True Crime with Elli Mac

00:00 Case 1 - Lam Luong28:34 Case 2 - Stanley Metcalf46:39 Case 3 - Ronald Clark O’Bryan01:03:12 Case 4 - Nubia Barahona01:33:57 Case 5 - Mick Philpott02:14:19 Case 6 - Karl Bluestone02:27:22 Case 7 - Darcey Freeman02:53:58 Case 8 - Corey Micciolo03:37:52 Case 9 - Darren Sykes=============================================📩 For business inquiries: ellimacproductions@gmail.com

In the early hours of March 11th, 2025, residents in a neighbourhood on the eastern edge of Belo Horizonte in Brazil, called the police after witnessing a woman and a young man, dragging what appeared to be a body into a nearby wooded area.When officers arrived, they found the remains of a man in a clearing. Partially burned. Mutilated. And with a trail of blood that led them away from the trees, back along the street, and straight to the front door of a house nearby. They knocked.At the door stood forty-two-year-old Erica Pereira da Silveira Vicente. She did not run. She did not deny what had happened. Instead, she handed police the knife and told them exactly what she had done. But then she told them why.And one year later, in a courtroom, seven jurors listened to the full story. They heard the evidence, heard Erica's confession, and heard what she said had happened before the killing. Then, they found her not guilty, and the next day she walked out of prison a free woman.This is the case of Erica Pereira da Silveira Vicente… and the question of how far a mother will go to protect her child.=============================================📩 For business inquiries: ellimacproductions@gmail.com=============================================📚 Sources for this episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yghACV7nKx6v1BiDrFiLVlg3Hi-zg8Ge/view?usp=share_link

On the night of February 5th, 1986, a desperate phone call sent police rushing toward a family home on Simmons Road in Montgomery, Alabama.Jeannie Bui had just received a terrifying threat from her husband, Quang Ngoc Bui. According to Jeannie, he told her she had fifteen minutes to get home if she wanted to see their children alive again. During the call, she could reportedly hear one of the children crying in the background.But there was no way she could make it there in time. Fearing the worst, she immediately called the Montgomery Police Department and begged officers to go to the house before it was too late.When police arrived in the early hours of February 6th, they discovered a devastating scene inside one of the bedrooms.Lying on a bed beside his three children was Quang Bui. Eight-year-old Phi. Seven-year-old Julie. And four-year-old April. All three children had been killed.But how had this family reached this point? How had a Vietnamese refugee who had escaped the fall of Saigon and spent years building a new life in America ended up accused of murdering his own children?=============================================📩 For business inquiries: ellimacproductions@gmail.com=============================================📚 Sources for this episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1EwVz4Y-KXdCF4vRmldD4xggZf8l04S9i/view?usp=share_link

00:00 Case 1 - Jessica Dishon23:15 Case 2 - Janet Chandler59:21 Case 3 - Shani Warren01:22:16 Case 4 - Daniel Holdom01:54:31 Case 5 - Jodine Serrin02:18:22 Case 6 - Kristin Smart03:27:34 Case 7 - Gretchen Harrington=============================================📩 For business inquiries: ellimacproductions@gmail.com

On the evening of March nineteenth, 2013, Ashlee Smith was halfway through her shift at Pizza Hut when her phone rang.Just hours earlier, she had walked out the door after leaving her two young children in the care of her sixteen-year-old boyfriend, Dylan Schumaker.At that time, both boys were unharmed. There were no bruises. No signs of distress. Nothing to suggest that anything was wrong.Now, on the other end of the line, Dylan’s mother was telling Ashlee she needed to come home immediately — that an ambulance was already on the way for her toddler son.Her twenty-three-month-old son, Austin Smith, was in critical condition.By the time she reached the house, an ambulance was already pulling away, rushing Austin to hospital without her.What had unfolded during those few short hours inside the home — and would Austin survive?=============================================📩 For business inquiries: ellimacproductions@gmail.com

​​This is a difficult case to tell. To protect the victims, no names are used, and some identifying details are withheld. Even so, it is important to tell this story carefully and truthfully, because what happened did not occur in isolation. This case exposed profound failures across child protection, healthcare, and safeguarding systems—and led to significant changes in how such cases are now handled. In its aftermath, multiple independent inquiries were launched to examine how authorities missed years of warning signs.The case became known as the Sheffield case, and was widely labelled by the media as the “British Fritzl.” The comparison was drawn to the Austrian case of Josef Fritzl, which had come to light only months earlier and shocked the world. In that case, it was revealed that Fritzl had held his own daughter, Elisabeth, captive for 24 years, resulting in the birth of seven children. The Fritzl case revealed unimaginable abuse hidden behind the façade of an ordinary family home, forcing the public to confront the reality that extreme harm can exist undetected for decades.The similarities prompted outrage, disbelief, and urgent questions: how could something like this happen again—here, in the UK?At the centre of this case was the conviction of a 54-year-old Englishman. For more than 25 years, he evaded detection by authorities. He fathered seven surviving children.What makes this case particularly harrowing is not only the scale of the abuse but the number of times it could have been stopped.This is the story of how it wasn’t.

