3: of the really old cases.
[25:50] Speaker 1: Evelyn told Rose that she wanted to try and age
[25:52] Speaker 1: the original sketch to see what the guy might look like.
[25:55] Speaker 2: Now, twenty years later.
[25:58] Speaker 3: She was doing it at home and she had a
[26:00] Speaker 3: big table, you know, her dining room table, and she
[26:03] Speaker 3: would have you do it in stages. You know, you
[26:05] Speaker 3: do eyes a whole nine arch. You do different parts
[26:07] Speaker 3: of it, so she'd had them spread all over her table.
[26:12] Speaker 1: This is the point where I have to issue another
[26:14] Speaker 1: cosmic coincidence of that.
[26:16] Speaker 3: And this is like another story out of a movie.
[26:18] Speaker 3: But I'm not kidding. Everything was meant to be, is
[26:21] Speaker 3: what I'm going to say. Yeah, her husband, who I
[26:24] Speaker 3: happen to know, was a Baltimer City detective. So he's
[26:28] Speaker 3: looking at these drawings that his wife's doing, and then
[26:32] Speaker 3: he ends up having to go to something that we
[26:34] Speaker 3: all have to go once a year. Police officers have
[26:36] Speaker 3: to go to what's called in service training to do
[26:39] Speaker 3: with policing, obviously current law, case law. Then you might
[26:42] Speaker 3: do physical stuff, how to defend yourself, stuff like that.
[26:45] Speaker 3: And I find this out on Monday. They come walking
[26:48] Speaker 3: into my office, he and his wife. He had a
[26:52] Speaker 3: VHS tape. Okay, so those two thousand and six and
[26:55] Speaker 3: he has it in his hand. They're both looking at
[26:58] Speaker 3: me and they say, I had to go to this
[27:01] Speaker 3: in service training in an instructor did not show up.
[27:05] Speaker 3: I'm not kidding you on this. An instructor did not
[27:07] Speaker 3: show up. So they put this tape in on a
[27:10] Speaker 3: forty eight hours interview.
[27:12] Speaker 1: Wow Like the Substitute Teachers in forty eight Hours is
[27:16] Speaker 1: a true crime news documentary program on CBS. The story
[27:20] Speaker 1: that was played in Eve's husband's training was about a
[27:22] Speaker 1: cold rape case from Baltimore in nineteen eighty three.
[27:25] Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm thinking, where are we going with this? So
[27:28] Speaker 3: then they said he's watching this video and when it
[27:31] Speaker 3: was over, he goes up to instructor and say, can
[27:33] Speaker 3: I get a copy of that? My WAFE sergeant needs
[27:35] Speaker 3: to see this.
[27:37] Speaker 1: The victim in the case was Laura Newman. When she
[27:40] Speaker 1: was eighteen, she was raped by a stranger. She got
[27:42] Speaker 1: home late at night after working her shift as a
[27:45] Speaker 1: waitress in a Mexican restaurant. At around two am, she
[27:48] Speaker 1: was lying in bed when she heard the clatter of
[27:50] Speaker 1: someone breaking in through a window. She disregarded it, thinking
[27:54] Speaker 1: she was maybe dreaming, which is when she was startled
[27:57] Speaker 1: by a pillow pressed onto her face. The case wasn't
[28:00] Speaker 1: solved at the time. Laura never saw her attacker, and
[28:04] Speaker 1: the fingerprints lifted off her windowsill didn't match anyone, but
[28:08] Speaker 1: she never let her case go. She kept calling the
[28:11] Speaker 1: police department, asking them to look at it again. So
[28:14] Speaker 1: in the early two thousands. A couple of detectives reran
[28:17] Speaker 1: the perpetrator's prints through the system.
[28:19] Speaker 3: Well, the fingerprints hit on this guy, Alfonso Hill. They
[28:23] Speaker 3: arrest him for a second degree rape, and he confesses.
[28:26] Speaker 1: It was such a remarkable story that forty eight Hours
[28:29] Speaker 1: wanted to interview everyone involved, even Hill, who, despite his
[28:34] Speaker 1: lawyer's probably very salient advice, agreed to go on TV.
[28:38] Speaker 3: They're telling me, Sergi, it looks just like everyone's composite,
[28:40] Speaker 3: that she's aged. And that's like, there's no way, I said, So,
[28:44] Speaker 3: you're telling me he's incarcerated right now, and he's been
[28:47] Speaker 3: incarcerated for a couple of years. Yes, I said, well
[28:51] Speaker 3: he should have.
[28:52] Speaker 1: Hit because Hill was in prison. His DNA should have
[28:55] Speaker 1: already been in the CODIS database. All of these rape
[28:58] Speaker 1: cases should have gotten a match to Hill right away.
