True Crime and Paranormal Festival Recap

0:00 To listen ad free visit simspod dot com slash subscribe starting at two ninety nine a month. You'll also get access to our exclusive bonus content episodes when you joined through Patreon or Apple subscriptions. Thanks for supporting the show. Hello, and welcome to our non subscriber bonus episode. Hey everyone, Hello, So we wanted to take a moment and drop a bonus episode for our subscribers and talk to you a little bit about the true crime and paranormal festival that we went to. I'm gonna say last weekend. Was it last weekend? No weekend before?

0:43 Oh gosh? Yes? July weekend is July fourteenth, Yes, thirteenth, fourteenth in Denver. Yes, and we're going to talk a little bit about the experience. It was our first time doing a podcast festival, as as podcasters ass. And this is not just for subscribers. I want to say that right, This is not just I say that you did. He said it again. I said it again. Oh my god, this is why we are scripted. Yes, we wanted to do a bonus episode, not just for our subscribers, but for everyone because we came home so jazzed after the festival, and we were just talking about it again today. And I'm still jazzed China, and.

1:24 John was like, Hey, maybe we should just record so we can kind of get it all out there and promote the fact that Boston TCPF twenty twenty five will be here before we know it. Buy your tickets now. They're selling fast. They are selling fast. We say that because we bought them already. Yes, so they are selling fast. It's going to be July eighteenth through the twentieth in Boston, in Boston, Boston on the which sure you told me. I think it's not Sha. No, I don't even know. I think it's not not not not shaw. I am from Boston. Have I said that before? John is from Boston. Yeah, so I'm excited tuning in. Yeah. If you've never joined us before, you're probably very confused. You're like, this podcast is not well named. We will not be covering a case right now. This is just a bone.

2:14 I mean, I guess we'll be talking about it. We might be talking a little bit about a bunch of cases. Because we did hear a lot, a lot from so many wonderful people, so many passionate creators who are out there advocating for victims, advocating for families, trying to change the true crime landscape, and we were just so excited to be a part of it. It was amazing, It was so incredible, so many great people. So why don't you tell tell the people out in the world podcast land about your panel, Because Sean was on a panel, I was on. A panel, Lany Hobbs, who is one of the masterminds behind the whole TCPF Lisa being the other one, Lisa being the other and I'm sure there was so many folks that work so hard to bring this all together.

3:01 But I got to reach out to Leaney, I got to Steve. I know that the panel was live streamed, so I'm hoping that there is a recording of it somewhere. I'm hoping because we'd love to share that audio with you because it was such an incredible experience. We had some of the most amazing podcasters in the business. We had who was there tell the people. Haley Gray, who is a podcast researcher and she has her own podcast researching course that you can take called DCPT. Yeah, I know, DCP True Crime Podcast Training. Yes, the True Crime Podcast Training, and it was Actually I've talked about the course before, I believe on the podcast.

3:46 It was incredible. We learned so much from being a part of it. So we had Hailey Gray. We also had the team behind Navigating Advocacy. They're amazing, Whitney and Melissa. Whitney and Melissa do so much for families. They go on searches, they do I think they call them Honkin waves, where they like, you know, stand on the corner with signs and just try and support families. They're just out there doing so much good work and helping so many people. And again they're super smart, you know, working so hard to make sure that true crime content continues to improve. So we had them on the panel. And lastly, two of the biggest. True crime are you talking about yourself?

4:28 Yes, myself I was there as well. And then there's another big name. The team behind I think not what Ellen and Joey. Yes, Ellen was not on the panel. Ellen was on my left the whole time. It's amazing. It was really really amazing. Ellen and Joey. They have so much passion and compassion for people, and they just talk so much about how. They happy to hear that they can take that that passion and come passion thing. I like that. You can have that for free, we talked. So the topic of the panel was ethical storytelling and being mindful about the language that we use and using proper terminology for things because we don't want to re traumatize people. We don't want to stigmatize people. So that was basically the topic was how there are a lot of phrases we use in American English that are either inherently violent idioms like shoot you an email, I'll take a stab at it, or have come from some of the ugliest parts of American history and are rooted in racism, and that we should just erase from our vocabulary. You'd be surprised how many phrases like what was the one we talked about, cakewalk? Cakewalk has those racist origins. Yeah, so those were And then also when you talk about people, you want to be careful not to stigmatize them, so just kind of choosing not describing where someone lives as like the ghetto, or you know, calling someone an addict