It was the final days of the year, that quiet stretch between Christmas and New Year’s when the city usually slowed down. Instead, Edmonton was about to face one of the worst crimes in its history.On the evening of Monday, December 29, 2014, police were called to a home in southwest Edmonton for a weapons complaint. Inside, they found a woman dead. At first, it appeared to be a single homicide.But hours later, officers were sent to a second house in north Edmonton to check on the occupants. When they entered, they found seven more bodies inside the home, including two young children.The person believed to be responsible was missing.As police worked through the night, they were left with urgent questions—where was the suspect, what had happened in the hours leading up to the killings, and why had so many lives been taken?

In December 1997, police arrived at the Daniels family home on Dasher Street, in the tiny Christmas-themed town of Santa Claus, Georgia.The front door was ajar. Inside, the house was pitch dark and eerily silent. Deputies called out, but no one answered.When they reached the master bedroom, the deputies froze. Forty-three-year-old Danny Daniels lay sprawled beside his thirty-three-year-old wife, Kim. Both were drenched in blood. Kim had been shot in the face; Danny in the head.Down the hallway, they found sixteen-year-old Jessica Daniels, lifeless, near the doorway of her parents’ room. In an adjoining bedroom, eight-year-old Bryant lay in bed, clutching his teddy bear — shot point-blank as he slept.Each victim had been killed execution-style with a single blast to the head. Scattered throughout the home were spent Remington 1100 shotgun shells.In a nearby closet, officers discovered two small children — four-year-old Corey and ten-month-old Gabe — huddled together, trembling but miraculously alive.But three of the children — Amber, Brooke, and Amanda — were missing.Where had the girls gone? Were they still alive?And who could have carried out such a brutal crime in this quiet, close-knit community — a place known for joy, goodwill, and Christmas spirit?This is The Santa Claus Murders.

When 32-year-old Joanne Hill finished her day at work in Chester, England, her mind was already set on what she was going to do.After leaving the office, she collected her four-year-old daughter, Naomi, from the childminder in Connah’s Quay and drove them home.Once inside, she poured herself a glass of wine and drank it.A few minutes later, Joanne ran her daughter a bath while little Naomi sat in front of the television — completely unaware of the danger she was in.What happened next was unimaginable.That night, Joanne Hill did the unthinkable.

On the night of April 26, 2016, thirty-year-old Tricia Todd went to meet her ex-husband, Steven Williams. She was dropping off medication for their two-year-old daughter, Faith. Faith had been struggling to sleep, and Steven asked Tricia to bring the medicine over.Steven, who was living in North Carolina, had rented a place in Hobe Sound, Florida, to spend time with Faith as part of his custody arrangement. That evening, surveillance footage captured Tricia at a Walgreens buying the medication. She then drove to Steven’s rental, dropped it off, and left around 2 a.m.The next morning, Steven tried to reach Tricia to arrange picking up Faith. But she didn’t answer her phone. After calling repeatedly with no luck, he left Faith with a babysitter before heading back to North Carolina for work. By that evening, there was still no sign of Tricia.The babysitter, started to worry. Tricia was never late when it came to her daughter. Denise called and texted, but there was no response. Concerned, she reached out to Tricia’s family.As the day turned to night with still no word, Jonathan reported his sister missing to the Martin County Sheriff’s Office, and a BOLO — a “be on the lookout” — was issued.Soon after, investigators discovered Tricia’s car parked in an unusual spot near the home she shared with her brother, Joshua. Her keys were still in the ignition, and her purse was inside, but her wallet and cell phone were gone. At the house itself, nothing looked disturbed.Detectives suspected foul play almost immediately, and a search effort was launched. But the question remained — who would want to hurt Tricia Todd?

On the evening of March 24th, 2012, a 911 call came in from a quiet stretch of rural Iowa. On the other end of the line was a 13-year-old boy. He told the dispatcher he had just shot his mom.Just before the call, he had texted his father, saying, "Dad, this is Noah. I killed Mom accidentally. I regret it. Come home now please." His dad assumed it was some kind of twisted joke and texted back, "Okay. Just throw her in the grove. We will take care of her later."Earlier that day, Noah had come home with bad grades. His mother, Gretchen, took away his video game controller—a punishment that may seem small, but for a boy obsessed with gaming, it hit hard.Maybe it was that. Maybe it was something deeper. But by that evening, something had shifted—and by the time the sun went down, Gretchen was dead, and nothing in that house

On August 29, 2013, a woman named Kiki Muddar dialed 999 from a house on Broomfield Road in Chadwell Heath, East London.She reported that her 33-year-old roommate, Polly Chowdhury, had attempted to take her own life in the bath - and that Polly's daughter, eight-year-old Ayesha Ali, was dead.When paramedics arrived, they found Ayesha in her bedroom, unresponsive and already cold. She was naked except for a pair of pink underwear, and despite efforts, she was pronounced dead at the scene.Near her body, police discovered notes written by Polly.One claimed Ayesha had tried to drown herself, and that Polly, unable to revive her, had suffocated the child with a pillow - supposedly to "end her suffering."Polly was rushed to hospital.She survived and was taken into medical care - but within hours of leaving the hospital, she was under arrest for the murder of her own daughter.At first glance, it seemed like a tragic but straightforward case of a mother's mental breakdown turned deadly.But investigators immediately noticed something off - Kiki Muddar, the woman who made the emergency call, showed little interest in Ayesha's fate. Her concern, strangely, was focused solely on Polly's wellbeing.All the evidence initially pointed to Polly. But as detectives dug deeper, a far more disturbing story began to emerge - a twisted web of psychological manipulation, obsession, and lies.And at the center of it all… was Kiki Muddar.