[29:02] Speaker 3: I said, it can't be him. Well, I'm just telling you, Sarge,
[29:05] Speaker 3: it looks just like him. So I said, all right,
[29:07] Speaker 3: I'll look at it. I put this VHS tape in
[29:10] Speaker 3: the office. When my detectives found one or player, we
[29:13] Speaker 3: put it in and we've got the composite next to us.
[29:16] Speaker 3: And I'm telling you, I've never had this feeling before
[29:18] Speaker 3: in my life. The hair on the back of my
[29:21] Speaker 3: neck was starting to stand up because this was the guy. Wow,
[29:26] Speaker 3: I mean, it was unbelievable. But I'm still thinking it's
[29:30] Speaker 3: not possible. So I call Maryland State Police because they
[29:34] Speaker 3: run the actual code is database, and I was in
[29:37] Speaker 3: first name basis with the woman Michelle that was running
[29:40] Speaker 3: it by then, and I'd said, Michelle, are you sure
[29:43] Speaker 3: you don't have this guy in the database, Serge, I
[29:45] Speaker 3: don't have them.
[29:47] Speaker 1: Rose hung up, but she couldn't shake the similarity between
[29:50] Speaker 1: Hill and their suspect, so she dunald Michelle's number again.
[29:54] Speaker 3: So then this time I gave her a name. Like
[29:57] Speaker 3: an hour later, she calls me.
[29:59] Speaker 1: She told Rose that Alfonso Hills DNA hadn't been put
[30:02] Speaker 1: into the national database yet because Maryland State Police were
[30:06] Speaker 1: extremely backed up with all the DNA that was now
[30:09] Speaker 1: being uploaded.
[30:10] Speaker 2: She suggested that.
[30:11] Speaker 1: Her team should go to the prison, get their own
[30:14] Speaker 1: swap of Hills DNA and run it against the serial
[30:17] Speaker 1: rapists themselves.
[30:19] Speaker 3: Not a problem. Click. I go right into the office
[30:23] Speaker 3: where my detectives were working that case. I said, get
[30:25] Speaker 3: a search warrant, let's go. We're going to go up
[30:27] Speaker 3: to I think he was in Hagerstown. It's like, we're
[30:28] Speaker 3: getting his swabs. Even when I was in homicide, I
[30:31] Speaker 3: don't think I ever got results back this fest. I'm
[30:35] Speaker 3: sitting in my office a week later, and all of
[30:39] Speaker 3: a sudden, I hear all these people walking and all
[30:41] Speaker 3: this commotion, and all of a sudden, all these my detectives,
[30:44] Speaker 3: the biologists are all standing in my doorway, and I'm
[30:48] Speaker 3: looking at him and I said, please tell me that
[30:51] Speaker 3: Alfonso Hill, that it's him, And they said it's him.
[30:56] Speaker 3: It's like, oh my gosh.
[31:00] Speaker 1: Bill was still serving time in prison for the rape
[31:02] Speaker 1: of Laura Newman, but Rose's team had DNA evidence that
[31:05] Speaker 1: he'd committed many more. When they confronted him with it,
[31:08] Speaker 1: he seems to realize that there was no point in
[31:11] Speaker 1: denying it. Once he was charged with these rapes, he
[31:14] Speaker 1: pleaded guilty to them. After decades of assaulting women in Baltimore.
[31:18] Speaker 1: In two thousand and eight, Alfonso Hill was finally held
[31:21] Speaker 1: responsible for his crimes. He had been applying for parole,
[31:26] Speaker 1: and now he would likely never be free again. All
[31:29] Speaker 1: but one of the survivors came to his court hearings.
[31:33] Speaker 1: It was an opportunity for them to finally stare him down.
[31:36] Speaker 3: Every single one of them except for one, wanted to
[31:38] Speaker 3: be there. It was just something you just don't see.
[31:43] Speaker 3: We take him to the courtroom and they're all sitting together,
[31:46] Speaker 3: and all of a sudden, the door opens, and I'm
[31:50] Speaker 3: looking at my survivors and it's like like laser. I mean,
[31:55] Speaker 3: as soon as that door open, he started walking horns
[31:57] Speaker 3: and is like laser, because remember, all but one of
[32:00] Speaker 3: them have never saw his face. The state's attorney reads
[32:05] Speaker 3: every single one of these horrific cases, and the judge,
[32:10] Speaker 3: who'd been around a long time, he was speechless. And
[32:14] Speaker 3: then all of a sudden, after they read the last one,
[32:18] Speaker 3: and before the victims could even go up there and
[32:20] Speaker 3: do their impact, he said, you know, that's a shame
[32:24] Speaker 3: doctor Britnecker's not here, because what he's done and what
[32:27] Speaker 3: he thought before anyone else did, is why we're here.
