169: A MONSTER Husband: WORSE Than Chris Watts? 01:48:40

Hey, true crime besties. Welcome back to an all new episode of Serialistly. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to an all new episode of Serialistly with me, Annie Elise, your true crime bestie. I am here to break down another case for you. And guys, the case we're talking about today is one that you may be familiar with. You might be. Some of you might not be.

But I guarantee you, even if you're familiar with this case, there are details that you have never heard before because you know that I had to go into the trenches when I was researching this and figure out every single detail that I could find out because this is a case that has bothered me for years. And I know it's bothered a lot of other people in the true crime community. And so I wanted to make sure that I went to like the bottom of the barrel, the depths

of hell and scraped out every single piece of information that I possibly could. Now, I also will say this before we get into it, that today's case is one of the more disturbing and honestly unbelievable cases that we've talked about in quite a while. It is a well-known case, as I mentioned, so you may have heard of it. You might have heard bits and pieces about it, and honestly, I

even I thought I knew the full story. But like I said, once I started researching it, the amount of just like unnerving, twisted, and shocking details I discovered, it almost reminds me...

i'm gonna say it i'm gonna say guys of chris watts except maybe even worse actually if you can even imagine that and i know that i often say oh this case has a bunch of twists and turns but truly even if you think you know everything about this case

buckle up, and we are going to get right into it. So this case takes us back to 2009, when Susan and Josh Powell, a seemingly happily married church-going couple, were living in West Valley City, Utah. There, they were raising their two little boys, four-year-old Charlie and two-year-old Brayden.

On Monday, December 7, 2009, Josh got home around dinner time with both Charlie and Brayden. They had just come back from a father-son camping trip. But when they got home, something was wrong. The police were at the house.

Now, apparently, that morning when the boys didn't get dropped off at daycare like they usually would, the daycare tried to get a hold of Susan and Josh, but neither of them answered their phones. So then, the daycare got a hold of the boys' emergency contacts, Josh's mom and Josh's sister. They, too, tried calling Susan and Josh, but again, neither of them answered, which this really started to freak them out.

So they went over to Josh and Susan's house to make sure that everything was okay. But when they got there, the door was locked and nobody was answering when they knocked. So finally, they called the police and they asked them to come and do a welfare check. And when the police arrived, they tried knocking on the door as well. But again, nobody was answering. So this was becoming really weird. The boys didn't go to daycare, nobody was home, and now the police were learning that Susan never went to work that day either,

which was extremely, extremely unlike her. Now at that point, Josh's mom, his sister, and the police thought that the only possible explanation in all of this was that the family had died from carbon monoxide poisoning, figuring what other reason would they not be answering the door? Why wouldn't Susan have gone to work? Why wouldn't the boys have gone to daycare?

So with that, they felt like they really had no other choice but to break into the house. However, when the police were able to finally get inside by breaking a window, there was very loud music playing. But nobody in the family could be found anywhere in this house. In fact, it looked like the house had been completely undisturbed.

Except there was one thing that stood out to the police. A wet spot on the carpet with two air fans positioned perfectly pointing at it trying to dry this spot. They also found a wet spot on the loveseat.

So when Josh was pulling into his driveway, he had no idea that his family had been reported missing all day. And within minutes of the boys and Josh arriving home, there was kind of this brief sense of relief. Everybody was okay. The boys were back. This was just some huge misunderstanding.

except that feeling of relief went away almost as fast as it came because susan was still missing so as i'm sure you can imagine when josh returned home from his camping trip without susan he was almost immediately brought into the west valley police station to speak with the detectives now this wasn't a huge deal or anything serious but his wife was now a missing person and the police really needed his help to figure out what was going on here

Now before we get into this next part, we do need to talk a little bit more about Josh and Susan's backgrounds. Susan Powell had brown hair and blue eyes. She was born on October 16th, 1981, and Susan and her sister were raised by their parents as members of the LDS Church.

They moved around a little bit when Susan was young, but eventually they all settled in Puyallup, Washington. Now growing up, Susan was very happy. She was also very outgoing, and she kind of just had this like very optimistic and caring personality about her.

After high school, she ended up going to cosmetology school, and then in November 2000, Susan attended a dinner party slash kind of like this singles event that was hosted by then 24-year-old Josh Powell, and Josh was also a member of the LDS church. Susan didn't really know Josh, but she had been invited to this singles gathering, this little party through a mutual friend, and

and so she had just decided to go to this dinner party. At the end of the party, Susan and Josh began talking, and when they did, they immediately hit it off. That single interaction from that first meeting kick-started their absolute whirlwind romance.

And by the following April, that spring, they were married at a Mormon temple. So as I briefly mentioned, I mean, overall, Susan had a pretty normal upbringing. But the same couldn't be said for Josh. So Josh was born on January 20th, 1976, to Steve and Terry Powell.

He also grew up in Puyallup, Washington. And as I mentioned, he and his siblings were also raised in the LDS church. When Josh was 16 years old, his parents ended up filing for divorce. And according to the court documents, their divorce involved not only serious conflicts over parenting and also religion, but there were also very disturbing allegations of violence, pornography, polygamy, and even witchcraft.

Steve believed that women essentially only existed for men. He wanted to have multiple wives, but Terri, she was absolutely against this.

So not only did Josh and his siblings grow up watching his parents' very tumultuous, violent, and toxic relationship, but Steve started teaching his sons to share his views about women: that all women are essentially worthless, they should be obedient, that men are always the ones who are in control. And like most divorces, soon the biggest battle became a custody battle over the children.

In court documents, Steve accused Terri of engaging in witchcraft because she had studied herbs and natural healing, and Steve said that she mixed this with her Mormon beliefs. And he used that as his proof that she was quote "practicing witchcraft and devil worship."

Meanwhile, Terry said that Steve shared porn with Josh and with his two brothers, the children, and claimed that Steve was this mentally unfit parent that needed true psychological help. What's also in the court documents is a very disturbing portrayal of Josh, who, remember, was just 16 years old at the time. Josh was described as a seriously troubled teen who had once attempted suicide, killed his pet gerbils, once threatened his mother with a butcher knife over an argument about dishes...

and had also adopted his dad's disparaging views about women. Which, they say the expression is "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree," but who knows if that would have necessarily been the path that Josh had taken had his dad not heavily tried to influence every single decision that Josh made and his way of thinking. And that's not to give any sort of pass or any sort of excuse here; everybody certainly is capable of free will and making their own opinions.

but Josh was just an impressionable kid and then teenager. And so here he's looking at his dad, who I would imagine he somewhat idolizes as a man, a parental figure, and he now is becoming very troubled himself. And it's no surprise that when Josh and Susan met in all of this, I mean, she had no idea about any of this, about any of the history, about any of the red flags, none of it.

In her mind, she was marrying her Prince Charming, her life partner, the absolute soulmate to her counterpart, or whatever the expression would be. Now, shortly after getting married, they moved in with Josh's dad, Steve, the same one who had heavily influenced Josh growing up, and this was in South Hill, Washington. But here's where it starts to get really creepy. While living there, Steve developed a very creepy obsession with Susan, and

And that is putting it beyond mildly, guys. And we're going to get to all of that, which is very unnerving, as soon as we hear from the first sponsors of today's episode.

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Okay, so Josh and Susan are married. She doesn't know anything about his past. They move in with his dad. And now Steve, his dad, is getting this weird obsession about Susan, his son's new wife. Now, guys, when I say this, this man was truly depraved. I cannot emphasize this enough. Now,

Not only did he have this crush on Susan, but he frequently stole underwear from her drawers or from her laundry hamper, and he would masturbate with it. Her father-in-law. He would steal her dirty underwear, and clean underwear as well, and masturbate with it. Like, what a beyond disgusting creep.

He also constantly took photos of Susan. And Steve was actually known for being the kind of dad who always had his camcorder out. You know what the one I'm talking about. And I say camcorder, which totally dates me. But you know where they have it on their shoulder, they're videoing every single thing. He was always making these home movies. But instead of making home movies about the whole family or the whole house, he would just zoom in on Susan. And he would zoom in on her butt

anytime she walked away or he would just focus completely on her the entire time he was recording at one point he even set up a hidden camera in the bathroom so that he could record susan all without her knowing he even started collecting susan's used cotton balls the ones that she would use to remove her nail polish and then toss away in the garbage he would collect used tampons used pads like

a full-blown collection, guys. And there are actual pictures of this, not just allegations. It is truly unhinged. And he would use those items, those dirty sanitary items as well, anytime when he would fantasize about Susan and start masturbating. Now, if you're thinking, okay, Annie, that's revolting. That is foul. I've had about enough.

