Hi everyone, this is Deb from Dying to be Found.
Before we get started, I just wanted to say that episodes contain disturbing discussions on harmful acts and crimes against animals and or humankind.
Recordings are not intended for young or sensitive audiences due to the content nature of this podcast.
Listener discretion is strongly advised.
Hi everyone, this is Deb, your host from the True Crime Podcast, Dying to be Found.
Welcome to The Dash, which is a little detour I created off of our Thursday episodes to help you dash through the True Crime community with me as I get other podcasters to help me with my storylines.
The Dash provides you with a collection of more uplifting stories, and I've added these bonus episodes to showcase podcasters who have agreed to join me on The Dash.
And today we have Megan from True Crime Declassified to help us out on this episode.
Hi, Megan.
Hello, thank you so much for having me.
Absolutely. Thanks for being here today.
I appreciate you joining me on The Dash.
It's always cool to meet other podcasters from around the world.
I love the diversity that comes along with true crime communities.
And Megan, you have a little different approach on your podcast, True Crime Declassified, which examines the ethics behind reporting.
And this is such a unique approach.
I know also that you're working on your PhD, which goodness in itself, it's such a feat.
So congratulations on that.
Are you finishing up pretty soon?
Yeah, I've got a couple of years left, so it started to get to the really difficult part now.
OK, well, good luck to you on that.
And I have a question, does True Crime Declassified contribute in any way to your study?
Oh, massively.
So it started out as something that I was going to do alongside my research, but it almost became integral to the research.
It's been a way for me to really engage with the true crime community, to talk to true crime podcasters like yourself,
because I started this journey as a fan of true crime and I've since been able to really position myself within the community.
And True Crime Declassified has let me do that.
Wow, yeah, so that's cool in itself, because as you were doing your research, you're starting to see your thought processes change.
So I really think that you are adding so much to the true crime podcast world.
Thank you for your work.
It's really exciting to see how this is going to go.
And I wanted to ask you, what is it about how podcasters bring us true crime stories that inspires you to examine that process?
So it started out as a way for me to look at the different complexities within true crime.
When I first started researching it, it became clear that a lot of the existing research,
a lot of the criticism around true crime really overgeneralized the genre.
And what I realized was that true crime podcasters, they had such a different objective to doing true crime.
They weren't in it for the money. They weren't in it for the fame.
They wanted to talk about something that really mattered to them, whether that's local criminal cases that they care deeply about.
Social causes that are really important to them.
And so I found that really beautiful, the reasons behind why true crime podcasters wanted to put in the work and put in the time to create this content.
And I really wanted to look into the diverse nature of true crime, to try and counteract a lot of the overgeneralization I'd found in my research.
From personal experience, I talked to a lot of true crime podcasters.
And yeah, there's a lot of just it's a small community.
And me personally, I'm not in it to make much out of it other than to bring awareness myself.
So, yeah, that's that's a great concept.
Now, what gives you inspiration behind the stories that you examine?
I'm really interested in true crime works.
And when I say that, I mean podcasts, documentaries, novels, anything that's created within the true crime genre.
I'm really interested in works that have a societal impact.
Obviously, with my PhD, I'm looking at the Venn diagram of entertaining and ethical true crime content and the existence of true crime content that can be entertaining and ethical.
And so I want to then look at true crime content that has impacted the criminal justice system.
It's led to societal change.
It's raised awareness for miscarriages of justice.
I mean, recently, my husband sent me an NBC article about podcasters and their attorneys and their content and what they found led to the release of two gentlemen who were wrongfully imprisoned.
And we've seen that time and time again, that the work and the care and the energy that true crime podcasters have put in have led to these conversations that have been really important.
But there's also a lot of content that I'm interested in that has had a negative impact.
I spoke recently on my podcast about the staircase by HBO Max and how the recreation.
I did hear that one. Yes.
Yeah. How the recreation of the staircase really negatively impacted the family members of the victim.