6:01 or other words for sex worker, you know, those kinds of things we talked about, and just being respectful for families because you know they're listening and if you truly want to help them, you want to be respectful. So it's just an incredible panel. It came together beautifully. It was wonderful. I was so honored that that Haley and Melissa and Whitney and Ellen and Joey all agreed to be a part of it. And I said, I'll talk to Laney again and we'll see if we get that audio, because I really would love to share it with all of you. That would be amazing. Yeah, we can tag them everybody in it. Yeah, they can share it. Yeah, and then everyone can learn from it, because I think there's something for everyone in there, even if you're not a content creator.

6:44 Yep. So yeah, I mentioned I mentioned Kendrick Lamar at. One point, you did? I did? Kendrick Lamar out there dropping truth bombs is musical truth bombs. So what do you want to talk about? Net The second one in our list. I want to leave till the end because because it is the it was the final the session of the weekend, and so we'll talk about that in a minute. But we did go out with our with the TCPT folks, with the team between and behind True Crime Podcast training. It is the website, by the way, is True Crime podcast Training dot com. Just as a reminder all written out, and we really recommend that if you're considering starting a podcast, or if you're just interested about how the process.

7:33 Works, or if you want to do podcast research for other podcasts, because there is there are podcasts out there who can pay you, and they will pay you for your research, So. If you want to do that, you should definitely check it out. But we went with the alumni from the from from the podcast Training, which was awesome, and Haley and Andrea on Andrea's thirtieth birthday. Yes, should I say it was the thirtieth? Should we? Should we take that art on post? That's all good? Yeah, she's very It was amazing. We kind of had an am I the asshole moment because we were waiting for a table large enough to see us all, and the people who had that largest table in the restaurant were taking their sweet time watching UFC fighting, and even though their plates had been cleared and their bill had been paid, they were just loitering there in the restaurant. We were standing there like salivating.

8:26 Waiting, starving. That was great, And then didn't it turn out that our server that she she's a true crime fan. She was, and they gave us free appetizers, which was nice. Oh yeah, that was nice. Yeah, so they made it right. So shout out to the b JS by the Denver Marriotte. Yeah, I wish I knew exactly their address, but great, great staff, and it was a great dinner. Yeah. I talked about Melissa and Whitney. I kind of want to gush about them some more because they are just incredible and it was so great seeing them and spending time with them.

9:08 And then what other panels did we see? Oh my god, we saw so many. The first one we saw was actually about a Netflix documentary that I watched the first episode of. I think there's like three episodes in the documentary. It's called the program cons Cults and Kidnapping, And I watched the first one by myself and I was like, John, I want John to watch this with me. So we got to see the panel with Ashley from that So Fucked Up podcast with two of the filmmakers that well, because it was a documentary, so there was the filmmaker Catherine and then one of the women who when she was a teenager was actually a resident in the program and the documentary is about I guess what I would call a reform school. But it was just a horrific torture device for teenagers who allegedly, you know, couldn't go to regular school, were committing such horrible, heinous acts that they had to live in a prison like and repressive environment. It was awful. The youth who lived there were tortured, psychologically tortured. So it was just it was great. I was glad. I'm glad that Ashley had them on their panel and you could learn more about about what went into making the documentary and what the women's experience was when they were younger, and.

10:25 It really was pretty messed up. It was really scary. I mean, I hadn't watched the documentary. I still haven't actually watched it, but I am going to do that. And but what I heard shook me that this actually existed. I had no idea. Existed, and parents paid money for it. Unbelievable. It's terrifying. Well, and then we had like our creator mixer. That was all Friday, but then the keynote Saturday morning. Not a dry eye in the house. Sarah Joorney talking about her sister Melissa. And if you haven't heard that story.