I'm not even done yet, guys. So buckle up again. He also had a journal, and he would write all of these sick, twisted, and deranged fantasies about Susan inside this journal. And he also had a video journal where he would actually talk about it in depth. He also videotaped himself sniffing Susan's underwear. I mean, just beyond disgusting. Stephen Powell was narcissistic, very self-absorbed, out of touch with reality.

He was under the impression that anytime he was with Susan or saw Susan, she was hitting on him. That she was interested in him. She did that for me. I'm always good. I gotta show how happy I am. He was infatuated with her. I gotta worship her. She just turns me on. I'm in a perpetual state of turmoil when she's around.

He would video her. He would be inside of his van and video her walking to and from buildings. I had to get a picture of this dress. It was so beautiful. Back here, it was in jacuzzi. I'd love to spend the evening in here with Susan is what I'd like to do. So I'd probably do some pretty, you know, some people might think they're weird.

Here are the panties that I picked up out of Susan's laundry. God, they smell so nice. I think she's the most beautiful thing that ever walked the earth. What I would like is to have, be able to do this actually on her body. Here's my stash of pictures that I feel very fortunate to have. There she is and I don't know when. This is another high school shot probably. That's what she must have been wearing.

A couple of mornings ago when I was taping her, doing her makeup, every time she takes a shower, I'm anxious to get into her laundry. I just had what is probably the most erotic experience I've had in my entire life. Susan has been feeling ill. She had a cold. And I offered to rub her feet, to rub her toes together somewhere.

Josh was sitting across the room on the chair and he wasn't always watching so I sort of took liberties as he didn't watch. It would be great to go to Colorado and see a different part of the U.S. You know? Yeah. I'm probably wrong but I'm really falling in love with it. Maybe I'm interpreting something that I shouldn't be interpreting.

You know, and just, for example, when we were sitting on the couch, it just felt like you were very, um, you know, I mean, I was extremely aroused, and I think you were somewhat aroused, at least I thought. I don't know where you're going with this. Susan, I don't, I, I, yeah, well, I'll tell you what I, where I'm going. I mean, I'm married to your son, and I should just be the daughter-in-law. I know. Which puts me a step beneath your own children.

It was definitely a romantic obsession, yeah. I mean, uh...

- You know, Susan's a beautiful woman and when a beautiful woman comes on to you like that, it's really hard to resist that kind of a thing. I mean, maybe it's just me, probably inappropriate, but I admit those things were going on. - In this video guys, he is literally rubbing the crotch area of her underwear while he is talking.

Now, obviously, this was extremely upsetting and uncomfortable, to say the absolute least. And Susan apparently even told Josh about all of this, saying like, hey, your dad's making me really uncomfortable. But Josh didn't do anything about it. And he kind of even brushed it off like Susan was just crazy.

But in any event, it ended up reaching a boiling point. And finally, Josh and Susan moved out, and they moved into a home in West Valley City, Utah. Now this move was great. It was a fresh start for both Susan and Josh, and not long after they moved, they welcomed their first son Charlie in 2005. Then they welcomed a little Brayden in 2007. Susan absolutely loved being a mom too. Becoming a mother was something that she had always wanted.

She loved being an LDS member at the church. She enjoyed bringing Charlie and Brayden with her to church, even though Josh eventually stopped attending. And on top of being a busy mom, Susan worked full-time. She worked at Wells Fargo while Josh worked as a computer programmer. Now going back to the night when Josh came home with the boys from that camping trip, and Josh going to the

police station, he answered a few questions, but he was pretty tired, so detectives ended up telling him, like, hey, go home, get some rest, come back in the morning, and you can finish answering some questions. So the next day, Josh came back into the police station, and this time he was in a more formal interview room.

But again, he wasn't under arrest or anything at all. It was all totally voluntary, just talking with the detectives. And Josh spent nearly four hours talking with them, talking about his life, the night of Susan's disappearance, and kind of honestly just a whole lot of nothing.

Josh said that Susan hadn't been feeling well the night before, so that's why he had decided to get the boys out of the house for a little bit, take them on this father-son camping trip. But he said that other than her not feeling well in the evening, that Sunday was just like any typical Sunday for her. She went to church with her boys at Hunter 36, the LDS ward, and then later that afternoon, one of her neighbors came over for a visit. After the neighbor left, Josh ended up making breakfast for dinner, and then Susan started to lay down because she said she wasn't feeling well.

but everything was pretty normal. Then later that evening, he went camping with the boys, and then when he got home the following day, he found out, just like everybody else, that Susan was now missing. Which, okay, fair enough, that could make sense, that is plausible,

But then, the detectives asked Josh why he was a no-show at his job, and why he took the kids out on a Monday morning from daycare. Josh claimed that he didn't realize that it was Monday. He thought that it was still Sunday, or that it had been Sunday, I should say, which I have to say is pretty odd, since he had just said that morning before that Susan went to church, and it's pretty standard that church is on a Sunday.

But anyways, in any event, detectives just kind of moved on, and they just wanted to hear more about what sparked this random one-day camping trip in December, no less, in Utah with two toddlers. And Josh said that Susan was asleep, and that he left her at the house around at 1230 a.m. so that he could go camping with his sons. And let me just say, guys,

I am a parent of two toddlers, and on no planet am I packing up my two kids at midnight, after midnight, in the depths of winter to go on a camping trip, on a whim, on a Sunday night.

Mm-mm. Something is weird. And that's not the only strange and kind of unbelievable thing about this whole story. The night before, there was also a huge snowstorm. But Josh insisted that he had generators and he had other camping gear and he wanted to try it out and they'd be warm and it wasn't that big of a deal. But again, I'm sorry, who in their absolute right mind wakes up a two-year-old and a four-year-old in the middle of the night during a blizzard to go camping?

So then the detective said, okay, sure, I'll roll with this. But where did you go camping? The detective then asked more questions, asking where he stopped, what direction he went, and how exactly Susan was supposed to get to work since they shared a car. And here's how Josh responded. Did you make arrangements? Did you guys talk about arrangements for her getting to work? I was thinking it was going to be Sunday, and I didn't even think about work.

Probably about it. Okay. And what time did you guys, uh, what time did you say you left your house? It seemed like it was 1:30 or 2:00. Okay. And, um, so you leave the house. I just needed to know the exact route, what you took, where you went. If you stopped to get fuel, if you stopped to get food, if you stopped anywhere, I need to know where you stopped. So walk me through your route, where you stopped. I don't think I stopped anywhere. Where you went.

I just went through Tooele and headed south. Okay, so that's, I need to know your route. I mean, I need to know like where, you say you went through Tooele, you didn't get to Tooele two different ways. How did you get to Tooele? So you left your house and you used Interstate 80? Yeah. To Tooele? Uh-huh. Okay. And I mean, I just headed south. Uh-huh.

and found my way onto the Pony Express route and that was it. Then I just pulled off into some trail. - So you just took I-80, went through Tooele, and you went to the Pony Express route. And you didn't stop anywhere? - I don't think so. - Okay, so you're saying you already had a full tank of gas, you didn't have to fill up? - Yeah.

You have what? Yeah, I had a tank of gas. Okay. So you didn't have to... I think I might have gotten it the day before or the day of or something. I don't remember. Okay. So you drove out to the Pony Express Trail. You didn't...no stop for food, gas, nothing, right? And you get to the Pony Express Trail, obviously go east...er, sorry, west, right? Yeah. And how far west do you go? I don't see anyone paying attention, but I just...I just drive.

if anything looks good honestly i've never been out there i need to make sure i haven't been out there too long out there so it's a nasty road okay so i don't know if there's like any landmarks if there's camping grounds all along the road um if there's are there roads that come off of the point express trail and go south and north no there's just trails that you can

I don't know. I've only been out there three or four times. Okay, well you've been out there most recent before that. I mean, pretty recent, right? Yeah. Okay, so... But it was also snowing and so I was pretty focused on the road. Okay. Looking for a turnoff. Like I say, I just found a trail and... Were you concerned with the snow, knowing that there was a snowstorm coming in? Um, yeah, I was... In a minivan?

Actually, the minivan handles like a 4x4. Okay. Yeah, you can go some serious off-roading with that minivan. Okay. So, I mean, wasn't that a concern with the storm coming in and it was already snowing? It wasn't already snowing when I left. No, it was snowing when you got out there. Yeah. And so I was watching the road and I'm going, how thick is this going to get? And then I thought, well...

what are the odds that it'll be anything that'll get us stuck out there. And we have the generator and the heaters, so it's like, well, we can risk it. We're already here, what the heck, you know? - So about how far do you think you went west on the trail, if you had to guess? - I don't know, maybe 20 miles or who knows. - Okay, so maybe 20 miles?

