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iHeartPodcasts

Hell And Gone is a true crime podcast from iHeartPodcasts and School of Humans that follows journalist and private investigator Catherine Townsend as she investigates unsolved deaths. 

Now in its fifth season, Hell and Gone is going weekly. 

Over the past five years of making true crime podcast Hell and Gone, host Catherine Townsend has received hundreds of messages from people all around the country asking for help with an unsolved murder that’s affected them, their families and their communities. 

In past seasons of the show, she’s only been able to focus on one case. But now, she’s hosting a new weekly show called Hell and Gone Murder Line. Every Thursday, Catherine features a new case, adds updates to old ones, and helps as much as she can to get the word out about unsolved murders. 

If you have a case you’d like Catherine and her team to look into, you can call the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145.

Hell and Gone

On January 7, 1995, at around 12:50 pm, two women, Monica Jones and her girlfriend Cheryl Edwards were driving down Highway 56 near Brockwell, Arkansas when Cheryl saw smoke coming from a trailer at the residence of 43-year-old Connie Townsend. 
 
The two women pulled over and ran up to the trailer to try to help. At around that same time, another woman, Billy Browning arrived. Monica and Cheryl both desperately tried to get inside the trailer, but the heat was too intense. 
 
The trailer was already engulfed in flames. 
 
By the time the first officer from the Izard County Sheriff's Office and the Calico Rock fire department arrived on the scene, it was chaos. 
 
According to the police report, the officer noted that there were about 20 to 25 people standing in the yard. 
 
Connie Townsend burned to death while it seemed like half the town stood outside, and multiple people told police about threats that she had allegedly received, some of them earlier that day. And yet, 30 years later no one has ever been arrested or charged in connection with her death. 
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: Connie Townsend Part 1

On January 7, 1995, 43-year-old Connie Townsend’s home burned to the ground in Brockwell, Arkansas in front of over 20 witnesses. 
 
Connie was moving out of her house that day. She had separated from her estranged husband, David Townsend years earlier. David had been staying with his parents, Dale and Ramona, and also with his girlfriend of three years, JoAnn Ellis. 
 
But according to Connie’s daughters, Stacy and Amber, David was angry that day and had threatened Connie. They also said that David had threatened to burn the house down in the past. 
 
Connie’s body was found in a utility room; she was lying face down with a pair of sewing scissors underneath her body. 
 
Investigators said that Connie had died of smoke and soot inhalation, and according to the autopsy report there was no tissue left. 
 
And it seemed like after investigators went through the charred remains of her trailer, they had a lot more questions. Was Connie’s death due to an accidental fire, or murder and arson? 
 
We had heard from Connie’s daughters that Connie’s body was found in a junk room, a bedroom that they kind of used as a utility room. If there was a fire, why would Connie shut herself into a closet in the back of the utility room, a place where there was no escape? Or could someone have put her in that closet?
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: Connie Townsend Part 2

On January 17 2023 at 11: 22 PM the Johnson County deputy coroner arrived at 1954 County Road in Clarksville Arkansas and found the body of 53-year-old William Vick. 
 
The case of death on William’s autopsy was listed as a combined mixed prescription and illicit drug toxicity. Manner of death: homicide.
 
William’s family was suspicious of his wife, LaRenda, but someone else confessed: LaRenda's mother, Martha McLean. She was in her late seventies, terminally ill with throat cancer, and lived in a separate structure on William and LaRenda's property. And she had written a letter confessing to the murder.
 
So why would LaRenda’s 72 year old mother want to hurt William. And with her supposedly being frail and ill, would she even be physically capable of something like that? 
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: William Vick Part 2

On January 23, 2023, just six days after William Vick was found dead on his bedroom floor at 1954 County Road 3259 in Clarksville Arkansas, police did a welfare check on his wife Larenda’s mother, 72-year-old Martha McLean, who lived in a detached house on the property with William and Larenda.
 
They found Martha struggling to breathe with drugs including lorazepam and morphine around her. Martha had overdosed and was close to death, but paramedics administered Narcan, a drug that blocks opioids. So Martha's breathing improved, and she survived. 
 
Matt Foster with the Arkansas State Police wrote that Martha had a pen and a partially handwritten note in her hand when he found her. The note stated that Martha didn’t want to hurt anyone. And after he found her, he executed a search warrant for the property, and he found a second handwritten note where Martha confessed to tampering with William’s medication and to killing him. 
 
But why did Martha kill William, and what really happened to her? 
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: William Vick Part 3

Christine Harron, a book-loving teenager from Hanover, Ontario, leaves for school in the spring of 1993 and is never seen again. A suspect emerges, confessing to her murder, but the case falls apart and Christine's family are left without answers.
 
