Épisodes

  • A Dry Card in a Wet Box: The Harvey Lane Fraud Case

    A Dry Card in a Wet Box: The Harvey Lane Fraud Case
    Oct 5 2026
    A Dry Card in a Wet Box: The Harvey Lane Fraud Case

    A town's quiet confidence cracked the morning a soaked velvet box sat on a doorstep-and the citation card inside was perfectly dry. A man celebrated as a veterans' advocate for nine years was actually living under a false military identity; how did a dry card expose a decades-long deception, and what else was being hidden?

    In this episode, we lay out the sequence of discoveries from March 4, 2011 through the months and years that followed, showing how documents, memory, and a single patch raised questions about a trusted figure - and whether those questions should have been asked sooner.

    Person: Harvey Lane (real name Harvey Dale Mercer)
    Date: March 4, 2011
    Location: Dellworth Avenue, Millhaven
    Age: 44
    Prior occupation: claims processor

    - The citation card was found dry inside a soaked velvet presentation box on the doorstep at about 6:00 a.m.
    - Charles Bell, age 14, discovered the box while two hours into his paper route.
    - Harvey had presented a military discharge document to Callum County social services by 2005 and worked as a veterans' outreach coordinator from 2005 to 2011.
    - Mercer claimed service in the First Special Troops Battalion, 101st Special Division, including deployments to Kuwait in the early 1990s and Afghanistan after 2001.
    - Robert Schmidt noticed the wrong unit patch on Lane's right shoulder at a Memorial Day ceremony in 2006 and raised the issue privately in 2008.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    19 min
  • She Built a Fortune From Hotel Stationery: The Marilyn Ford Case

    She Built a Fortune From Hotel Stationery: The Marilyn Ford Case
    Oct 4 2026
    She Built a Fortune From Hotel Stationery: The Marilyn Ford Case

    Cold certainty: a briefcase of four hundred real hotel letterheads, found upright in snow, helped a woman with no criminal record collect nearly $200,000 from a small town - so how did blank stationery become the proof everyone trusted? Which single misstep allowed Marilyn Ford to turn decades of administrative know-how into a convincing riverfront fraud?

    In this episode, we follow the sequence of events from a snowplow discovery to Detective Warren Cole’s questions, tracing Marilyn Ford’s path through hotel rooms, forged polish, and a town that invested in a promise. We track the paper trail, the presentations, and the one conversation that almost stopped her - but didn’t.

    Person: Marilyn Ford
    Date: February 11 (briefcase found); October 12 (presentation to chamber president)
    Location: Aldenmoor Grand Hotel; Carver City
    Event: Briefcase containing approximately 400 sheets of hotel letterhead discovered
    Amount: nearly $200,000 collected from local investors

    - Briefcase discovered on service lane behind Aldenmoor Grand at 5:15 AM by snowplow operator Earl Smith
    - Inside were about 400 sheets of blank hotel letterhead organized into four stacks with rubber bands
    - Marilyn Ford had been in Carver City for four months and used her real name while collecting funds
    - The prospectus shown to Chamber president Lawrence Mott had an Aldenmoor Grand cover and stock renderings bought for $300
    - One local realtor, Keith Fitzgerald, raised concern in December after a four-minute conversation about "preferred return" but chose not to act

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    17 min
  • A Town's Only Doctor Was Never a Doctor: The Kenneth Morris Case

    A Town's Only Doctor Was Never a Doctor: The Kenneth Morris Case
    Oct 3 2026
    A Town's Only Doctor Was Never a Doctor: The Kenneth Morris Case

    Trust in a small town was weaponized for six years: a man with two years of community college and a decade in hospital supply rooms posed as a family physician to a town of 4,000, never attended medical school, and used forged diplomas and a transposed medical license number to pass board review. How did his papers, a cream-colored diploma and a certification from an online template, convince a clinic that had waited eleven months for a doctor - and who finally noticed the truth?

    In this episode, we follow the sequence of events that put Kenneth Allen Morris in the clinic exam rooms of Dellwood, what his daily practice looked like, and the institutional gaps that allowed a false medical identity to persist; can the details of appointments, a pharmacist’s photocopy, and a single mis-typed digit explain six years of trust?