And then everyone's talking about Netflix's Jeffrey Dahmer series and the criticism.
I mean, personally, I believe is warranted around that series.
So, I mean, I'm interested in true crime works that have had an impact on society for better or worse.
So what I'm hearing is it's more of you're trying to take the approach of the accuracies of it and not sensationalizing it like Netflix does.
I personally don't watch a lot of those series on Netflix.
I hear it in the news all the time and how great that show may be.
But I personally like to take the smaller approach.
And I guess I do enough of my own research where I don't want to step into that in my after hours.
There's plenty of research that I'm doing for myself.
Definitely. And what I think frustrated me the most about the discourse around Netflix's series is how a lot of they talk about true crime as this monolith, I guess,
as they don't talk about the diverse nature of true crime.
And when they criticize one big production company series, all of the indie true crime podcasters who are just recording from their closet are lumped into that as well.
And I think that's what is really driving me to do this research and to try and uncover how the diverse nature of true crime may lead us to better understand it.
Yeah, absolutely. I agree with that.
So you do the same thing that I'm doing on my podcast right now, which is to bring on other podcasters to discuss certain topics.
I know that you do an interview style, which I'm doing on The Dash.
How do you choose who it is that you want to interview?
So I really want to interview as many different types of podcasters as I can.
I'm really interested in hearing how people get into true crime.
A lot of people I found get into it because they either have a background in law enforcement or law and legal, or they have a personal connection to true crime.
And so I'm really interested in that, the motivations behind it, but also people's creative processes, how they feel about the ethical dilemma.
So I try and talk to people who have lots of different types of true crime podcasts, whether that's comedy podcasts, they look at historical cases, they look at more recent cases.
So trying to talk to as many different types of podcasters as possible, but also people who work in industries that intersect with true crime.
I recently interviewed someone who is an investigative journalist, and I wanted to hear about how he saw the true crime genre as a journalist from a journalist perspective.
And to try and get some insight into how true crime podcasters can take on some of those, the principles of journalism to approach their cases and approach their investigations with that level of kind of rigor and integrity that a lot of journalists have.
So trying to talk to as many different types of people as possible.
Yeah, so diversity absolutely works.
Now, I'll tell you, Georgia, where I live in the United States, we have a huge industry as far as the entertainment industry.
I think it's the small Hollywood and they're building so many studios around Georgia.
And yeah, you had mentioned even taking maybe podcasting or the true crime community over to the entertainment.
But yeah, there's definitely a way that you could do that so that it's not sensationalized and it's hitting maybe the smaller stories that we talk about.
So what do you think true crime podcasters could do better?
And that's me too, by all means, throw me under the bus.
What do you think that we could do better to stay neutral when we report our stories?
Yeah, I think I want to preface this answer with being ethical and being guided by your moral principles.
It's a journey that's constantly evolving and constantly improving.
So it's similar, I think, when people talk about anti-racism, it's not something that you can label yourself as I'm an ethical podcaster and that's me done.
It's something that you're constantly striving for.
And so that's firstly, I think, a really important thing to talk about.
I've written down a couple of suggestions that I've got, but obviously there's way more than this.
The first one being, I think, asking yourself what your why is, what's your reason behind creating this true crime podcast.
And if you struggle to answer that, then that's maybe something you should sit with for a bit.
I'm not saying that we need to change the world with every true crime episode we put out.
But if your why is to talk about cases of misjustice, talk about under-reported or under-represented victims,
they're all really good motivators for creating true crime content.
And having that be your sort of guiding light is a great way to keep you ethical.
Yeah, that's really good advice.
Thank you.
Another one, I think, is where possible, choosing anonymity.
And this isn't something that's regularly practiced in true crime,
but it's something I gave a go for my episode on the staircase.
And I found that removing the names of the victims and the family members had no impact on my ability to tell the story.
There are some cases where you really, really can't escape it.
