A Simpler Time True Crime

A Simpler Time True Crime

I’m Megan, your host, and each week I revisit unsolved cases from decades past—stories that have too often been forgotten or overlooked. Together, we examine the facts, question the myths of “the good old days,” and ask whether a simpler time was ever really a safer one. This podcast honors the people at the heart of each case—focusing not on sensationalism, but on the lives affected and the justice still waiting to be served. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/a-simpler-time-true-crime--6665681/support.

Episodes

The Judge Is More Worried About The Dog Than Me: The Murder of Galina Komar

January 18, 2026 • 45 mins
“There is no actual physical injury, is there, other than some bruising? I am not suggesting that bruising is nice, but there is no disfigurement. There are no broken bones. There are no serious physical injuries, are there?”

Those words were spoken by Criminal Court Judge Lorin Duckman at a bail hearing for the man who had been relentlessly stalking and abusing Galina Komar. Galina was present in the courtroom that day, forced to l...
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The Answers Died With Him: The Unsolved Murder of Cynthia and Heather Johnson

January 12, 2026 • 49 mins
I want to be transparent about this case from the start. While it is technically unsolved, there is a strong and consistent understanding of who is responsible. This is less a whodunit and more an opportunity to walk through our criminal justice system and examine how, over the course of decades, one man was able to manipulate outcomes in his favor. Shorter sentencing, public sympathy, and ultimately a lack of meaningful consequenc...
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The Day It Was To Finalize: The Unsolved Abduction of Deborah McKneely

January 5, 2026 • 29 mins
A fifth grader comes home from school in 1991 expecting to see his mother but instead is greeted by an empty home and a terrifying scene. Everything from the home pointed to foul play for the mother. Other clues made it seem like aspects had been staged to make the scene look like something that it wasn’t. On the day of Deborah’s disappearance, she was supposed to be meeting with her husband to finalize their divorce. And while tha...
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Terror After Sundown: The Murder of Carol Jenkins-Davis

December 29, 2025 • 54 mins
In September of 1968, a young saleswoman named Carol was traveling through Indiana, selling encyclopedias for a company based in Indianapolis. She was part of a small crew made up of another black woman and two white men. That day, their route brought them to Martinsville, Indiana, a town that was already known among Black travelers as a dangerous place to be. As the term was better adopted over the years, it would be known as a su...
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Steps From Home: The Unsolved Abduction of Rachel Louise Cooke

December 21, 2025 • 51 mins
In January of 2002, a college student is home in Texas for winter break, just days away from returning to school. Like she does nearly every morning, the avid runner laces up her shoes, grabs her Walkman, and heads out on her familiar four-mile route through her family’s quiet subdivision. Neighbors see her along the way. Her movements are accounted for. One neighbor even places her less than a football field from her own driveway....
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Payphone Call at 1:58 AM: The Unsolved Disappearance of Dr. Cherryl Lamont Pearson

December 15, 2025 • 37 mins
A treasured pediatrician from Tennessee spends the night out at an NBA basketball game. She calls her mom from the game and mentions to her that she isn’t feeling well. After she gets home, she hosts a couple of girlfriends at her place to finish out the evening as a quiet night in before heading to bed. What happens to her after they leave her home is a mystery, but her family began to worry when she wasn’t around early the next m...
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Special Updated Episode: Judy Lord's Case Is Solved

December 12, 2025 • 30 mins
UPDATED EPISODE: When I first covered this case in October 2025 the case was unsolved. As of November 24th, 2025 a suspect was confirmed in the case with advanced DNA evidence and NHSP Closed the case. Today I go through the evidence police have released after their big press announcement. This is the full original episode with an updated ending. 

Rest Peacefully, Judy. The truth is known. 

A young woman is living in a small Concord,...
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Wedding Dress For Sale: The Unsolved Murder of Patricia "Denise" Palmer

December 8, 2025 • 37 mins
On a Tuesday morning in late November of 1981, a newlywed met up with a man she thought was purchasing her wedding dress from her. She was scraping together any cash she could for a down payment on a house. Little did she know, the man had no intention of buying her dress. Her murder has stuck with the Tulsa community for over four decades, but with DNA advancements there is still hope.

TIPS: https://www.tulsapolice.org/cold-cases
Ca...
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"If It Is A Joke It Is A Very Poor One" : The Unsolved Murders of Andrew and Patricia Puskas

December 1, 2025 • 39 mins
“I don’t know if it is a joke or not. The timer is not ticking or anything, but if it is a joke, it is a very poor one. I would like someone to come over and look at it please.” Those were some of the last words Andrew Puskas ever spoke to a Middlesex, New Jersey police officer. Moments later, his home exploded, killing both Andrew and his wife and stunning an entire community.