    Person: Kenneth Allen Morris
    Age: 54
    Location: Dellwood Community Clinic
    Period: 2004-2011
    Event: Arrest on January 19, 2011

    - Morris had two years of community college and never attended medical school.
    - The Dellwood Community Clinic had gone eleven months without a physician before hiring Morris.
    - Morris began seeing patients the week after a 4-1 board vote in autumn 2004.
    - A Virginia medical license number on his application belonged to Ellen Pruitt; Morris had transposed one digit.
    - Pharmacist Warren Carlson made a photocopy of a suspicious postoperative prescription in winter 2007 and sealed it in his filing cabinet for four years.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    20 min
  • She Sat With the Dying - But Her Ordination Was Fake

    She Sat With the Dying - But Her Ordination Was Fake
    Oct 2 2026
    She Sat With the Dying - But Her Ordination Was Fake

    A laminated ordination certificate was found dry on a frosted park bench in December 2011, yet the seminary named on it had been closed for five years - and the woman it belonged to had created it herself. How did someone with two semesters of community college and a copy-shop job become the trusted bedside presence for dying patients for two and a half years, and why did she leave before anyone asked for answers?

    In this episode, we follow the timeline from a small-town upbringing through volunteer work at a palliative care facility, the application that included unverifiable references and a forged credential, and the clinical observations that described an uncommon bedside skill. What held this deception and genuine comfort together, and what finally unraveled it?

    Person: Vicki Williams
    Date found: December 9, 2011
    Facility: Cedarview palliative care
    Education: two semesters at Harwick Community College
    Conference: chaplaincy conference in St. Louis, October 2010

    - The ordination certificate was dated June 2007 and issued by the Interdenominational Seminary of the Ozarks.
    - Vicki began volunteering at Cedarview in May 2009 and was recommended for a part-time chaplain position in November 2009.
    - The seminary named on the certificate had been closed for five years by the time the certificate was found.
    - Vicki had attended Harwick Community College for two semesters and left with no degree.
    - In April 2009 Vicki submitted an application to Cedarview listing two years of prior chaplaincy at “Riverbend Extended Care” and two references that could not be verified.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    19 min
  • He Certified Fires He Never Understood: The William Stevens Fraud

    He Certified Fires He Never Understood: The William Stevens Fraud
    Oct 1 2026
    He Certified Fires He Never Understood: The William Stevens Fraud

    The smell of smoke and a laminated fake credential on an empty lot started a collapse that would expose $2.3 million of fraud and eleven years of deception. A man presenting himself as a certified fire investigator used a homemade certificate stamped CF-0047 to convince fourteen regional insurance carriers he was legitimate - so how did nobody ever check, and who finally pieced it together?

    In this episode, we follow the discovery, the false credential, and the small inconsistencies that grew into an eleven-year fraud. Listen to how a locked Plexiglas box, a green spiral notebook, and a claims examiner's unease led to the central question: how did William T. Stevens sustain a career built on a certificate that never existed?

    Person: William T. Stevens
    Age: 40 at collapse
    Company: Tri-State Origin and Cause Consulting
    Credential number: CF-0047
    Loss uncovered: $2.3 million

    - A laminated certificate bearing the seal of the National Fire Investigation Council and number CF-0047 was found two weeks old inside a locked Plexiglas emergency-shutoff housing on an empty lot.
    - Stevens worked two years as a paid field assistant to Ted Voss and shadowed him for approximately eight months, keeping a detailed green spiral notebook of techniques and measurements.
    - For eleven years Stevens provided origin-and-cause reports to fourteen regional insurance carriers without any carrier verifying the existence of the issuing council or the credential.
    - A textile-storage fire claim of $400,000 raised suspicion when three photographs were missing and replacement photos had shadow angles inconsistent by several hours, noted by claims examiner Patrice Wynn.
    - Investigators later confirmed there was no National Fire Investigation Council, no registry, no CF-0047 in licensing databases for Ohio, Indiana, or Kentucky, and a blank stack of identical certificates was found in Stevens's locked drawer.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    21 min
  • inside Lena Crouch's informally sublet unit; hung there ~20 months

    inside Lena Crouch's informally sublet unit; hung there ~20 months
    Sep 30 2026
    inside Lena Crouch's informally sublet unit; hung there ~20 months

    A laminated detective badge, a fabricated missing-person case, and a true-crime podcast that gathered 11,000 believers - what happens when an entire community mourns a woman who never existed? Listeners followed a 61-year-old medical transcriptionist who created airtight documents, fake local news, and pitched her voice into other identities; how did no one notice for years?

    In this episode, we tell how the badge in a Clover Falls church storage unit led a deacon to call state investigators and unspooled a podcast persona built from precise forgeries, staged interviews, and invented records-could a single photograph undo a fiction that had taken hold of thousands?