For example, in the UK, if you're talking about the missing case of Madeleine McCann,
it's talked about so, so much that you really can't escape referencing the name or you talk about the case and people connect the dots.
But there are definitely cases where removing the names,
particularly if during your research you've noticed that the family haven't spoken a lot to the media about the case,
that may be an indication that actually the family don't want the case to be spoken about.
And in that case, it may be worthwhile removing the names, including a disclaimer and saying,
I've removed the names for this reason, to kind of encourage that best practice among other people.
And then a disclaimer as a whole, I think it's important to give audiences informed consent when they listen to your works.
And so someone may go into your True Crime podcast with a particular trigger,
and they may be slightly younger, or they may just not be in the right headspace to hear about a particular detail of a criminal case that's quite grotesque, that's quite disturbing.
And so having that disclaimer at the start, even if it's just a brief discussion of what's going to be included, gives people that informed consent.
They can make that decision for themselves.
To stop or go somewhere else. Yeah.
Oh, definitely. And I think that topic, it raises a lot of negativity.
And people have a lot of opinions around disclaimers.
And I know a lot of people are going to think, why should I have to do that?
They know what they get themselves in for.
We're just creating, you know, it's a bunch of snowflakes, all that sort of thing.
I know that people have those opinions, but it's the things that we can do to make sure that people aren't affected by it.
Yeah. So I actually have a disclaimer at the beginning of every one of my episodes.
And one of the things that I feel is important because I say that there could be animals involved.
And yeah, they're not human, but I have a soft heart when it comes to animals and it's a living, breathing creature.
So, yeah, even something as small as that, I think it's really important to at least throw that out there.
And I've had some people say, oh, yeah, I heard that you're talking about something that happens to animals.
Well, we see that in television shows all the time.
Whenever I see a movie when people are on horseback and the horse goes down, I'm just like, oh, my gosh, poor horse.
Are we thinking about the horse? Yeah.
It's definitely important to give that disclaimer as well.
Oh, 100 percent. And I think there are certain I don't like to use phrases like triggers because that's got a lot of connotation now,
but there's certain content warnings that I myself, I have a huge, huge needle phobia.
And so if I was listening to a true crime podcast where the mention of needles comes in or the description of needles comes in,
that caused me to have quite an adverse reaction to it.
And so it's not just about talking about the really grotesque details of a criminal case and being honest about that,
but highlighting where people may unfortunately have a negative reaction to the things we're talking about.
Sure. It's just doing our best.
We're not going to be able to catch every single trigger or every single thing in our works that people may have a reaction to.
But as long as we're trying to be as open and transparent in that, then I think that's really important.
Sure. And then finally, for me, doing good with the true crime works that we put out, I think is hugely important.
And I mentioned Celisia Stanton with True Crime Podcast.
She does a fantastic, fantastic job of doing this.
If during your research process you come across a GoFundMe page that the victims' families have put out,
it takes you a couple of seconds to mention it at the end of your podcast and put a link in the description.
Yeah, that's a great point.
Yeah, I think that's such an important way to do as much good as possible.
And, you know, fact isn't copyrighted.
No one really owns their own story in the way that I think they should do.
So we can go and we can talk about whatever criminal case is in the public domain.
But having that awareness that we are inadvertently profiting off of someone else's hardship,
whether through sponsorship deals, engagement, more likes, more follows, even if you don't intend to,
we are profiting off of these stories.
And sometimes putting a link to a GoFundMe goes some way to reimbursing for the use of that story in our podcasts.
Absolutely. Yeah, that is a great talking point there.
I don't think I've ever come in my research to find those.
Now, I've come across websites, maybe the family has put out for more information and it could be a missing case
or it could be somebody being wrongly accused and put behind bars.
And yeah, every little bit of information that you can find, especially if it is coming from the family members.
And I like how you said that sometimes it's not necessary to even say their names.
So anonymity does go far.
Dying to be found, it does not monetize.