[32:32] Speaker 1: Well, it turns out that Rose was way ahead of
[32:35] Speaker 1: the judge. She also wanted doctor b who is now
[32:38] Speaker 1: in his seventies, to be there for this moment, so
[32:41] Speaker 1: she asked her colleague Linda to bring him to the courtroom.
[32:45] Speaker 3: So Linda and has to make he such a humble
[32:47] Speaker 3: man and had to make him stand up. Let me
[32:51] Speaker 3: tell you, everybody in that courtroom collapsed. I mean he
[32:54] Speaker 3: got to see what he did.
[32:58] Speaker 1: That's so beautiful. How did he react to that moment?
[33:02] Speaker 3: He just he just looked at everybody and you know,
[33:07] Speaker 3: did the hand like okay, you know, thank you, you're well.
[33:09] Speaker 3: You know, he's just very he's a big man and
[33:12] Speaker 3: he's Austrian, so he's got a very heavy Austrian accent,
[33:15] Speaker 3: and he was embarrassed. I guess that. You know, we
[33:18] Speaker 3: made him stand up, but in everybody clapping, even the
[33:21] Speaker 3: even the deputies, I mean everybody.
[33:24] Speaker 2: Well he deserved it.
[33:26] Speaker 3: So I mean he's passed away. I went to the funeral.
[33:28] Speaker 3: He passed away a couple of years ago. This would
[33:30] Speaker 3: have never happened for all these women without him.
[33:32] Speaker 2: One an amazing guy.
[33:34] Speaker 1: It does seem like so much of your work here
[33:38] Speaker 1: has just You've had a lot of coincidences.
[33:41] Speaker 2: How do you feel about that?
[33:43] Speaker 3: Yeah, do we call it fate? I don't. I don't know.
[33:46] Speaker 3: Meant to be, I mean God's will, it was time
[33:49] Speaker 3: to get these cases cleared. I don't know, because it
[33:53] Speaker 3: just seemed to fall these cases like this crazy.
[33:56] Speaker 1: Yeah, in these incredible ways. Obviously your amazing worked.
[34:00] Speaker 3: Well, it's my detectives, they did the investigations.
[34:04] Speaker 1: How many of these cold cases did you close in
[34:07] Speaker 1: total in your whole time at the SPU.
[34:10] Speaker 3: From what I remember, it was eighty.
[34:12] Speaker 1: Six eighty six. You must be so proud of that number.
[34:16] Speaker 1: That's incredible.
[34:17] Speaker 3: So I think it was around eighty six.
[34:19] Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, amazing, but that works still being done as
[34:24] Speaker 1: we speak.
[34:25] Speaker 3: Yeah, they have actually the department actually has a cold
[34:27] Speaker 3: case unit now. Incredible think out when after I retired
[34:30] Speaker 3: they finally put one together.
[34:31] Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's great. So look, I've got one final question.
[34:36] Speaker 1: I guess it's a bit of a reflective one. I'm
[34:39] Speaker 1: wondering kind of what your message would be to survivors
[34:42] Speaker 1: of sexual violence who are listening to this podcast, because
[34:45] Speaker 1: I know already that there are many and a lot
[34:48] Speaker 1: of those people will have cases that are cold and
[34:52] Speaker 1: haven't been solved.
[34:53] Speaker 3: Well, look at wherever department that handled your case whenever
[34:57] Speaker 3: it was, call them, because most apartments across the country
[35:01] Speaker 3: have called key sexual assault teams now and if you're
[35:05] Speaker 3: a survivor, there's some place you can go to for help.
[35:09] Speaker 3: There's plenty of victim agencies that will help you get
[35:12] Speaker 3: through the emotional part of it, because don't live with
[35:14] Speaker 3: it without telling people. There's so much help out there,
[35:19] Speaker 3: but you have to ask for it. But it is
[35:21] Speaker 3: out there. I guarantee you it's out there. And don't
[35:24] Speaker 3: walk alone.
[35:25] Speaker 2: No, don't walk on.
[35:26] Speaker 1: I mean that feels very inclusive of the kind of
[35:28] Speaker 1: girlfriend's mantra.
[35:29] Speaker 2: If we're all in it together on this podcast.
[35:37] Speaker 1: I know that sexual violence cases are a particularly tough
[35:41] Speaker 1: listen for women. It's not exactly something that we need
[35:44] Speaker 1: to be curious about, because it's something we all have
[35:47] Speaker 1: to be sadly attuned to. One out of six women
[35:51] Speaker 1: in the United States have experienced sexual violence, and research
[35:55] Speaker 1: from the Rape, Abuse and Incess Network suggests that for
[35:59] Speaker 1: every one thousand and rapes that happen in the United States,
[36:02] Speaker 1: only three hundred and eighty four are reported to the
[36:05] Speaker 1: police and only seven end in a felony conviction. It's
[36:10] Speaker 1: depressing data, and for a series that claims it tells
[36:13] Speaker 1: the stories of women winning, this episode is full of
[36:17] Speaker 1: far too many women losing out in the worst possible way.