    Person: Karen Barrett
    Age: 61
    Podcast: Cold Signal
    Facebook group members: 11,000
    Event date of discovery: October 14, 2019

    - The badge found had the name Vaughn Crosley and listed Tanner County Sheriff's Office with a handwritten chain-of-custody noting case TC-2014-0047.
    - Karen Barrett registered an LLC called Signal and Record in 2016 and launched Cold Signal, which reached national download success by season three.
    - Karen recorded episodes alone in a closet starting around 2:00 a.m., using a condenser microphone, audio interface, and soundproofing panels bought on a payment plan.
    - She created fabricated materials including an invented Aldermoor ZIP code, six PDF front pages of The Aldermoor Register, and falsified evidence logs and autopsy summaries.
    - The first recorded suspicion came in spring 2018 when a journalist could not verify audio engineer Tom Wicker, credited in Season Two, and received a detailed but unverifiable response.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    20 min
  • He Built a Fake Career for Seven Years: The Marvin Myers Case

    He Built a Fake Career for Seven Years: The Marvin Myers Case
    Sep 29 2026
    He Built a Fake Career for Seven Years: The Marvin Myers Case

    A man kept a seven-year professional life built on a diploma no university ever issued, serving about sixty families while institutions passed along a photocopy as proof - so why did no one stop him sooner? Who was Marvin Myers really, and what did he think he was doing when he placed that framed diploma against a tree?

    In this episode, we lay out the sequence of events from the morning a framed diploma was found on Stanley Perry Trail to the county review that found no evidence of deliberate harm. We trace Myers’s college years, short internship, move to Kellerton, his adjunct role, and the transfer request that unraveled everything - but can a file folder and a photocopy tell the whole story?

    Person: Marvin J. Myers
    Date: September 11, 2018
    Location: Stanley Perry Trail, Kellerton area
    Case: Credential discrepancy leading to board interview
    Event: Diploma photocopy filed in Kellerton State's department folder

    - A framed diploma reading "Marvin J. Myers, PhD, University of Northern Indiana" was found leaning against a tree on September 11, 2018.
    - Myers reportedly worked with roughly sixty families over seven years under the credential in question.
    - He enrolled at Maplecroft College in fall 2001, left in spring 2004 after two and a half years without completing his degree.
    - Myers accepted an unpaid internship at the Vantage Center in summer 2006 and lasted one week before calling in sick and never returning.
    - Kellerton State’s file on Myers contained only a photocopy of a diploma and no original transcripts, no registrar confirmation, and no APA verification.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    21 min
  • She Built a Law Firm Using Her Brother's Name: The Judith Sharp Case

    She Built a Law Firm Using Her Brother's Name: The Judith Sharp Case
    Sep 28 2026
    She Built a Law Firm Using Her Brother's Name: The Judith Sharp Case

    A woman ran a functioning arbitration firm for nearly ten years using her twin brother’s Tennessee bar certificate she kept from their mother's papers, and not one of her arbitration awards was overturned on appeal. How did a paralegal with no law degree issue seventy- to eighty-page awards that withstood judicial scrutiny while hiding a laminated credential bearing Marcus Doyle Sharp’s name?

    In this episode, we lay out the documented timeline and actions in the case as shown in the record, from the river discovery of the wallet to the decade of arbitration awards and the moments when the scheme nearly unraveled. What drove Judith Sharp to adopt her brother’s bar identity, and why did her legal reasoning survive review despite the fraud?

    Person: Judith Sharp
    Person: Marcus Doyle Sharp
    Date: August 14, 2011
    Location: Sycamore Fork / Demonbreun Street, Nashville
    Status: Awards not vacated on appeal for ten years

    - A dark brown leather wallet containing a laminated Tennessee Bar certificate for Marcus Doyle Sharp was found after five days in Sycamore Fork on August 14, 2011.
    - Judith Sharp opened Doyle Sharp Dispute Resolution in autumn 2001 and operated from a leased office on Demonbreun Street in Nashville for nearly ten years.
    - The Tennessee Bar certificate listed Marcus Doyle Sharp with bar number 0041872, admitted in 1983; his license lapsed in 1994 and he lived in Spokane, Washington.
    - Judith billed $240 an hour, a rate described in the record as deliberately set below market to attract referrals while suggesting establishment.
    - In 2007 a paralegal ran Marcus Sharp’s bar number in the Tennessee Bar lookup, found him inactive since 1994 with a Spokane address, and left a “check this?” note that was filed without stopping the arbitration outcome.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    18 min