It's an indie podcast and it's just more of really getting a lot of the information out there that maybe even 20 years down the road,
something happened 20 years ago while you just heard this podcast and you're like, oh, wait a minute.
But I had a neighbor who I might want to bring up.
And just so yeah, awareness is is a really huge avenue.
Now, what is one lesson that you've learned since you began declassifying true crime?
So I mentioned this already, but just how diverse it is.
I approached true crime with a handful of podcasts that I'd listen to regularly.
And when I started researching it and listening to more and finding out more works and more practitioners,
you really come to realize how diverse true crime is.
And I really love the fact that people will focus on a specific type of true crime work,
whether that's local cases that mean a lot to them, a particular type of criminal case,
like a missing persons case.
And I think that's really beautiful that people will focus on something that means something to them and use their voice and use their platform to talk about it.
It's universal that law enforcement, the legal system, it's stretched thin and it doesn't do the job that it should always do.
And there are people who fall through the cracks.
There are cases that fall through the cracks.
And I genuinely believe and from declassifying true crime, I've come to discover that we fill a gap in that space where we can talk about
cases that deserve to be talked about, but have been overlooked quite often.
Yes. What I love about what you just said is that I have come across a lot of cold cases myself.
And sometimes those cases do go cold for a decade, whatever long the period is.
But sometimes I don't want to make this to sound negative, but sometimes it just takes a fresh pair of eyes that the original investigators did not see,
that when somebody else comes along, I don't know if you've ever seen that show called The Cold Case.
And it was probably out in the 90s. Oh, my gosh. I just loved that show.
That's probably one of my top shows that inspires me.
Yeah. So a fresh pair of eyes of new investigators is sometimes what it takes.
But that's OK, because that's how cases do get solved.
Oh, definitely. And I'm not saying, as you mentioned, I'm not saying for an instance that a true crime podcast,
like myself, is going to walk into a police station and solve a cold case. Right.
But the manpower, I think it takes, or woman power or them power to look at a criminal case and to really pick at the fine details and pull that thread until you find the answer.
Yeah. Sometimes, I guess, people in professional capacities don't have the time or the resources to really do that justice.
And that's where I think true crime can come in and can look at these criminal cases.
And as you said, find something and pick it and pick it until they figure out what it may mean.
And again, not saying that a podcast is going to solve a criminal case.
And I think it's important if you have information to take it to the correct bodies.
But I think that's what where true crime can really come in handy.
We have the passion. We have the time.
We may as well take a look at what's in the public domain and see what we can come up with as long as it's not.
And I make sure to say this, as long as it's not pointing a finger at someone that has nothing to do with the case and has been proven innocent, that's where it gets dangerous.
Absolutely.
So if it's looking at a particular piece of evidence and looking at it from a different angle, I think that's safe.
Yes.
But when it gets to the point where you're saying, I think it's this person and publicizing that online and potentially ruining someone's life who doesn't deserve it, that's where we need to be a bit more careful.
Absolutely. Totally agree with you on that.
I think that is all the questions that I have for you, Megan, today.
So where can I find you online?
Of course.
Well, if you want to keep up with the PhD research that I do and my sort of journey as I am a first generation PhD candidate here in the UK at De Monfort University.
And I talk a lot about my experience on my Instagram, which is Megan Lupton-Rykes.
Megan, spelled British way, N-E-G-A-N, Lupton, L-U-P-T-O-N and Rites, W-R-I-T-E-S.
And then if you want to take a look at my podcast or the Instagram account, I have my podcast.
It's True Crime Declassified across all platforms.
So, yeah, that's me.
Thank you so much for having me on.
Absolutely.
So you can check Megan out at True Crime Declassified wherever you get your podcasts.
Now, Megan, we're going to turn to the dash.
I'd like to bring a little bit of good news out of a bad situation in my little mini episodes here.
So are you ready to dash into our story?
Oh, I'm so excited.
OK, before we get started, I like to ask questions to kind of warm things up.