Okay. And then just walk me through from that point all the way up until you left that area. Well, I just stopped, set up the generator just on a tarp and plugged in the heaters, got some sleep. Just right there on the trail? Mm-hmm. Okay. So you set up the generator and you set up the heaters and you sleep, right? And actually I did also the humidifier. Okay.

Then we woke up dawnish after the light. Then we did a little campfire, hung out, drove all over Creation. You just do the campfire just right there on the side of the road? Yeah. What did you use for the campfire? Just wood, just some crappy wood that I had.

Okay. So you just basically, you stayed on the Point Express Trail. There's no trails that come off of it, right? Off of the road? Well, just the trails. Yeah, I mean... I mean, did you just drive on the road straight out to this campground? No, we drove into the trails. So you drove on some of the trails then? Yeah. Okay. How could you see the trails with the snow out there? You can tell. Can you? Some are wide, some are narrow. I don't know.

So Josh doesn't know where he went. He doesn't know how far he went. He doesn't know where he pulled over. He doesn't know anything. And then the fact that the detective said, well, why did you continue driving when there was a huge snowstorm that was coming in? And Josh replied, I don't know. I just thought I'd risk it. Really? Risk it? With a two-year-old and a four-year-old?

Okay, so according to Josh, he has no idea where they were, right? He has no idea how long they were there for, what route he took on the way home, what time they left. He knows nothing. I mean, it truly was ridiculous. He couldn't commit to anything, almost to the point where it was extremely awkward during this interview. He also couldn't seem less uninterested in where his missing wife could possibly be. It was beyond strange.

And guys, the hole that he is beginning to dig for himself is about to get even deeper. Josh said that after leaving the campgrounds and going back home, he again doesn't know which route he took. So coming back, you say about maybe 11 or 12, he said it was time to leave and he started coming back. Walked me through that from that time up until...

Tell me that where you drove to, where you stopped. I just head north, you know, East and North. I saw a Lehigh sign, so I was like, take Lehigh. But he says that he stopped at a self-service car wash and he washed his car while it was snowing. Like,

You've got to be the dumbest person in my mind, honestly. Who's washing their car in a snowstorm when you're saying you don't even know where you were driving? It just doesn't make sense. I mean, sure, yes, getting a good car wash after camping, maybe your car's filthy. Okay, I can make sense of that. But this wasn't that at all.

Josh said that he stopped to give his car a full detail treatment at one of these self-service places. You know the kind where you like drive up under a bay, you use one of those power washers, you use quarters to pay, you vacuum the inside of it. And Josh power washed the living crap out of his car. He also vacuumed it as much as he possibly could in the interior, all during a blizzard in the middle of nowhere.

Totally normal, right? Now this interview, as I said, lasted around four hours. During the entire interview, Josh was trying to like muster up these tears that just were not coming. He kept sniffling every two minutes, almost making this interview pretty unbearable to watch back. Because to be perfectly honest, there were no real tears, no real emotion, and his wife was missing. Well, let me ask you this then, okay? Do you feel like you're under arrest?

I don't know. I didn't even think it was that... I didn't even think in yesterday, but I don't know where she's at and she ain't back yet. Okay. So you don't know if you feel like you're under arrest or not? I feel like you guys are... I mean, I already told you guys everything I can think of and I haven't... Oh, and actually I did think of only one thing.

She has another friend that I wasn't even thinking of. It's one of her closest friends is Kiersey. Okay. Well, let me explain something to you, Josh, okay? But I can't even think straight. Okay. Let me explain something to you. You're not under arrest, okay? If you were under arrest, I would have came to your home, I would have put handcuffs on you, and I would have brought you here, okay? So understand that right now. You're not under arrest for anything, okay? The...

problem that we have and what we're investigating is what? A missing person, right? And that missing person being your wife. And initially this all turned out to be basically missing people, an entire family. And that's why we were notified. Okay? Okay. And that's why we were at your home. That's why we broke the window into your home.

to make sure that if there was anybody in there that they were okay. Okay? This report came from your mom, which is obviously very concerned, and it was started by the daycare provider. By the way, she has a key to my house.

The daycare provider has a key so I don't know why they had to break the window when she started it and she had a key. Okay, well that was not brought to our attention obviously. Okay, so the concern here is obviously, and you mentioned that we talked. And by the way, I just. We spoke yesterday, got some general stuff from you.

Alright. I mean, what do you want us to do? Do you not want us to talk to you? Do you not want us to talk to anybody and just leave you alone and hope that she shows up? Is that what you want us to do? No. Okay. I mean, I'm just trying to do my job. You know what I'm saying? Who's the closest person to her? Who's the closest person to her? Who? That's me. Exactly.

So you're telling me that you do not want to come in here and talk to me and answer my questions so we can try to figure out where potentially she could be. They told me that I should have an attorney because you don't know what's going on. They said that I'm pretty much in over my head. Okay. You're in over your head because your wife is missing.

Because you guys are already trying to trap me on little things. Like my hands, for one. Taking pictures of your hands, showing that there's no serious injuries to your hands is trapping you how? Well, when you guys were doing it, you were telling me that you were like... I actually wore the neck on your knuckle. And you explained that it was dry skin. Okay. Makes sense. Dry skin and work. I just work.

Like I said, you don't have to be here. If you don't want to be here, you can leave. I didn't force you to come here, and I'm not forcing you to stay. Okay? If you don't want to talk, you can leave. You're not under arrest. I haven't read your... I think it would be a good idea to talk, but I think it might be a good idea to have an attorney. What's an attorney going to do for you? I don't know. Answer your questions for you. I don't need the answers from an attorney. I need the answers from the husband that's closest to you.

um, dismissing person to Susan. You know her better than I do. You know her better than anybody because you guys have been living together, you're married. Who should I look at as a suspect? I don't, I can't think of anyone who's... You can't think of anyone? Who should I look at as a person of interest? Who should I start talking to? Just as much as I've been talking to you, who should I talk to that much? Because you're saying that

You know, you're concerned because we've been talking to you for so long. Well, that's not really a concern. Oh, okay. Because my perception is I'm trying to get as much information as I can get. And, you know, when I get up and I leave, I go out and I share information. If there's any new information, okay, he states that she works here. You know, let's get a hold of Linda. Let's see if Linda may have heard from him. You know what I'm saying? I mean...

What, uh, are you concerned as far as, what's your thoughts on what we're doing to find her? You haven't even inquired as to what we're doing. I have a clue, but you do accept, you already told me that you checked the hospitals and you've talked to everyone we know. And what else do you do? He seemed more upset that the window of his house was broken and he kept bringing that up over and over and over again. Yeah, and so I was kind of pissed off that they broke the window.

I was trying to fix that window. They busted a window in my house. Oh, they did? Who did? Yeah, they broke a window.

I don't know anything about this case. I'm just here. Josh came off as totally uninterested, and he acted like he couldn't remember anything at all, as if he just had the absolute worst memory in the world. Yet none of the stuff that the police had been asking him were things that he would have zero recollection or memory of, because most of the questions that were asked all pertained to things that he had done in the last 24 to 48 hours. It wasn't like they were asking him something about five or 10 years ago.

You talked earlier about how kind of sporadic throughout the day and early afternoon you were packing the vehicle and getting things ready for this trip. Tell me everything that you packed and put inside the vehicle. Three pairs of clothes for each boy and for me. Heaters. I actually grabbed the humidifier because, you know, it's...

pretty nasty this time of year. Generator, some wood, fire extinguisher, lighters, a bunch of camping gear. Sleds were already in there so I just kept them in there. What kind of camping gear? I couldn't even tell you at this point. It's a box.

I mean, I just grab it and assume whatever I need is going to be in there when it's ready to be used. And mostly the things I use are on top, you know, like the s'more sticks. Although I don't necessarily use those either because it's just easier to grab a stick and then burn it. What else did you put in there? Some cords, flashlight, I don't know, just a bunch of stuff.

Um, cords. What do you mean by cords? Uh, just cords so I can plug in the... Electrical cords? Yeah. Okay. And what's the bunch of this other stuff? I don't know, I mean... Oh, come on, Josh. You remember putting cream cheese in a pancake and you tell me you can't remember what you put in your car? I mean, that's basically all the significant stuff. Anything else?

