Speaker 1: All right, next witness please stay called Tracy Rain.
Speaker 2: You raise your right hand.
Speaker 3: You're listening to a trial which took place in nineteen
Speaker 3: ninety seven. A beautiful twenty seven year old blonde woman
Speaker 3: named Tracy Rain is on the stand.
Speaker 2: Because you pull a microphone just over.
Speaker 1: The closer to you. I good, Okay. You said you
Speaker 1: live in Savannah.
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: Do you have any children? Yes? I do?
Speaker 2: How many children?
Speaker 1: I have two children.
Speaker 3: Tracy was impeccably dressed with perfectly quafft hair, but her
Speaker 3: appearance was deceiving. She grew up on the poverty line
Speaker 3: and was exposed to extreme abuse. The prosecutor asked why
Speaker 3: she had worked so hard to see this case brought
Speaker 3: to trial.
Speaker 2: It was a search for truth.
Speaker 4: I realized that something bad had happened, and it was
Speaker 4: to correct that bad thing.
Speaker 3: A bad thing did happen. When she was just two,
Speaker 3: Tracy Riquel's brother Matthew, died. He was only four months old.
Speaker 3: There were many accounts as to what occurred, but her
Speaker 3: family chucked it up to a tragedy and life moved on.
Speaker 1: So what was your brother's death? Described as what did
Speaker 1: they tell you?
Speaker 4: So? When I was growing up, I was always told
Speaker 4: that Matthew died of crib death, that he slipped between
Speaker 4: the bars and fell on the floor. I had this
Speaker 4: idea of what I thought I knew. I was twenty five.
Speaker 4: I had finally gotten the records sent to me.
Speaker 3: These were the hospital records from the day of his death.
Speaker 3: They contained all the details she was desperate to know.
Speaker 4: I remember waiting for those documents on a daily basis.
Speaker 2: It was a right sunny day.
Speaker 4: I was downstairs in the living room. I had to
Speaker 4: get on my open as fast as I could, and
Speaker 4: that's when the world caved in around me. I wasn't
Speaker 4: prepared for what they said. It states child was threwned
Speaker 4: from crib by sister. Oh, hold on, did I do this?
Speaker 4: Is this everybody trying to protect me?
Speaker 3: Imagine just imagine seeing a report that says you were
Speaker 3: the reason someone died. Tercy Riquel is a kind and
Speaker 3: caring person. She couldn't picture hurting a baby ever, even
Speaker 3: by accident. Yet there it was, in black and white.
Speaker 2: Child threwned from crib by sister.
Speaker 3: Tracy saw in writing that she had thrown her little
Speaker 3: brother out of its crib. Was that true? Could she
Speaker 3: have done this? Or did something much more sinister happen.
Speaker 3: My name is Nancy Glass. I'm an investigative reporter. I've
Speaker 3: covered some of the most notorious crimes in US history.
Speaker 3: I've interviewed Jeffrey Dahmer in prison. I practically lived at
Speaker 3: the courthouse for a year covering the OJ Simpson trial.
Speaker 3: But even after being close to evil time after time,
Speaker 3: this is the story that has affected me more than
Speaker 3: any other. This is Burden of Guilt, Episode one, Age
Speaker 3: of Innocence. Tracy changed her name several years back to
Speaker 3: Tracy Riquel, so you will hear her referred to as
Speaker 3: both Tracy and Tercy Riquel in this podcast, especially since
Speaker 3: many of the people we speak to remember her from
Speaker 3: her younger years. I'll explain why she made that change
Speaker 3: later in the series, but out of respect for her,
Speaker 3: I will only refer to her as Tracy Riquel from
Speaker 3: here on out. This series talks about crime, domestic abuse,
Speaker 3: and homicide, but it's so much more than a true
Speaker 3: crime story. It's a real account of survival, resilience.
Speaker 1: And justice.
Speaker 3: It's taken us two years to put it together because
Speaker 3: it's that hard, it's that dramatic, and most importantly, It's
Speaker 3: taken twenty five years for Tracy Riquel to be able
Speaker 3: to tell her story. I went to see her at
Speaker 3: her home in Colorado. She lives on a heavily protected
Speaker 3: military base. We sat outside, so it's a little noisy.
Speaker 3: Do you just sit and enjoy the few.