[36:27] Speaker 1: But what dodr B and Rose have done is a
[36:30] Speaker 1: real win to me. Their dogged determination has brought convictions
[36:35] Speaker 1: into a woefully unprosecuted space and proven that solving cold
[36:39] Speaker 1: cases doesn't just bring about historic justice, but it can
[36:43] Speaker 1: protect people today. Next time the Girlfriend's spotlight, Madison and
[37:02] Speaker 1: Christine become digital detectives.
[37:07] Speaker 5: So we just started adding new folders of this victim,
[37:11] Speaker 5: this victim, this victim, And let's be honest, like, I
[37:14] Speaker 5: was very motivated to help you, but it's nothing's more
[37:16] Speaker 5: motivating than your own boobs being on the internet.
[37:25] Speaker 1: Hey, it's Anna, you've reached the girlfriend's hotline. Leave your
[37:29] Speaker 1: story after the tone.
[37:31] Speaker 3: Okay, I gotta go love you.
[37:34] Speaker 4: When I was skiing in Colorado, I fell and broke
[37:38] Speaker 4: my arm, and I was in a lot of pain,
[37:41] Speaker 4: but I was mainly just very sad and very low
[37:45] Speaker 4: because I had a lot of plans are up in
[37:46] Speaker 4: the air and the healing time is really long.
[37:50] Speaker 6: When I texted my closest group of girlfriends from home
[37:55] Speaker 6: to tell them i'd broken my arm, I sent them
[37:58] Speaker 6: a mirror selfie in the hospital room with my swing,
[38:01] Speaker 6: and most of their first responses we're just commenting on
[38:06] Speaker 6: how great may hair looked, which made me laugh.
[38:11] Speaker 1: If you have your own story like the one you
[38:13] Speaker 1: just heard, and you'd like the whole Girlfriend's Gang to
[38:16] Speaker 1: hear it, then please send it to us. You can
[38:18] Speaker 1: record it as a voice memo under ninety seconds please
[38:22] Speaker 1: and email it straight to the Girlfriends at novel dot Audio.
[38:27] Speaker 1: Please don't include your name, we're keeping things a little anon.
[38:31] Speaker 1: We want stories like say that one time you faked
[38:34] Speaker 1: an emergency on an awful date and your bestie bailed
[38:38] Speaker 1: you out with a phone call we love her. Or
[38:40] Speaker 1: that time when all of your girls showed up on
[38:42] Speaker 1: your doorstep with five pizzas, two tups of ice cream,
[38:46] Speaker 1: and three bottles of seven you're blanc because the man
[38:49] Speaker 1: of your dreams just dumped you. I want stories that
[38:52] Speaker 1: are meaningful or silly. I want big, I want small.
[38:56] Speaker 1: I'm desperate to hear them, so send them over. This season,
[39:02] Speaker 1: The Girlfriend's Spotlight is supporting the charity Womankind Worldwide. They
[39:07] Speaker 1: do amazing work to help women's rights organizations and movements
[39:11] Speaker 1: to strengthen and grow. If you'd like to find out
[39:14] Speaker 1: more or donate to help them secure equal rights for
[39:17] Speaker 1: women and girls across the globe, you can go to
[39:20] Speaker 1: Womankind dot org dot UK. The Girlfriend's Spotlight is produced
[39:34] Speaker 1: by Novel for iHeart Podcasts. For more from Novel, visit
[39:39] Speaker 1: novel dot audio. The show is hosted by me Anna Sinfield.
[39:44] Speaker 1: This episode was written and produced by Jake o'taibitch. Our
[39:49] Speaker 1: assistant producer is Lucy Carr. Our researcher is Zayana Yusuf.
[39:54] Speaker 1: The editor is Hannah Marshall. Max O'Brien and Craig Strachan
[39:57] Speaker 1: are our executive producers. Production management from Joe Savage, Srie
[40:02] Speaker 1: Houston and Charlotte Wolf. Sound design, mixing and scoring by
[40:07] Speaker 1: Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson. Music supervision by Jacob Tivich,
[40:12] Speaker 1: Nicholas Alexander and Anna Sinfield. Original music composed by Louisa
[40:17] Speaker 1: Gerstein and Jemma Freeman. The series artwork was designed by
[40:21] Speaker 1: Christina Lemkool. Willard Foxton is creative director of Development and
[40:26] Speaker 1: Special Thanks to Katrina Norvelle, Carrie Lieberman, and Will Pearson
[40:30] Speaker 1: at iHeart Podcasts, as well as Carl Frankel and the
[40:34] Speaker 1: whole team at WM

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