Remember nothing significant. But Josh, his response, he was acting like it, like, I just can't remember. Bro, it was yesterday. It was yesterday. What do you mean? And for all of his effort that he went through to act like he didn't remember anything for the past four hours of this interview, it was so painfully obvious that he was faking, like he forgot. While at the same time, he also kept asking detectives if he was a suspect.

even going as far as saying, well, they usually look at the spouses first, right? I mean, he really thought that he was being sly here or something. It is truly unbelievable. But as we know, the spouses usually are looked at first. So they needed to look outside of this. Could there be anybody else involved? Were they just narrowing in on Josh for, you know, a bias for an unknown reason?

But Susan didn't have any enemies. Everybody else that the police talked to said that Susan loved her boys and that she would never, ever leave them. There were also no signs of forced entry into the house, and it was really like pulling teeth to get Josh to give an answer to any of these questions.

So detectives were not buying any of the bull that he was trying to sell, and it was not looking good for Josh. Now, towards the end of the interview, after he had tried to leave a couple of times, the detective told him, no, you're being detained at this point. Because as all this was going down, another detective had interviewed one of his children, little Charlie.

And Charlie said that Susan actually went camping with them that night. And not only that, but that they left her there. Now, of course, Josh said that his son was lying in all of this. They know that she didn't come with us. Well, here's the thing. Kids are very honest. That's one thing I've learned in the years of doing this job. That when kids talk to us, we'll listen because they're honest. And they never lie. They don't make things up. So they're saying they were with you. They were with you. Okay. She was with you.

So I have to believe the kids. So now it's going to be up to you if you want to help us find her and help us get to the bottom of what really happened. That's what we're here for, okay? We're going to find out either way, with your help or without your help. I honestly don't need your help. I feel confident enough in my investigation and his investigation and everybody else involved. We have great detectives in this department that will find out what happened. We'll get to the bottom of this with your help or without your help.

So I want to give you the opportunity to help us and tell us what really happened. Because you're the only one that knows. There's nothing that happened. She was not with us. And if my kids said that... So your kids lie then? Do your kids lie? Sometimes they do. I mean, if they said that she was with us, they know that's not true. So if they say... And if they said that she was with us, then I guess that would put her out in the pony express. Okay, and that's my concern. That's our concern.

It is cold outside and if there's a way we can help her, we can help her right now if you help us out. No, she was not with us. I didn't leave her at the Pony Express. I didn't just take her out and drop her off or even do anything.

So detectives did interview Charlie that same day, and a lot more information came from that interview than what came from Josh's interview. Charlie was only four years old at the time, so the detectives knew that they had to take his age into consideration, of course. But he said that he did, in fact, go camping with his brother and his dad. But he said that his mom was there also, but that she didn't make it home with them. Okay, so Charlie, when you guys came home from camping, who came home with you? My dad. And?

My mom stayed at the National Park. Your mom stayed there? How do you know your mom stayed? Because I was coming. Because you were coming? Yeah. So your mom stayed at the park. Yeah. Where did she stay at the park? Do you know where? She stayed at the National Park.

Do you know where at the park? No? No. See, my mom stayed where the crystals are. Where what are? Where the crystals are. The crystals? Crystals? Is that what you're saying? Crystals? Yeah. Your mom stayed where the crystals are? Is that what you said? Yeah.

truthfully charlie's statement was pretty eerie but the police didn't really know what to make of it or whether or not what he was saying had any sort of truth to it because even though he was saying things that were in line with what josh had said happened he also said a lot of stuff that would have been impossible like they went on an airplane ride to go get to the campsite and remember he was also four years old and charlie

and Charlie sounded like your typical four-year-old, just full of imagination, full of making up stories in your mind, but also possibly and probably some truth sprinkled in throughout those stories. So when he was interviewed again the following day, the detective referred to his mom by her real name, by Susan, and he kept bringing her up, trying to get Charlie to speak more about this alleged camping trip.

And then at one point, Charlie said that they couldn't talk about Susan. We can't talk about Susan or Kevin. I always keep things as secrets. Well, when we talk about your mom, we can't keep that a secret because your mom would want us to talk about her.

would want us to talk about her. Who told you you can't talk about your mom? No, I... I... I bet my brain told me. Your brain told you that? Well, your brain needs to tell you that it's okay to talk about your mom because we want to find your mom. So, in order to find your mom, we've got to talk about it. Um... We are doing blessings. You're doing blessings? Yeah, but then stuff...

But it's okay that I keep a secret because we are doing blessings. You know what? It's not okay to keep secrets if it will help us find your mom. So we need to talk about those secrets. Did somebody tell you to keep a secret? No, only my brain did. Your brain did? What else did your brain tell you about the secret? My brain won't...

Tell me to say that. Your brain won't tell you to say it? Josh and Susan shared a car like I mentioned earlier, a blue Chrysler Town & Country minivan, and police spent the 7th and the 8th all day searching this van, and what they found inside was painting a very disturbing picture. Police found a metal crowbar, a circular saw, shovels,

tarps, cans of gasoline, a box of plastic gloves, and a tote filled with 31 pieces of camping equipment and supplies, most of which were all never used. They also found Susan's pink Motorola phone, and they noticed that the SIM card was missing from the phone. Which I just gotta say, why would Susan's phone be in the minivan when Josh said that she didn't go camping with them?

with them. So the family's garage was also searched in all of this, and the garage had most things that you would expect to see in a garage, but it also had tons and tons of power tools.

Inside the house near the couch where that wet spot was, remember the one I said where the fans were pointing directly at it to make it air dry? The same one that the officer saw when they first broke into the home? Well, near that spot, investigators found a bit of blood on a floor tile. And after it was tested, it was determined that the blood was Susan's. They also found multiple life insurance policies that came out to a whopping total of $1.5 million. All for Susan.

And jumping ahead a little bit, but still while we're on the topic of finances, 10 days after Susan disappeared, Josh filed paperwork to withdraw all of Susan's retirement funds. And we're going to come back to that shortly. So things obviously are not looking good for Josh. And on top of all of that, where was Josh while his van was in police custody?

being searched. You would think that maybe he would be out, I don't know, searching for his missing wife, passing out flyers at home, comforting his two little toddler boys who were missing their mom. But nope, that's not where Josh was. Instead, he rented a Ford Focus and put 807 miles on it.

For 18 hours, he was unaccounted for and nobody was able to get a hold of him. And the reason why nobody was able to get a hold of him is because he went out and got a new phone while he was out on this joyride trip. So God only knows what Josh was thinking while all of this was going on. I mean, probably sweating bullets and thinking that he was about to be arrested, right? But he was about to be in for a major surprise.

As police continued their investigation, they had been able to access Susan's safety deposit box, one that she had at work, one that she only had access to. Inside of it, they found a journal and also a handwritten note which said, Last Will and Testament for Susan Powell. Inside that note, she wrote that she had been having marital issues for four years, and she also confessed that she did not trust Josh.

The note said, quote, if Susan Powell dies, it may not be an accident, even if it looks like one. She also had savings bonds and legal documents inside in case she ever decided to leave Josh and bring her kids with her. And detectives had learned, too, that Susan told a co-worker at one point, if something ever happens to me, make sure that they look at Josh. The co-worker replied to this being like, what do you mean? Has he threatened you?

Susan said, no, it's just the way that he talks. Josh told her that if she ever even thought about divorce, he would make it his mission to end her and that she would never, ever see the boys again. Now, most of their marital issues were reportedly financially driven.

But they also included Josh just kind of overall not helping with the boys, putting everything on Susan, and almost not really wanting to have anything to do with her at all. And she said that there was little to no physical intimacy whatsoever. Susan was the breadwinner, and Josh made her stick to a very strict budget, questioning every single thing that she purchased.

He told her that she needed to use certain coupons for groceries and that once she was done grocery shopping, she needed to enter it all into a spreadsheet that he would later review. And even so little as a 10 cent difference, it would just make him spiral, go off the rails completely.

And what's crazy about their financial issues is that Josh was the one with the spending problem. And at times, he had a really difficult time sticking with a job. He even declared bankruptcy in 2007 with over $200,000 in debt. And I just gotta say, we oftentimes see where money is a motivator, especially in either murder-for-hire plots or murders or people going missing.

But we also see that when there is a certain level of control over one person who exudes the control, who wants to be the one making all the decisions, oftentimes we do see where they are so strict with spending, just like it was said that Josh was, where they need to know where every single penny is going, yet they're the ones either frivolously spending or they're the ones off having affairs. It is just beyond.