The Puskas family was quiet. Middle class. Ordinary in ...
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Murder at Cloverleaf Mall: The Unsolved Double Homicide of Charlita Singleton and Cheryl Edwards

November 24, 2025 • 27 mins
In November of 1996, two co-workers are closing up their retail store in large mall outside of Richmond, Virginia. Their closing routine is like clockwork so when they don’t return to their homes, alarm bells went off. The next morning would reveal a horrific scene inside the mall. How could two women be brutally murdered inside a popular mall with security nearby? Nearly thirty years later, this case still baffles authorities and ...
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Prime and Only Suspect Part 2: The Unsolved Disappearance of Kip Hess, Keith Fleming, and Charles Collingwood

November 18, 2025 • 28 mins
In Part 2, we pick back up on what happens after John Rodney McRae is released from prison. In this episode, we leave off after discussing Kip Hess's disappearance and the early conviction of McRae in Joey Housey's murder. After his sentence is commuted, McRae relocates to Florida and other boys begin disappearing. 
While these cases may appear solved on the surface, the boys have never been located and its believed that there are m...
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Prime and Only Suspect Part 1 : The Unsolved Disappearances of Kip Hess, Keith Fleming, and Charles Collingwood

November 17, 2025 • 26 mins
When a young teen vanishes on his way to school, a single note left behind pushes police toward the idea that he was a runaway. But the people who knew him best never believed that. As the days stretched on, that theory began to crumble and a prime suspect emerged. On this podcast, I never center the perpetrator, and that remains true here. But to show just how unsafe the so-called simpler times could be, today I am walking you thr...
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The Motorcycle Gang: The Unsolved Murder of the Deal Family

November 9, 2025 • 32 mins
A family of three is brutally murdered in their rural New Jersey home in 1978. Police dismissed early rumors of connections to a violent motorcycle gang, but as the years went on they began to lean into that theory more, especially after a chillingly similar crime 3.5 years later. While many accept this theory, some say the killings feel more personal and fall outside of the way outlaw motorcycle gangs operate. Despite extensive th...
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Her Last Customer: The Unsolved Murder of Gale Green

November 3, 2025 • 31 mins
In 1987, the owner of a small lingerie shop was closing up for the night, looking forward to a busy evening of plans ahead. Plans she would never make it to.
When her brother came by later, he found her body inside the store. Investigators believe she was ambushed by someone pretending to be a customer, trapped in her own business. She fought hard for her life and injured her attacker in the process.
Now, thirty-eight years later, he...
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Someone She Trusted: The Unsolved Murder of Jessie Marie Twilight Song Crooks

October 27, 2025 • 30 mins
It’s late August of 2001, and a bubbly teenager from a tiny town just outside Bowling Green, Kentucky, answers a phone call on her family’s landline. Everything that happens after that call becomes a mystery. No one knows who was on the other end, but it’s believed she slipped out of her house that night to meet the caller and never came back.

Weeks later, her body was found the day before a national tragedy, and her case faded from...
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The Sales Call: The Unsolved Disappearance of Katie Eggleston

October 20, 2025 • 43 mins
On a hot summer day in 1993, recent college graduate Katie was making sales calls in downtown Portland, Oregon. It was her first day working solo after weeks of training and shadowing. She finished her morning calls and was on her way to her afternoon appointments—appointments she never made it to. When her car was found abandoned in an industrial lot, investigators explored several theories, including that she may have left on her...
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All Just A Game: The Unsolved Murder of Harriet Riley

October 13, 2025 • 28 mins
In 1975 Sacramento, a young girl named Harriet went out to play at the park and never returned home. Her concerned mother called police and tragically, the next day, her body was found in a dumpster just a mile away. Police quickly focused on two local boys who claimed it was all part of a child’s game that went terribly wrong. But as you’ll hear, there’s so much more to this story. Her father — a decorated veteran — was also murde...
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(Updated Release: Solved 11/2025) Valid Concerns For Her Safety: The Unsolved Murder of Judy Lord

October 6, 2025 • 30 mins
Note: When I first covered this case in October 2025 the case was unsolved. As of November 24th, 2025 a suspect was confirmed in the case with advanced DNA evidence and NHSP Closed the case. Rest Peacefully, Judy. The truth is known. 

A young woman is living in a small Concord, New Hampshire apartment with her husband and their little boy. Their marriage is rocky, and he comes and goes often, leaving Judy alone with their toddler. D...
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A Killer At The Door: The Unsolved Murder of Virginia State Trooper Johnny Bowman

September 29, 2025 • 34 mins
In the early morning hours of August 19, 1984, a Virginia State Trooper answered his front door and was ambushed. In an attack lasting no more than three minutes, he was fatally stabbed more than 40 times in front of his wife, brother, and sister-in-law, as well as his toddler daughter – who had been asleep in bed with him prior to the attack. From the over-the-top disguises left behind at the crime scene to suspects no one would e...
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Lover's Lane: The Murder of Cathy Britt

September 22, 2025 • 30 mins
In May 1983, a young couple parked near the Loch Raven Reservoir in Baltimore County, Maryland, was suddenly ambushed when gunfire shattered the quiet night. Just four weeks earlier, another couple had been shot in a similar lovers’ lane attack, but they managed to survive. This second tragedy claimed the life of a 22-year-old woman and left the community shaken with fears that a serial predator was on the loose. Then, as suddenly ...
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