11:06 Voices for Justice, you have to listen. She tells it over she in the session. She told it like very quickly, like she hit all the main points. She shared so much about her sister and her experience. Sarah, we love you. If you're listening, Sarah, we love you. You have our support. It was great getting to know you better and chat with you, so we can't wait to see you again at Actually, our next thing is Advocacy Con which is coming up in Indianapolis in March, so we'll see you then, Sarah. And if you're listening and you're not Sarah, on the off chance, then you should go listen Sarah. Most of you who are not Sarah, I mean maybe your name is Sarah, but you're not Sarahttorney and that's okay too.

11:50 And if that's the case, you should go listen to Sarahttorney's podcast and listen to the first season. Definitely an amazing listen and you will not believe it. The next thing we went to, I believe was Arlene Arlene Harbison, Leon Laurelis's niece and Bethany hassel Vladi Castle's sister, together with Haley Gray and Kristen Ceevie from Murder She Told, And they were just talking about the new project that they worked on together where they made a guidebook for families and how to work with the media and podcasts when you are a victim of a horrific situation like Arlene and Bethany. Are you all? We shared Arlene's episode about Leon and her podcast The Box in the Basement on our feed that she does with her partner Leah.

12:53 And we've shared vladeck story before, but you can always find out out more if you surge. Flateck has been missing for a few years now, and Bethany would love to get some leads and get some answers on that, just like Arlene would love to have answers about Leon. So this again was another very moving session because there's no way to go to TCPF and not be moved by the stories shared by families and advocates. Was the next one we went to the Laura Norton. Yeah, all right, so that was also an awesome one. Go ahead, Yeah. The next one we went to was with Laura Norton and doctor Amy Michael, who I was too intimidated to talk to I know. I was so intimidated.

13:36 I kept seeing them and I was like, I was like, we wrote in. The Elevator with doctor Amy, and I. Was like, yeah, so podcast you're a scientist. Laura had a book come out Gosh earlier this year called Lay Them to Rest, that. Is which we have both read. We both read. It's an incredible piece of nonfiction about the story behind Anah Jane Doe and how she worked with doctor Amy and other forensic scientists forensic artists to help identify Ana Jane Doe. There's a ton of good stuff in there about the science behind all of that work.

14:16 So that was fascinating. Yeah. So they were able to talk more about some of the techniques that are used in identifying unidentified decedents. Yeah, that was really cool. This is another one that I made a note that you went to that I didn't get to go to. Oh yes, the one about the Denver Airport. That was so much fun. It was with Justin from Generation Why and John Lorden. That was really fun. I did not know what to expect. I had no idea what the deal was with the Denver Airport before I went, But now I know. This was an example of one of the paranormal type, right, yeah, because some of we lean towards the true crime sit side, but there are paranormal sessions as well. Lani actually made Lane and Lisa made the decision to kind of split the podcast festival in half. So the next year there's going to be a true crime version and there's going to be a paranormal version called Behind the Veil, So there'll be a separate paranormal one this but this year.

15:18 So yeah, so this was one of the paranormal sessions about the Denver Airport. What is one thing you remember from that? So there's so many things, but the when the Denver Airport was built, apparently they built this luggage moving system underneath it, and it was going to be just a like a very complex web of like not moving sidewalks that'll conveyor belt the conveyor belts, right, and it was supposed to be a highly efficient way of getting luggage on and off of airplanes and what have you. And it was like extremely expensive, incredibly expensive and did not work at all because it turns out that there are constantly changes and there are gate changes, and so it just wasn't something that was actually viable, but the tunnels are still there, so they will like drive around the tunnels basically and move luggage around that way underneath the airport.

16:16 But one of the things, one of the conspiracies, not sure why, is that there are like many levels underneath the Denver Airport. That the Denver Airport is a like a fallout shelter for rich people. So when. Say hell mouth, it might. Be a hell mouth too. But it went like when when it goes down, that the rich people are going to go there immediately to the airport and yeah, they're gonna go to the airport and live in this underground bunker. Hey, okay type thing. Good luck to them, Yeah, we wish them the best. And the other thing was the if you look at the overhead shot of the airport, so the way the airport is designed, it's designed to accommodate a high volume of air traffic as you might expect, even more so than like you know, Harry Reid is pretty this high volume. But you're can be coming from the north to south, the east, or the west. So you can have four planes landing at any one time in Denver, one from the north, one from the south, one f one from the west. So if you look at it from overhead and you kind of ignore some extra lines in the it looks a little like a swastika, So so it looks sort of like so, but I'm with Justin, And what Justin said was like, I'm not sure what the conspiracy is here, Like if I'm not sure if that's meant to convey to Nazi aliens that