Now remember those video journals I mentioned about Josh's creepy-ass dad? Well, Susan also made her own video journals. And in hers, she was documenting the way that Josh treated her. She documented what assets were hers in the house. I mean, she documented all of it. It was like she made this perfect paper trail of evidence for the police to follow so that they could uncover the truth. Ah, this is me.

July 29th, 2008. It is 12:33. Mountain time. Covering all my bases, making sure that if something happens to me or my family or all of us that our assets are documented. Hope everything works out and we're all happy and live happily ever after as much as that's possible. Charlie, say hi. Today is Tuesday, July 29th, 2008.

And we are in the 6254 Wester Circle House. This is me. Hi. Sorry. And it is... Can you see that? 11:44 a.m. And I am documenting all our assets just in case of any emergencies, fire, flood, damage, disputes. And we have two Samsung monitors. This is Josh's computer and there's some type of backup device and speakers.

Here's the kind of pimping out stuff he's done to his computer. He built it himself. I think there's like five hard drives, something about doing raids. There's those for all the computer geeks. And Josh locked this, but this is all of his files. Locked. Those are his files.

And he bought expensive stuff like these are, I think this was like a couple of thousand dollars of like, it says graphic design templates by stock layouts or something like that. Alright, here's our unfinished basement. He bought 3,000 pounds of wheat and these are buckets of wheat.

Here is a rigid saw. I don't know the differences. I think this is a chop saw. Oh, there we go. It says miter saw utility vehicle MSUV. Oh, that's the holding thing of it. And there is a shop vac. This is all stuff bought in a year or less through Home Depot on my credit. Josh bought a lot of stuff and then he had to bankrupt it. And then he bought a little bit more on my credit. There's a nice...

These are things to roll wood with. Oh, there's his RC car. It's pretty pimped out. You can see that stuff. I think he's got probably a $3,000 worth of supplies in the RC car world. It's a beauty salon chair we got. Virko chairs. And here is our safe. Bear with me a moment. I'm going to press the code. Okay.

So things are fairly organized. We've got all sorts of files. This is all thanks to me trying to save them. A whole lot more tools. So we bought drill sets. There's a nail gun by Boss Stitch. There's a rigid small drill. A Milwaukee drill. A rigid, I think that's a sander of some sort. There's another rigid saw. Paint supplies.

This is all of Josh's RC car stuff. You are with me. I'm told it's like worth $3,000. There's more RC car parts. Yeah, we got that rigid step ladder. There's some fans. Okay, now we're upstairs. Here's another saw, or I mean drill. There's another RC car and remote. Here's a laptop. So there's expansion port 3. I don't know what kind it is.

There's part of the phone. Books. These are the ones that we felt should be out. These books my mom gave me. Beautiful brown encyclopedias. Here's a wedding picture. This remote I guess is like $300. Justified by a babysitter to be able to run our TV. Get out, let go of my leg. Okay. So Josh built this entertainment center.

Speakers, 5.1 surround sound. Be quiet, Charlie. So, don't touch the TV. This is... Go to your room if you're gonna be whiny. AIWA is the brand. Five disc CD or DVD, I don't know, stereo system. There's this one of the speakers. Two, three, four, five. We added these lights.

Chandelier. Chandelier. Josh cleaned that. It was a birthday present I think for me. Alright. Hoverstorm. You bought a stupid hovercraft. Remote control toy. Uh. Keys and locks. Cooking and cleaning supplies. There's another remote by the Clorox on the right. This is recycling and garbage. Sour washer. Duet. HT. Whirlpool.

Front loader and there's the dryer. We got it at the scratch and dent at RC Willys when we first moved here in 2004, like March/April. This is a can organizer that Josh and I made. I had to help him all through the way. He doesn't do projects by himself. More supplies. Little freezer. Josh did have this before me. This table saw. It says "rigid." We built a table on it. This is Josh's welding machine.

He borrowed the cart from the Wade's. There's the box to the filter. Here's trickle tape. I think it was a couple hundred. Camping supplies. All those cabinet doors. Here is, I think it's a band saw. All expensive stuff that we bought. A lot of it got bankrupted. A lot of it got added afterwards. This bike I paid out of my Wells Fargo account. $489 was with the fender.

Josh has an old Peugeot right there. That's the red one. Here's the rest of the 3,000 pounds of wheat. So, another saw, drill, or nail gun or whatever. There's a sander, brushes, some type of saw, an iron, lights, sanders, drills. I don't know what that thing is. That's a Dremel. Those are cases of something. And...

Tools galore. More tools galore. Our scratch and dent furniture that we got from Percy Willie's when we moved in the house in 2004, like March, April. This is a $3,000 rocker glider. My parents lent us the money for it. We still owe them, I think, $3,000. No, wait, that share was $300. We owe them a $3,300 and we, no, we owed them $4,000.

$200 or something like that. Now we are left standing owing $3,000. This is the bathroom. Josh felt the need to pull the mirror out and cut more holes in the wall. Said he was gonna make shelves. That didn't happen. My toiletries, nail polish, makeup. I like to do Mary Kay but it's expensive so Josh always cuts me off after a while. Almost forgot.

Remember that camera we saw in the box in the garage? Next to the hovercraft? Here it is. Nikon Digital. And obviously what I'm shooting this off says JVC hard disk camcorder micro s HD 30 GB 7 to 37 hours for recording modes hybrid ever radio conical Minolta lens

Police then searched the campground that Josh had claimed he had taken his sons to the night that Susan presumably disappeared. But there was so much snow there that the search team was unable to properly locate any evidence. They couldn't even get a definite answer as to whether or not Josh was ever there. However, one of the things that Charlie said in his interview about his mom staying at the campgrounds was, quote, where the crystals grow. And that could have been a geode site about 30 minutes away from this area.

So while all of this was unfolding, I mean, this case was all over the media. Everybody wanted to know where Susan was. Investigators also learned that Josh had actually told a friend of his that if he ever needed to get rid of a body, he would put it in one of the mine shafts, because then nobody would ever find it.

Which I will say, it never ceases to amaze me when people, after the fact, it comes out that they've confided in a friend or a family member of, you know, if I ever wanted to get rid of a body, here's how I would do it. Or if I ever wanted to commit the perfect murder, here's exactly what I would do. It's like, if you're planning to do that,

keep it to yourself. You're telling on yourself. You are such a complete and utter moron. So a couple of days after all of this, Josh was supposed to be interviewed by police for a third time. However, instead of being interviewed, he hired Scott Williams, a defense attorney, and he skipped out on meeting with the police entirely.

One day after Josh hired that attorney, on Tuesday, December 15th, he was officially identified as a person of interest, but no arrest. So then three days later, Josh headed up to Washington with the two boys so that he could go see his dad, Steve, for Christmas.

Now, even though Josh didn't want to come in for another interview, he was having some conversations with the police, and he let them know that he was only going away for the holiday and that he was going to be back soon. Then, as the holiday season ended and it was the beginning of a new year, it was now almost a month since Susan had disappeared.

A social media campaign was started on January 4th, 2010 via Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, and all of Susan's family and friends were trying to raise awareness about the case, trying to get answers for Susan, trying to figure out where Susan was. Now, the point of the campaign, first and foremost, was of course to find Susan, but it was also to keep her name in the news, to keep her in the headlines so that the story would not fade away. But Josh, he was not at all involved in this campaign.

And in fact, many of the people who were in charge of it did not trust Josh's story of innocence. Not at all. Now at this point, we know that there were some financial issues with them, but at no point did he say that they were separating, that they were on the outs. So if you were trying to portray this loving marriage and there not being any serious issues, why aren't you out searching for your wife? Why aren't you helping campaign for your wife? Why are you detached and removed? It couldn't even make sense if you tried to make it make sense.

And throughout the police's investigation, you could also say that Josh just completely checked out of his computer programming job at Aspen Logistics. Not only was he not showing up at all anymore, but he also wasn't letting his manager know that he wasn't going to be coming in. So in the new year, he ended up being fired from that job. And then on January 6th, he and his brother Michael came back from Washington, and they started packing up the house.

He had decided at this point that the best thing for his family was to move to Washington and live with his dad. He no longer had this reliable source of income to pay his mortgage, which is kind of understandable. Yes, maybe if you can't afford to live there with your kids, you do move in with a parent, but it's

But at the same time, it was as if he was completely ruling out the idea of Susan ever coming home, and he was just throwing in the towel on all of the search efforts. More weeks passed, and there was no sign of Susan, and by mid-February, Susan's family was losing hope.

They ended up holding a press conference, which they had a spokesperson speak for them, and according to the family, Susan had indicated before she disappeared that if things did not change in the relationship by their wedding anniversary, she had planned on leaving Josh.