It gets us thinking about the topic.
You might think this is a little bit random and you'll understand later,
but I don't know how much traveling you do or what modes of transportation you get on.
Do you ever get air sick, seasick or carsick whenever you ride?
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Oh, most definitely. I get carsick a lot.
I have to sit in the front. I'm that annoying person.
I am the same way in a car.
I really I've been on ferry boats, planes, trains, automobiles,
but personally, I cannot sit in the back seat of a car and I don't know what it is,
but it is definitely a motion sickness.
Have you ever taken anything for that?
I know they have a lot of over the counter medications to help people,
but personally, I think it just knocks you out.
It does. Yeah, I've got some of those wristbands that pregnant women wear
that's supposed to press on some sort of pressure point in your wrist.
And I had to wear them. We drove up to Scotland and it took about nine hours.
And so I have to wear those wristbands.
Got you. Nobody will give up the front seat.
No, no. My mother certainly wouldn't.
Well, that question will come into play in just a little bit.
But I wanted to tell you first about the story that we're going to talk about today.
It is about Shannon Matthews,
who is a nine year old girl that went missing in the UK back in March of 2008.
Shannon's disappearance set off news media headlines
in a major investigation on an alleged abduction
that resulted in a three point two million pound
or a three point eight US dollar search in just 24 days.
That is crazy.
I guess that goes back to what you were talking about, manpower.
Yeah, I think they they just every police officer in Yorkshire
was just just looking for Shannon Matthews.
Mm hmm. Well, Shannon was last seen around 310 p.m.
on February 19th of 2008 at the Westmore Junior School
in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire.
When Shannon did not return home from a swimming event
at the Dewsbury Sports Center,
Shannon's mother, Karen, contacted the police around 648 p.m.
and reported her daughter missing.
Of course, most parents definitely would do that.
According to her friends, Shannon exited the bus
and told her friends to go on without her
because she proceeded to walk home in a different direction than she normally would.
She never explained to her friends why she was walking in the opposite direction
because she lived 10 minutes from her home
and she never gave any indication as to where she was going or what she was going to do.
Now, after Shannon's mom contacted police, the hunt for Shannon was swift,
which is a good thing because when a child goes missing,
absolutely you want to get on that right away.
Local residents of Dewsbury distributed flyers.
There were about 250 police officers
plus 60 detectives beginning to search for Shannon pretty quickly.
Authorities blanketed around 3,000 houses
and created roadblocks in the area,
stopping an estimated 1,500 drivers to ask them questions.
That is a lot of work.
Massively. I think it was one of the biggest police investigations following the Yorkshire Ripper,
which just, and that was like 30 years prior.
Oh, yes. Well, something that was rather odd that police discovered during their investigation
was that Shannon had scribbled a note on her bedroom wall
saying that she was going to run away and go see her biological father.
I thought that was interesting, which is obviously why I put that in there.
So I don't know what I would do if I walked into my child's room and saw that on the wall,
but she at least had given notification that she was going to do that.
And Shannon's mother, Karen, immediately participated in television interviews
begging for the safe return of her daughter.
I've seen enough of those as well.
And it's not just in some of the stories that I have reported.
I see it on the news where the family members do come forward and beg for safe returns and things like that.
It isn't standard, however, that Karen's behavior was a little off.
During one of the investigative liaison's visits to Karen's home,
they recalled walking in and seeing Karen and her boyfriend, Craig,
calmly sitting in the living room playing Xbox.
Wild. Absolutely wild. Immediately.
Yeah. During the same visit, the investigators phone rang, which had a pop music ringtone.
I know that we've all had those on our phones before.
Miley Cyrus, love you.
Karen got up and started dancing to the music on the ringtone.
Can you imagine? Oh, red flag.
Yeah, absolutely. Because suspicion was definitely starting to set in with her behavior patterns.