17:46 they should land here, this is the airport they should land at. It was not clear. But yeah, they're also I'm not sure this is really a conspiracy. But there were when we were walking around the airport leaving. Did you notice the gargoyle? I did notice there was a gar So there's an east. Side gargoyle in a west side gargoyle. I guess. I'm not sure. Oh and they are they are in luggage like they it's like they popped out of luggage. Yes, yes, I think. And at one point there was a talking gargoyle. I think. I feel like we have a conversation about the talking gargoyle while we were walking around and how the gargoyle used to talk to people and now it doesn't really talk anymore. It just talks like every twice an hour.

18:31 Or something. It's like an animatronic weird. It's not real talking gargoyle. Why would they put that in the airport. It's just as you would say, it's it's not a real clown. It's just a person dressed as a clown. It's not a real gargoyle. Just a person dressed as a gargoyle. So, yeah, that was really fun. I really enjoyed that session. That's awesome. Oh I missed this next one with Sarah Turney and Julie Murray. You mean I you missed like the first part of it. Yeah, uh yeah. So Sarah and Julie Murray did a session that was very specific to some of the online harassment they have faced over the years. And it's actually I really enjoyed that session because I had seen Sarah and Julie at Crime Con and i'd Las Vegas in twenty twenty two and I saw them. That's kind of when I realized how important ethical true crime is. And it never would have occurred to me that Sarah and Julie, who were dealing with such serious situations, would be subjected to such terrifying harassment just for basically existing and having bad luck, like.

19:41 And for being related to a missing person. Yeah to yeah, two people who are missing. Yeah, I still I do not understand that. I mean understand what's happening, But I just. I get a hobby. Yeah, get a hobby, get a life, or as Julie would say, you know, work on your empathy, you know. Yeah, So that one was really interesting. Yeah, if you ever have the chance to hear Sarah or Julie talk, they're amazing speakers. They're they're so engaging, and they've they just opened their heart out and they just share heart up and they just share so much out of their life. So in the next one, we went to we were late for this one, The Many Faces of Luri Dan.

20:26 I did not know anything about me, neither Lauri or this case. But Nina instead from Already Gone and Gary Howard Gary Nina did a great job telling the story of Laurie Dan, a young woman who seemingly went through some kind of She started showing signs that she was having some kind of mental breakdown. She was really struggling, and the people in her life were either ignoring her symptoms or they didn't know how to help her, and it sadly had a tragic end. Yes, as many true crime stories do. So Nina covered this in one of her episodes, and we highly recommend you listen to it. Yeah, it's a terrifying story that happened in nineteen eighty eight. There's a school shooting of fire. It's called The Life and Rampage of Laurie Dan. So check it out. And we're not going to.

21:23 Spoil it for you, all right. I know you loved this session with Defense Diaries. Oh my god. I had a really good time in this one. I didn't really know anything about the Karen Reid trial. I only knew a tiny bit. I mean I knew a little bit about it. I kind of knew the broad strokes, but I was not really following. We have a neighbor actually who was following it, who's been dying to talk to me about it. Yeah, because she knows we have a podcast. She's one of our subscribers. Yeah, and she's awesome. Maybe she's listening to this.

22:03 And so I didn't really know much about it, and but I certainly learned Bob Motto and and Alison really took everybody to school about that case. That was fantastic. I thought that was so interesting. Yeah, and it's so great seeing them together to debate things. Yeah, they're so good at that. Yeah. I love how he'll be talking and she'll jump in and he'll be like, actually that's not right. So much fun to watch. You're so smart. Yeah, so that was great. Yeah, so we talked about the Karen Reid trial. What else do you want? The big show stopper? Oh my god. So the final the final session of the of of the festival was called I'll take the stairs with Allen and Tara.