The spokesperson said, quote, "...it was a threat that he repeatedly had made to her, including controlling her use of the car, denying her access to the family finances, even though she's the one who brought in most of the money, repeatedly sabotaging her parenting efforts, and even governing which groceries she could buy."

However, one of Susan's friends said that she had been threatening divorce due to Josh not being involved in the church like he had once been. Susan wanted Josh to get back into their LDS religion like he was when they first started dating. And during the press conference, it also came out that Susan's sons now lived just within minutes of Susan's parents, now that they were in Washington. But apparently, Josh was shutting out her parents completely.

he wouldn't allow them to have a relationship with their grandchildren. Meanwhile, the search wasn't necessarily going cold, but not a ton was happening either, because detectives were just hitting a bunch of dead ends. And although Josh was the main suspect, they didn't have enough evidence to make an arrest.

mostly because they didn't have a body, they also didn't have a crime scene, and by August of 2010, over $150,000 and nearly 7,000 hours had been put into finding Susan. But even with all of that, Susan was still nowhere to be found. And although it was starting to feel as if all hope was lost,

The West Valley City Police told the public that five of their detectives were still working full-time on this investigation. But unfortunately, things were about to take another turn. And we are going to get to that as soon as we hear from the final sponsors of today's episode.

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But supplies are limited, so grab it now before it is gone. Now's the time. All right, guys, and let's get back into the case. So it's now been eight months since Susan disappeared. No solid leads, no evidence, yes, a person of interest, but no real credible tips or anything to go off of. So that fall, little Charlie started kindergarten at Carson Elementary, and he was kind of unlike a lot of the typical kindergarten students.

He was considered a little bit of a loner. He didn't act very playful. He was also showing some signs that made his teacher concerned enough to send him to the counselor multiple times. He said things like, Braden is dead, or he would draw a picture of a gun. And then one day, another student said that Charlie's mom was dead, and Charlie marched over to the student saying his mom wasn't dead, but that she went away because her parents were abusing her. When he calmed down, his teacher asked him if he was okay, and he said...

Which seems like a very oddly specific thing for a five-year-old boy to say. Charlie also drew extremely disturbing pictures that made Susan's parents almost absolutely certain that he witnessed his mother's death.

He also told the counselor that his mom only lived a mile away, but that his grandparents, Susan's parents, were Mormon, and that they abused Susan. Charlie talked a lot about hating Mormons, and how Mormons killed Brayden and also killed his mom, and eventually Josh started coming into the classroom, and he would just sit there, uninvited, almost as though he was monitoring his son, monitoring everything he was saying. The teacher would ask him to leave, but he wouldn't.

It was almost as if he was afraid that Charlie would say something incriminating against him. Josh also gave a letter to the school with names of people who were not allowed to see Charlie. The list included not only Susan's parents, but also Susan herself. Susan's parents also believed that the reason that Josh didn't want the boys to be with them is because he was worried that they might say something. They might slip up. Towards the end of the school year, the Mormon comments never stopped.

A boy tried to befriend Charlie at lunch, but Charlie told him that he was going to go to the little boy's house at night and he was going to kill him.

When asked why he would say that, why he would say such a thing, he said that he wanted to kill the boy because he's Mormon and they kill people. They are ordered to kill people and all scientists who believe in Jesus. Again, a very odd and very specific thing to say for a five-year-old. So a couple of days before the one-year anniversary of Susan's disappearance, Josh and his dad, Steve, concocted a very crazy story about where they believe Susan was.

a story that they ended up publishing on SusanPowell.org. Now SusanPowell.org first seemed like a website that was dedicated to resources, to information, to different search updates about Susan, but then it became clear that this website was acting like nothing more than a mouthpiece for the Powell family.

constantly blaming Susan's family for smearing Josh in the press and making him the scapegoat so that nobody would know about the abuse that they were putting their daughter through. Which, let me just clarify too, Susan's family never abused her. Not in any sort of way. This website claimed that Susan was now in Brazil so that she could start this new life with a man named Steve Koecher.

Steve had disappeared a week after Susan did. But the thing was, Susan didn't even know Steve, and neither did anybody else. Literally, the only thing that they had in common is that they were close in age, they were both part of the LDS space, and they were both missing. That's literally it.

Josh's dad even went as far as to say that since Susan had a cosmetology degree, she would have easily been able to disguise herself and also disguise Steve while they were fleeing the country. I mean, talk about a stretch. And this was not the end of his bizarre behavior. Not at all.

In July of 2011, he went on the Today Show so that he could talk about Susan, and he fueled this narrative of her running off to Brazil with some other guy. He fueled this even more, even though at that point police knew that there wasn't any truth to it. But he said that he had read through 2,000 pages of Susan's journal, the journal that she had kept as a teenager up until she was 20 years old. Now why and how he had access to her journal is beyond me, but he said, quote,

The journal shows that Susan would have definitely done what we suspect she's done. I don't think that she was abducted, and I obviously don't think that she was murdered. I don't think she committed suicide either. People don't know that there are two distinct sides to Susan. She was an open person, in a sexual way, with the opposite sex.

And what made this even sicker was that Steve said that he was planning on publishing her journal online for everybody to see. Her

Her father-in-law, the same creep that had been videoing her, masturbating to her underwear. I mean, what on earth? This is a clear smear campaign, right? So Josh and his dad had a ton of issues with Susan's family. I mean, clearly. The whole SusanPowell.org website was one. The journal ordeal was another one.

But the number one issue was the fact that Josh was keeping their grandchildren away for no reason. One time, Josh was at Lowe's, the hardware store, and he was there with the kids, and he ran into Susan's dad, Chuck. Chuck asked if he could give the boys a hug.

And Josh spinned the story and said that Chuck mouthed the words, you're dead. And then Josh went to go see a judge so that he could get a restraining order against him, which was ordered on August 23rd, 2011. It ordered Chuck to stay 500 feet away from the boys' school and for both Josh and Chuck to stay at least 500 feet away from each other.

And during all of this, Josh actually had the audacity to sit down with ABC News in August of 2011 to do an interview about the case. Did you kill your wife?

No. Their family seemed picture perfect. Two beautiful children, a home in a peaceful Salt Lake City suburb. But when Susan Powell suddenly vanished in December 2009, all eyes turned to her husband, Josh, who eventually became the only person of interest, according to police. Did you have anything to do with the disappearance of your wife? No. Nothing? Nothing. What is the truth? People who know me know that I'm a good dad.

I work hard. I put my sons first. I was a good husband. I took care of my family. And I see you're still wearing your wedding band. Yeah. And during it, he was asked if he still loved his wife. You still love her? Yeah. I guess you could say that I still love her. The following day, a search warrant was executed for Steve's house. Police had searched the home before, but with Steve there giving consent.

Steve was out of town now when they arrived, but Josh was there. And apparently, Josh's brother John was the one that answered the door. And guys, he was completely naked, not wearing any clothes when he answered the door. Nobody was under arrest, but the police ended up taking a ton of items from the house, such as pictures, VHS tapes, computer equipment, and so much more.

During this search, they also found all of Steve's journal entries, which were long and very, very incriminating against his son, Josh. Steve had written in his journal from day one that he believed that Josh was the one involved in Susan's disappearance. At one point, he said, quote, Soon after this search, a 10-day search took place near Topaz Mountain in Utah.

People had their hopes up thinking that Susan's body might have been recovered because police were reporting that human remains had been found. But shortly after announcing that, they backtracked, saying that cadaver dogs were alerting them to the scent of human remains. During the search, the investigators then found what they called a shallow grave, and it had close to 100 charred wood chips in it. And they believed that the wood chips were what had the scent of human remains.

But again, nothing really came from this search. Then, an arrest finally was made on September 22, 2011. But it is not for what you would think.

The arrest was for Steve, Josh's dad, and it was regarding 14 counts of voyeurism, and also possession of child pornography. Which, if you don't know what voyeurism is, its definition is "the practice of gaining sexual pleasure from watching others when they're naked or when they're engaged in sexual activity." So, basically, what he had been doing to Susan. But worse, because he had continued this sick behavior on total strangers.

he also had child pornography material. And not only did they find child pornography, over 2000 photos to be exact, which is beyond sickening, but they also found photos that were taken using a telephoto lens, photos of his two young neighbor girls from a few years ago, who were just 8 and 10 years old in these photos.

The girls were inside their home in the bathroom, not fully dressed. And somehow he was able to take these photos from inside his house using this like super mega lens. Child welfare officials noted at that time from police reports that pornography was found lying openly all around the house and that Josh's brother John quote, runs around the home nude and in a diaper.