Absolutely. And neighbors also felt the same way because if you have any relationships with any of your neighbors,
you kind of get to know each other.
And Karen simply was not acting like a distraught mother whose child had gone missing.
Apparently, just from the neighbors feedback on their interviews,
it happened only when the cameras turned on, when Karen was being interviewed for the news media.
Yeah, I think it's important sometimes to not place expectations on people
on how they should react to huge experiences of trauma, these horrible instances of children going missing.
But there are limits to it. And I think from what was later reported, her behavior, it just made, not to spoil it,
absolute complete sense.
Yes. And you're right. So many people grieve in different ways and react in different ways.
Me personally, I go into, I'm not going to say robot mode.
I go into a mode where I don't react until I know I have to,
because I've brought children up and children break bones, children fall down.
So you don't react until you know you have to.
But when I am in the middle of a crisis, I am more of a, I have to attack it from all angles to make sure I take care of everything.
And so, yeah, I don't know if I were to ever be interviewed.
I hope it doesn't look suspicious because I shut down and that's just me.
I can't say that about you, Megan, or anybody else who's put into this situation.
Oh, I'm a cryer.
Well, as it turns out, Karen Matthews devised a plan with her boyfriend's uncle, Michael Donovan,
to use Shannon as a pawn to collect 50,000 pounds or just over 60,000 US dollars as reward money for her safe return.
I was flabbergasted when I read that.
But here's where my warm up question comes to you, because Karen first used a travel sickness medication.
She put Shannon to sleep before stashing her away under Uncle Michael's bed in his flat.
It's my understanding, too, just from some of the articles that I read, that Karen also dosed Shannon up, not just this one time.
It actually happened on several occurrences.
So I don't know if it was something that can build up in your body, but she liked to dose Shannon up.
And it was not the first time.
Now, Karen and Michael had planned a timeline to release Shannon and to take her to the police station to collect that reward money.
So obviously, there was a little bit of premeditation here.
Between the inconsistencies found during the investigation, plus Karen's odd behavior,
police were able to piece together what was really going on here.
And in case you're wondering, Karen's boyfriend, whom she was playing Xbox with, was not an active participant in Sharon's abduction.
I didn't find any articles where I read that he had any knowledge of what was going on.
It was just something that Karen and Michael came up with.
So 24 days had passed.
And on March 14th, 2008, two investigators, Nick Townsend and Paul Kettlewell, paid a visit to Michael's flat,
obviously on some of the leads that they had gotten.
And there was no answer at the door.
But a neighbor heard them knocking and came out and verified that she had heard somebody moving around upstairs.
And it also sounded like it could be a small child or a toddler.
Now, I've lived in apartments or flats where people have lived above me.
And you can certainly tell if there's a lot of activity and if it is a small child.
So, of course, this raised suspicions.
Townsend and Kettlewell called for backup, then returned to Michael's flat and then used a door rammer to enter the residence.
So imagine this for just a moment.
Police used the door rammer, which would splinter the door frame.
I'm thinking I've seen enough of those movies where they do that.
Oh, yeah, there's some force.
Yeah, absolutely. And it's going to create a little bit of noise.
Now, seconds go by after they finally get through that door.
Everything is really, really quiet.
And then the police hear a little girl's voice that says, stop it.
You're frightening me.
It's not clear if the girl was speaking to the police who were entering that apartment or flat or if they were speaking to someone else.
Now, I don't know if you've heard anything more than that.
But to me, there was not a lot of definity on who she was talking to.
But as police made their way through the flat, they followed the muffled sounds that led them to the bedroom
where Michael and Shannon were hiding underneath a box spring bed.
There's a name for that. I can't remember the type.
But if you were to go to Wayfair or any of these sites, you can see that there is a big hollow space below the bed.
And that's where both Michael and Shannon were at.
Police immediately dragged Michael out.
But in the process, he was kicking and biting and anything that you would do to try to get away, I'm sure.
The first thing that he said once he was exposed was to get Karen down here because we're sharing this reward money.