22:58 Yes, and if any true crime fans out there know what happened with Ellen and Tara. More like, if any true crime fans out there don't know what happened between Ellen and Tara at Obsessed Fest, A want to say twenty twenty three. Yeah, I believe it might have been early twenty twenty four. It might have been in the spring. Oh maybe you don't know. I you know. I hesitate to say google it because you're gonna get a really no, don't google it. Yeh, don't google it. How are they going to know if they don't. I don't know you can google it, But I would say take anything you read with a grain of salt, A huge grain of sault because what Ellen and Tara did was basically dispel any and all rumors about what happened.

23:39 They came clean, they took accountability for things they had made. They explained how they became friends because of what happened, and it was it was awesome, beautiful, it was moving, inspiring. It was it was so much about not holding grudges, not making shit up about another person's motives or and like coming to someone and saying like, do you have a problem. How can we solve this problem? I want to I want to fix this. How do we fix this? And you guys, they they fucking fixed it. Yeah, And they were there together to tell tell the story and to dance and embrace each other, and it was just incredible.

24:19 And Joey was there too. Who always amazing. One of the things I thought was really cool about that was that they talked about how other people that were involved, who shall obviously remained nameless, kind of fanned the flames ye and made it so much worse. But it was really it was really interesting, interesting to find out from both of them, like from both sides how it was just like a comedy of errors. Maybe not a comedy because it was pretty you know, it was it got to be pretty hurtful and scary, but it was just it was like a Three's Company episode.

25:01 It was just a lot of cross signals and just it. Ah. But I'm so glad they squashed it. Yeah, there's yeah, there's. Some other people in the true crime community like helped them, yes, talk and talk through it, and it was just it's just so great to know what can be right. Yeah, take men out of the equation and see what happens. They'll spend an hour talking about the Denver Report. We had a kind of a funny moment with Julie and Brooke. What it was. It Saturday. We left to get lunch and we had rented a car, so we left the hotel and we were driving down the sidewalk and we saw.

25:46 We weren't driving down the sidewalk. To be clear, I'm a very good driver, so I'm driving across the grass, so I pulled the car into the curb. So I jumped the curb. No, we were driving on the street, on the correct side, on the correct as and walking down the sidewalk. We see two of the participants from the festival, Julie Murray and Brooke. And I didn't really know Brooke, like I recognized. Her, but she was a friend of sarattorneys. I didn't really know her. And I knew Julie, like I said, by a reputation because I'd been in her sessions before. And so we pulled over and I rolled down the window and asked them if they wanted a ride to where we were going for lunch, and they accepted.

26:34 They were like, yeah, why not? And I said, get in losers, We're going to Target, like. And it was legitimately a I don't know, it was like a three minute drive. It was just really short. It was silly, but it was also one hundred degrees in human Yeah it was, but it wasn't too humid, but it was. It was hot. And so we you and I went and got lunch and they went over to Target, but we did I didn't have anything. They didn't like. We had each other's contact and. We wouldn't coordinate, so we didn't coordinate the return trips. So we got stuck at the at the sandwich place for a while waiting for our order. And I just because it was like time for the sessions to start up again, I kind of assumed they either walked back or figured something out, maybe got to ride back with another two Randos and hopefully well no, you know what I mean, like its not random Rando's, but people like us.

27:21 And you know, we got back, and then a couple hours later we were able to run into brook and I said, hey, you know, I'm sorry that we didn't give you ride back. And when I was talking to Brooks, she said, you know, I said, you know, and I realized that it was kind of strange, you know that I don't really know you. And I kind of pulled over and offered you a ride, and you took the ride, and she said, well, yeah, you know, you know Julie, So so I knew it was okay, It's like, I don't I don't really know Julie. We were like, I mean, I guess we do. I mean, I mean, she's I know who she is. You know who she is, and we think she's amazing. And yeah, so it was just kind of funny to think that like they all kind of I think each other might have assumed we were fine to take a ride from and which we were to be, of course we were, but it still was kind of like a funny, funny moment.