Now, first of all, John, his brother, is an adult, so your guess is as good as mine for why the hell he goes wearing a diaper around and nothing else and running around, but sounds a little fetishy to me, not to kink-shame anybody, but sounds a little bizarre. And also, when police had searched John's room, they found all kinds of weapons and even disturbing drawings of women being raped by swords. And it gets sicker. There were also nooses,

hanging in the home. Now, I'm sorry, but even if they're not responsible for Susan's disappearance at this point, the fact that he has drawings of women being raped by swords, nooses hanging throughout the house, he's running around naked or in a diaper, and remember, he answered the door naked when the police got there to search the house the first time, and then the dad has child pornography, it is just beyond crazy.

concerning. I mean, truly gross, gross, gross. Now, luckily, at that point, Charlie and Brayden were removed from the home altogether, and they were placed into protective custody. But get this, despite Steve literally getting arrested for being a total, complete pervert, also a child predator, and the list goes on, some of his family members were saying to the media that this was all some sort of setup from Susan's family.

that all of this was planted there. Then they would even say, even if this were true, the child pornography, it was of girls. So Charlie and Brayden weren't really in any danger because they're boys. I mean, what on earth are you even talking about? And

And luckily, the judge absolutely did not agree, and only a few days later, Susan's parents ended up being awarded custody of the boys, at least temporary custody until Josh was given custody back. And this enraged Josh. He was extremely against the boys living with their grandparents, even saying that he would prefer for them to live in foster care.

He didn't really give a reason as to why, other than it would be better for them, but he just did not want the boys going to Susan's parents. However, because of the absolute horrendous and disturbing things found in the Powell home, Josh was ordered to take a psychosexual evaluation, all as part of the judge's order so that Josh could have supervised visits with Charlie and Brayden. When the boys had visits with their dad, a social worker was always present.

The social worker noted that the boys made some pretty harsh comments about religion, especially regarding Mormons. Charlie told the social worker at one point, Do you know what I hate? I hate Jesus. He is made up and fake. Both of the boys told the social worker that they heard all of this from, you guessed it, their dad, Josh. Charlie said to the social worker the following day, quote, Mormons are trying to steal me.

He went on to say that the reason that they moved to Utah was because a Mormon was attempting to steal him and take him to the desert. And Charlie's cryptic comments just continued. He said that his grandparents, Susan's parents, were abusing him and Josh.

However, the social worker could tell that Charlie was just being spoon-fed all of this information from Josh. All of these lies were coming from his dad, Josh. Susan's dad, Chuck, told the social worker that he and his wife, Judy, were having a really hard time getting Charlie and Brayden to bed because they wanted to sleep without any clothing or any underwear on. They would say that their dad would let them walk around naked and that they wanted to go by his rules, which again,

It's just a little bit unsettling when you put all of the information into context. And in that same report, Chuck and Judy mentioned that both Charlie and Brayden were saying other disturbing sexual comments. Just very sad for these two innocent boys who it seems as though were just completely manipulated by their father and their paternal grandfather.

So after Susan Powell Org stopped posting, another very slanderous website was made by yet another crazy Powell family member. This time, it was Josh's brother Michael. The site was all about shaming the West Valley City Police Department, and also shaming Susan's parents.

Michael felt that his family were the ones being slandered through this whole investigation, and he even stuck up for his dad, Creepy Steve, who was still awaiting trial at this point. He said that one of Josh's sons was being abused by Susan's parents, and that they were in danger. And the whole thing was just completely unhinged lies, and luckily the website didn't stay up too long. Then Josh had another custody hearing on February 1st, 2012.

but he didn't get the news that he was hoping for. Instead, the judge ordered that he would not regain full custody of his boys until at least July. He was ordered also to do a polygraph test and another psychosexual evaluation test,

This was all due to information that had been found on his computer, which was taken during that initial home search back in 2009. Josh was also required to live somewhere other than his dad's house. It had taken years for the police to crack the code on his computer. But when the computer finally was unlocked, what was found was beyond sick and beyond disturbing.

There were cartoon pictures of characters from Rugrats, SpongeBob, The Simpsons, Flintstones, and other well-known characters, and they were all engaged in sexual activity, including incest, group sex, and sodomy. The report also said that they found, quote, mother-on-son, mother-on-daughter, father-on-daughter, and family group sex.

and that the reviewed images indicate someone's fantasy view of having sex with children. Look, any sort of predator on a child is bad enough. When you bring incest into it, it is like a whole 'nother sick and twisted level. It is truly grotesque. The psychologist who wrote this report also says that there appears to be a pattern of poor sexual boundaries between the family members.

Now, Josh, of course, denied ever going onto that site, which depicted children like that, and he said he had no idea where these images came from. But he did agree to do these evaluations in order to get his sons back full time. So things seemed to be calming down for the boys a little bit, and their life was now beginning to have some semblance of normalcy. But a social worker was required to make regular visits to Susan's parents' house to see how Charlie and Brayden were acclimating to the custody arrangement.

And on February 3rd, 2012, when the social worker visited, Charlie and Brayden, they were thrilled to show off their new room, their new toys, and all of this new extra space.

All in all, things seemed to be going pretty well for the boys. Then, two days later, Josh was scheduled to have supervised visits with Charlie and Brayden. This was on February 5th, 2012. Susan's parents, as I'm sure you can imagine, were less than thrilled about this visit. And the boys had actually told their grandparents that morning that they didn't want to see their dad. But there was nothing that they could do since it was court ordered. So the social worker drove the boys to Josh's new house.

Whether or not Josh actually lived there full-time is another story. Neighbors said that they hardly ever saw Josh's car or any cars there at all. So after the social worker arrived, she got the boys out of the car, and the boys ran to the door. Josh let the boys inside. He told them that he had a surprise for them, but then he shut the door, and he locked it, locking the social worker out. The social worker began banging on the door, but Josh would not let her in.

So then, she called 911. A supervised visitation for a court-ordered visit, and something really weird has happened. The kids went into the house, and the parent, the biological parent, whose name is Josh Powell, will not let me in the door. What should I do? What's the address? It's 8119, I think it's 89, I don't know what the address is. It's pretty important for me to know. I can't, just a minute, let me get in my car and see if I can find it.

Nothing like this has ever happened before at these visitations, so I'm really -- and I could hear one of the kids crying, but he still wouldn't let me in. Okay, it is -- one -- just a minute, I have it here. You can't find me by GPS? No. Okay, it is -- but I think I need help right away. He's on a very short lease with CSHS, and CPS has been involved, and this is the craziest thing. He looked right at me and closed the door.

Are you there? Yes, ma'am. I'm just waiting to know where you are. Okay. 19189 Street Court East, Puyallup. 98375. And I'd like to pull out of the driveway because I smell gasoline and he won't let me in. You want to pull out of the driveway because you smell gasoline but he won't let you... I smell... He won't let me in. He won't let you out of the driveway? He won't let me in the house. Whose house is it? He's got some kids in the house and he won't let me in. It's a supervised visit. Whose house is it? Josh. Okay. So you don't live there, right?

No, I'm contracted to the state to provide supervised visitation. And who is there to exercise their visitation? And the visit is with me. And who's supervising? And he's the husband of the supervisor. So you supervise and you're doing the visit? Yeah, I supervise myself. You're supervising yourself? I'm the supervisor here. Wait a minute. If it's a supervised visit, you can't supervise yourself. If you're the visitor... I do supervise myself. I'm the supervisor for the supervised visit.

Okay, well, aren't you the one making the visit? Or is there another parent? You're supervising. No, they're supervisors. I pick up the kids at their grandparents. And then who visits with the children? Josh Powell. Okay, so you're supposed to be there to supervise Josh Powell's visit with the children. Yes. And how did... And he's the son of missing Susan Powell. How did... This is a hypothesis.

How did he gain access to the children before you got there? I was one step in back of them. Okay, so they went into the house and then he locked you out? He shut the door right in my face. Your last name? My name is Elizabeth Griffin Hall. Was hyphenated? Yes. And what agency are you with? Foster Care Resource Network. And the kids have been in there about ten minutes. And he knows this is a supervised visit, too. How many children?

and Charlie is seven. P-O-W-E-L. Two L's at the end of L? Yes. His first name? His first name is Josh. Black, white, Asian? He's white. Date of birth? He's about 39. 150 pounds. Brown. Did you notice what he was wearing? No, I didn't notice what he was wearing. Is he alone then or is anybody? I don't know. I couldn't get in the house. Are you in a vehicle now or on foot? I'm in a vehicle. 2010 Prius. What color is it? With the doors locked.