Oof.
Isn't that crazy?
Yeah.
Well, once Shannon was removed from the flat, police asked her mom if she knew where she was.
And she said, yes, she told the police officers that her mother knew where she was at, but Michael would not let her talk to her.
That's awful.
Yeah.
Obviously, both Karen Matthews and Michael Donovan were arrested for Shannon's disappearance.
And on December 4th, 2008, they were charged with kidnapping, false imprisonment and perverting the court of justice.
Karen also received child cruelty charges and both Karen and Michael were sentenced to eight years in prison.
Now, Karen only served four of those eight years behind bars.
And you probably know this.
She was dubbed Britain's worst mom.
Yes.
Yeah.
Which she denies because she said, quote, I never killed anybody, unquote.
That's all right then, isn't it?
I know.
I'm speechless.
Now, Shannon has since been given a new identity and has moved on with her life.
She does live with a new family.
I'm going to say just from my calculations, she is 23 or 24 today.
Her biological parents still keep in touch and describe Shannon as a beautiful woman and a beautiful spirit.
I think that's beautiful.
And we dash through the story, Megan.
And that's the best that I can call a happy outcome from this entire debacle here.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, all the best to Shannon.
My goodness.
To go through that at such a young age.
And she's about the same age that I am because I was 11 in 2008 when it was all kind of coming out in the news.
Oh, wow.
So as an 11-year-old, what were you thinking?
Because she was on the news.
So that's a great perspective from a child's thought process.
What was going through your mind?
Oh, to be around the same age as her and to see that was an incredible perspective to have.
But I remember it was on TV constantly and it was all anyone was talking about.
And I think it's important to consider as well.
This was in the wake of Madeleine McCann's disappearance.
And I think when you put those two together, it sort of makes more sense because of how much exposure.
I mean, Madeleine McCann is a local case to me from Leicester.
But the exposure that it gave the McCanns, the money that came flooding in to support and to try and find Madeleine McCann.
I'm sure there's some sort of connection there.
I mean, that's just my assumption to then think, you know, you see the money bags going and you think I could do something with this.
Right.
Yeah, I just remember everyone talking about it and everyone having an opinion.
There was unfortunately a lot of elitism that came into it because Shalin came from a family that was less privileged, I think, than previous people who had gone missing.
So that came into it as well.
But I then remember when she was found and when it all came out, it was just it was like a Hollywood thriller.
You could not believe it that that's what had actually happened.
I have no words because, first of all, there's something about mothers and how they protect their children.
But yeah, for that to come out, I think I would be in complete shock.
Absolutely.
So that's the finish line of the dash, Megan.
We're done.
And I'm thrilled that Shannon was found safe.
I absolutely wish her well and the same as you.
Yeah.
So thanks for helping me out today.
Are you frozen?
Uh oh.
You all, Megan is frozen.
All right.
Well, I guess I'm going to have to finish this out.
Megan, thank you so much for being here today and helping me out with the dash.
Be sure to check Megan out at True Crime Declassified wherever you get your podcasts.
Plus on Instagram.
Best of luck to you.
I was going to tell you this while you were online with me, Megan.
Best of luck to you on your PhD.
I can't wait to find out what your findings are going to be until next week.
Talk to you soon.
Thanks for listening to Dying to be Found, True Crime Podcast, and our dash mini series.
Every week, we'll bring you a variety of true crime episodes, a little dash of hope,
plus special bonus episodes with some really cool guests.
Before we go, we'd love for you to share this podcast with your friends and give us a five star review.
Follow us on TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest at Dying to be Found,
or visit our website at Dying to be Found dot com spelled just like you see it in our logo.
Better yet, click on our Linktree account found in the show notes where you'll find all the information in one place.
Be sure to dash in every Wednesday for our mini episodes, plus every Thursday when I get together with some of my family members.
Thanks again, everyone, and we'll talk to you soon.