28:15 But I was also like, never take a ride from a stranger again. Oh my god. And when I told Julie this story later at the VIP mixer and I mentioned you know that, I said to Brooke, you know, yeah, of course I know Julie, but it's not like we're besties. When Julie said, we're not, like, I just. You were like, I remember I saw you afterwards and we were like, we are now. We are now right. Yeah, probably one of my favorite memories from the whole weekend because it was just so silly and yeah, it was awesome, and it was it was kind of cool to like get to know new people that we never met before. But it was also awesome to see some of the people that we'd seen last year or that we worked together with that we hadn't really spent a lot of time with since because we live here, they live there. Like our buddies Kenna and Coel from Diagnostic Killer.

29:16 They're amazing. They are amazing, and it was so cool spending so much time with them. I wish our table had been closer to that. Yes, maybe we should, like. Next year, I mean, who cares? Yeah, Kenna uh. Kenna and Coel were definitely some of the first people we talked about when we were like, hey, maybe we think we want to do a podcast, and they gave us so much guidance and do it. Yeah, so much support. It was awesome. I include Eric carter landin in that as well as being one of the people who we talked to who really encouraged us along the way. Yeah, and of course PNW. Oh my gosh, we missed not having them there.

29:56 They weren't there, and. We were hoping to get to meet Jake and Jake and Jamie from Strictly Stocking. Neither of them were there, which was a bummer, but you know, there's always next year. But we did meet Jen and her dog Freya. Yes, yes, anyone who was at the festival saw the little dog Freya with her pink tail walking around and that was such a treat. It's so nice to have dogs around when you're especially when you're you know, hearing some awful stuff and you know, working through some difficult sessions. Sometimes just need some dog time. So yeah, that was awesome. I'm not sure if I have any final thoughts.

30:41 We are very excited for the next one. Yeah, we're trying to think of what we should do for our session. Yes, if anyone has any ideas for what you think if Sins and Survivors were to do a session in Boston, what would it be about? Because we don't know. Yeah, we will likely figure something thing out, but we are also open to suggestions and partnerships, because we are always open to suggestions and partnerships. Speaking of suggestions and partnerships, I didn't even mention Natalie from the Murder Diaries, and we spent so much time with Natalie and. What is wrong with us? I was going to say, what is wrong with you? But I felt very cue story, what is wrong with us? I know, Natalie, it was so awesome meeting you and spending time with your husband Tim. And I'm sad that Paige wasn't there and we didn't get to meet her as well, But hopefully next time, next time, next time, because there's always going to be a next time.

31:32 That's right. We are planning to spend more time with Tara as well, which is awesome. Coming up here about Tara. Well, I talked we talked about her in the Oh that's true, in her her sessions she did with Ellen but Tara was right there during my panel and definitely her podcasting course was the inspiration for me pitching that idea for that panel. So we love Tara so. And you should definitely do her podcast course as well. Yes, if she's doing it again. Yes, Or listen to her show The Batty Club. And Terry's why not both? Do it all? Do it all? Look up all these people that we've talked about. Listen to all their podcasts, learn their stories, share their stories.

32:16 That's right, there's so many that we left out. We already know we did, so if. We did, we apologize. I think that's all we have for today. But we had a great time. We were so excited for the next one. Yeah, thanks for listening to this. We do appreciate you. Yeah, let us know what you think. Was this too rambly? It's going to take me so long to edit this. I'm going to edit it down to three minutes. Do you want to say the thing? Did it appropriate to say the thing? I'm going to say the thing. What happens here happens everywhere, even Boston, especially Boston. Thanks for listening. Visit sinspod dot com slash subscribe for exclusive bonus content. And to listen ad free.

33:22 Remember to like and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and threads at Sins and Survivors. If you're enjoying the podcast, please leave us a review on your podcast platform of choice. You can contact us at Questions at sinsnsurvivors dot com. If you are someone you know as affected by domestic violence or needs support, please reach out to local resources or the National Domestic Violence Hotline. A list of resources is available on our website, Sins and Survivors dot com. Sins and Survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast, is research, written and produced by your hosts Sean and John. The information shared in this podcast is accurate at the time of recording. You have questions, concerns, or corrections, please email us.

34:02 Links to source material for this episode can be found on our website, Sends and Survivors dot com. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the podcast creators, hosts, and their guests. All individuals are innocent until proven guilty. This content does not constitute legal advice. Listeners are encouraged to consult with legal professionals for guidance.