In Season 9 of the award winning podcast Someone Knows Something, David Ridgen, along with Christine's mother, reopen the investigation and come face to face with the man who said he killed Chrissy.
 
Someone Knows Something is the investigative true crime series by award-winning documentarian David Ridgen. Each season tackles an unsolved case, uncovering details and bringing closure to families.
 
More episodes are available at: lnk.to/beLwSGEq
 
 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Introducing: Someone Knows Something

On September 29, 2023, just over nine months after William Vick was found dead on his bedroom floor in Clarksville Arkansas, his house caught on fire and burned down under very suspicious circumstances. 
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: William Vick Part 4

On June 25, 2020, a 56-year-old named James Escalante, who had Native American heritage and was also known by his nickname, Blackhawk, left his home in Wonder Valley, California on his mountain bike
 
James lived with a girlfriend, Sherry, and she told law enforcement that he left the home that day to head down the road about 10 minutes from their place to help a friend of theirs named Dee whose car had gotten stuck in sugar sand, which is almost like dry desert quicksand. 
 
It’s hot out there; the average temperature for that part of the desert in July and August is 89 degrees and highs regularly top out over 100, or even 105. 
 
And out there in the desert it’s dry heat so it feels like you’re baking in an oven.
 
It happens every year - hikers go missing or people just wander off and get lost and don’t come back. But the terrain also means that when people do go missing under mysterious circumstances it can be easier for local law enforcement to write it off as just an accident. 
 
Now supposedly the friend, Dee, had been out looking for rocks near Highway 62 and Shelton Road east of Twentynine Palms. And James had lived in that desert for a long time, and knew the area well. So the plan was for James to meet her at a specific intersection to rescue her. 
 
But once he got out there, according to Sherry, he couldn’t find Dee. So James called Sherry on his cell phone to figure out what was going on. At that point, Sherry called Dee on a three way call, and James told Dee to honk her horn so that he could find her. 
 
He seemed to think he could hear her, so he hung up. But he never got to Dee’s car. And no one ever saw James Escalante alive again.
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: James Escalante Part 1

On June 25, 2020, 56-year-old James Escalante, who also went by Blackhawk, left home on a red mountain bike to help Dee, a friend of his and his girlfriend Sherry’s, whose truck had gotten stuck in the desert. 
 
But he never made it back home, and no one reported him missing until September 7th. Heather Escalante and her husband Jon, James’ son, began their own search. 
 
After Heather started posting on social media and looking for information, she heard that remains were found in the desert on August 8th by a hiker. The body was a John Doe. Half his face was missing, he had long black hair and there was no ID found. 
 
Heather contacted the detective working the case to say that she believed that the body could be James, and on December 15th, the family’s worst fears were confirmed. They got a call from the coroner. James Escalante was dead. His cause and manner of his death were undetermined. 
 
What happened out there in the desert?
 
 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: James Escalante Part 2

Six bodies were found in Wonder Valley between December of 2019 and January of 2021. Some of the bodies in the desert, including the disappearance of 37 year old single mother Erika Lloyd, started making local, then national, news. But there were no national news reports about James Escalante. 
 
We’re going to dive into the missing persons report and compare accounts from the last people who saw James to see if we can shed more light into what really happened out there in the desert on June 25, 2020. 
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: James Escalante Part 3

On July 30, 2020, in Starke County, Indiana, a 911 call came from North County Road 1025 East just before 3:30 a.m. 
 
The caller, a man named Zachary, had worked late that night and had gotten home and climbed into bed when he said that he and fiancé were woken up by someone pounding on their door. 
 
The man was 27-year-old Nicholas Rudd. Nick said that he had been shot, but neither Zachary nor his fiancé had heard gunshots. 
 
What he didn’t know was that Nick had not been shot, he had been attacked with a hammer, and stabbed in the neck. He was bleeding to death on their doorstep, and the killer was still outside. 
 
If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: Nicholas Rudd

The Madison County Sheriff’s Office got a 911 call in the early morning hours of August 5, 2024 from caller who heard sounds that she believed could be from a woman being raped or tortured. 
 
But the police never came. Then a few weeks later, people were expressing concern about Taylor Barksdale, a 30-year-old woman who had been living in Huntsville and who had gone missing. When police finally went to the area of the 911 call to investigate on September 9, they went out to a residence in Kingston, and they found Taylor's remains.
 
Taylor was a mother of two young children, someone who was loved by her friends and family and someone who was vulnerable. Someone who died screaming in a dark field, desperately waiting for help that never came.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hell and Gone Murder Line: Taylor Barksdale Part 2

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