But he won't... He hasn't opened the door. Ma'am, careful. I rang the doorbell and everything. Elizabeth, please listen to my questions. What color is the Toyota Prius? Gray. Dark gray. And the license number? I don't know. I can look. We'll have somebody look for you there. Okay. How long will it be? I don't know, ma'am. They have to respond to emergency, life-threatening situations first. The first available deputy... Well, this could be life-threatening. He went to court on Wednesday, and he didn't get his kids back. And this is really...

Okay, has he threatened the lives of the children previously? I have no idea. We'll have the first available deputy contact you. Thank you. Sam, were you calling about the third loss of one idiot? Yes, he destroyed the house. He didn't ever leave the house. He just opened the door. The kids were one step ahead of me. They're one step ahead of me, and he slammed the door on my face. And you think he might have done this intentionally? Fire, there's a house on fire.

Firefighters take just three minutes to arrive. At nearly the same time, Powell's sister Alina is also calling 911 terrified. She's just received his final voicemail. I am not able to live without my sons. I'm sorry to everyone I've hurt. Goodbye. I'm terrified. I'm afraid of seeing something.

It was absolutely devastating. Josh's house exploded. All of the walls of the home were on fire, and the explosion itself was so big that it made the neighbor's house shake. Later that evening, when the smoke went down, the bodies of Charlie, Brayden, and Josh were found inside the home. And in a very sick and horrible way,

Horrible detail, guys. It makes me sick to my stomach. Sorry. A medical examiner determined that Josh had used a hatchet to make, quote, chop-like wounds at the boys' heads and necks.

It wasn't that he would just set the house on fire and that would be the cause of death. He used a hatchet on his two little boys. However, ultimately, that's not what killed them. Because Josh, Brayden, and Charlie's causes of death was carbon monoxide poisoning. And when I tell you I hate Josh, guys, every fiber of my being is like tingling right now because I just hate...

hate this monster so much i hope that this perverted monstrous freak is rotting in hell i mean why why why why would he do this and i am not trying to be crass here guys but kill yourself take your own life leave your innocent children out of all of this

The fact that the social worker said on that 911 call that she could hear the boys crying, it makes my soul die a little bit inside. It truly does. I cannot even imagine what those sweet little boys' last moments were like. And nobody should ever have to think about that. No parent should ever put their children through something like that.

The only silver lining in any of this, if there is one to be found, is that the boys are most likely with Susan somewhere now in heaven. Now, I do want to go back to that god-awful police dispatcher. He later said that he felt bad and he regretted his lack of urgency and that he could never forget this.

Which, let me just say, you know who else can never forget this? The traumatized social worker who was standing outside and watched that house go up in flames. Also, Susan's family, the boys' maternal grandparents. Later on, investigators learned that Josh had actually been planning this whole horrific annihilation of his boys before the boys had even come. Before the boys arrived, he had doused the house with 10%,

gallons of gasoline. He gave away all of the boys' toys to Goodwill. He made arrangements for any of his financial obligations to be taken care of. And then just 10 minutes before the explosion, he sent an email that said, I'm not able to live without my sons, and I'm not able to go on anymore. I'm sorry to everyone that I've hurt.

So this news was just completely devastating for Susan's family. They were, of course, absolutely heartbroken. Now, because Susan was always a missing person and never declared dead, Josh was never able to get the claim to the life insurance policy that he took out on her.

And get this: after Josh's death, his family actually had the freaking nerve to sue to have control of Susan's estate, so that they could legally declare her as dead and get the money. And yes, you heard me correctly, guys. They are such sick, twisted monsters. However, Susan's parents countersued, and luckily, they were awarded Susan's estate.

Steve's trial, Josh's dad, took place in June of 2012, where he was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for the voyeurism charges. Although the jury did find him guilty and convicted him on the child pornography charges, the judge said that the photos weren't considered sexually explicit, so those charges ended up being dismissed. And guys, let me just mention, those photos that weren't deemed sexually explicit were the ones of those little girls in their bathroom getting dressed.

How on earth does that equate? But in 2014, the State Court of Appeals reversed the judge's findings regarding the photos, and Steve was convicted in 2015 for child pornography, and he was sentenced to an additional five years in prison, which, good riddance. However, after just two years and good behavior, he was released in 2017. And then, one year later after his release, he died in the hospital of a heart attack. Wait,

Which, see ya. Not long after that, Michael, Josh's brother, committed suicide. And many people believe that the reason that Michael committed suicide is because he assisted Josh with Susan's murder, and that he put her body in the trunk of his car, and that he was feeling shame, guilt, all of these emotions. He got rid of that car, but police were able to find it at a junkyard, and cadaver dogs hit the trunk for the smell of human remains.

So when the heat was starting to finally turn up on him for his involvement, that led to him committing suicide. I want to be clear, that's just a theory, but some people believe that that was his way out. Some say it was guilt and the shame, but some think it's because the walls were closing in. So you can come to your own conclusions with that.

Susan's parents sued the State Department of Social and Health Services, claiming that the department was negligent with their grandchildren, and that the negligence was partially the reason that the boys died that day. They believed that there should be laws preventing a parent that is suspected of murder from having custody of children. And honestly, I agree. In 2020, they were awarded nearly $98 million. Sadly, today, Susan has still never been found.

She was only 28 years old when she was last seen alive. In 2022, bones were found in a Utah mine, but they were discovered to be that of an animal. A pair of pants was also found in that same area, but the DNA that was found on the pants were from a male. A piece of a blouse material and a sock were also found, but they were not submitted. However, Susan's family asked if they could be tested just in case.

Susan's dad has said that he thinks that Josh was capable of dismembering Susan and then scattering her remains in various different locations, especially after what he did to his own children. He believes that Josh's brother Michael also acted as an accomplice to Susan's murder. And Susan has now been missing for over 14 years, guys. A memorial was put up in Woodbine Cemetery with an angel on top of a marble slab which reads, Angel of Hope.

Susan's parents created the Susan Cox Foundation, whose mission is to help families with a no-cost media consulting service to bring their loved ones home. This case is just...

Beyond tragic and heartbreaking, I mean, to think that Susan was foreshadowing her future before anybody else knew what was going to happen, but she knew that she was in danger, it is so terrifying. And poor Charlie and Brayden were taken into the lion's den by someone who was supposed to love them unconditionally.

It is absolutely gut-wrenching to think about how if they had ever charged Josh formally with any of this, there's a good chance that Charlie and Brayden would still be alive today, that they would still be with their grandparents. There was just never enough to charge Josh. Had they been able to, maybe this outcome would have been very different. And guys, there are so, so many questions that I still have with this case that I know will likely never be answered. I

I have read some theories that think that he went back and picked Susan's dead body up from the original location where she was murdered back when he had that rental car and he racked up the 800 miles, then dumped it and moved it to another location. And a lot of people wonder if his dad Steve was involved or how many members of the Powell family in general know what truly happened. I mean, it seems like the people who may have had the answers in this case kind of all died with their secrets. But what do you guys think?

And if Josh was responsible, which I believe he was, what was the motive? Did he know that Susan had planned on leaving him? Was it in some sort of sick way to protect his dad who was fantasizing about Susan? And

What like, was there some sort of retaliation? Was he jealous? Like there's so many different twisted angles and elements to this. It's really hard to choose just one singular path. So I'm interested to hear from you what you think the truth is, what you think the motive was and what really went down here. Now, if you're interested in learning more about this case and doing an even deeper, deeper dive, there is so much information out there.

I highly, highly recommend checking out the podcast Cold by KSL News. They have a ton of the original footage. They have clips. They have a lot of the clips that were used in this episode. So I'm going to put a link to that podcast in the show notes in case you want to do a deeper dive. Other than that, I just hope that one day Susan is found.

that she is recovered and that her family can finally begin to heal and have peace it is just so tragic the way that this case turned and from the jump actually the whole thing is just so sick and deranged from the dad to josh to the pornography to the weird brother in the diaper i mean talk about a very toxic and unhinged family meaning the powells not susan obviously um

Thank you guys so much for tuning in to another episode of Serialistly with me, Annie Elise. I will be back on the mic with you this Thursday with an exclusive audio-only episode where we are talking all things going on in the world of true crime, new cases, case updates, all the things. So if you're not following the podcast yet, make sure you take a quick second on whatever podcast app you use, hit the follow button. It's totally free, but that way you will be notified as soon as additional and new episodes drop.

Alright guys, until the next one, be nice, don't kill people, and I will talk with you again very soon. Alright.