Speaker 4: I can only see the very top of it from
Speaker 4: my house, but I'm under Shyanne Mountain, you know wargames,
Speaker 4: the movie Nora d That's where we are. It's all
Speaker 4: beautiful there.
Speaker 3: This place has everything her soul needs, peace, tranquility, and
Speaker 3: beauty and a garden. But there's also everything her head needs. Fences,
Speaker 3: uniforms and protection.
Speaker 4: I mean those are yeah, that's just the little pilot's
Speaker 4: training over there at the Air Force County.
Speaker 3: Really, yeah, that's them.
Speaker 4: That's their touch and goes.
Speaker 3: Terca Riquel is a veteran. She served in the Army
Speaker 3: for two years. She has lived all over Hawaii, Colorado, Alabama,
Speaker 3: different states, cities and bases. To her home is where
Speaker 3: her family is. She's a wife, a mother, and a grandmother.
Speaker 3: Against all odds, she has created a stable and comfortable
Speaker 3: life for herself and her family with her husband, Bart
Speaker 3: who is still on active duty.
Speaker 4: Because I'm with him, I don't feel terrified, I don't
Speaker 4: feel as vulnerable, feel safe. I guess that's the easiest
Speaker 4: way to say it, right, Yeah, I feel safe. I
Speaker 4: think we're in that coupled now that when you see
Speaker 4: pictures of us, we've started to look like each other,
Speaker 4: like people look like their dogs, and pipes are their
Speaker 4: dogs look like them? And then you see people, I
Speaker 4: think that's where we are, and you've gone to the
Speaker 4: same little quirks.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 3: I loved hearing the way she talks about her husband.
Speaker 3: It's really special. When I see her life in Colorado
Speaker 3: and hear about her family, it makes me smile because
Speaker 3: the odds were so stacked against her.
Speaker 4: If I decide something's gonna be, something's gonna be. I'm
Speaker 4: pretty annoyingly tenacious. If I believe something has to happen.
Speaker 1: Then it's gonna happen.
Speaker 3: Well, that's the theme of all of this, isn't it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah, I guess it is.
Speaker 3: Before I went to Colorado, I had been fascinated by
Speaker 3: Tracy Riquel's story for almost a decade. A few years
Speaker 3: ago we started corresponding, and I have spent the last
Speaker 3: four years getting to know her. We come from such
Speaker 3: different backgrounds, yet we do have so much in common,
Speaker 3: like our love for gardening and poodles and cooking and
Speaker 3: our kids. Of course, Tracy Riquel is in a safe
Speaker 3: place now and any pain is well hidden, but her
Speaker 3: road was a long and difficult one. Now at times
Speaker 3: the story can be difficult to hear, but please stick
Speaker 3: with me. After seeing hospital records that said Tracy Raquel
Speaker 3: was responsible for her four month old baby brother's death,
Speaker 3: it was a reckoning. The night Matthew died also happens
Speaker 3: to be her very first memory at the time.
Speaker 4: I didn't understand what all the lights and sirens are,
Speaker 4: and I don't really have a memory of an emotional
Speaker 4: state at that point, just asking what they were doing.
Speaker 1: Were you scared?
Speaker 4: I was terrified.
Speaker 3: She has flashbacks of images of her herself in a car.
Speaker 2: I remember it being a dark green El Camino.
Speaker 4: I remember standing up in the seat with my arms
Speaker 4: around that headrest and looking around at all the sirens everywhere,
Speaker 4: and Jan saying they're trying to help Matthew.
Speaker 3: Jan Is Jan Barry Samblin, Tracy Riquel's father. Matthew, a
Speaker 3: four month old baby, was hurt and needed serious Medical
Speaker 3: Attention journalist Jill Jordan Cedar explains how the sequence of
Speaker 3: events started with Tracy, Raquel, and her mother.
Speaker 5: That day, Kathy and Tracy went on an errand Jan
Speaker 5: was at home babysitting little Matthew. When they returned, Jan
Speaker 5: came to the door, blocked her entry, and asked her
Speaker 5: to retrieve something from the car. Kathy did that and
Speaker 5: Tracy went inside the apartment. When Cathy comes back, she
Speaker 5: goes into the bedroom finds Tracy in the crib, Matthew
Speaker 5: on the floor, eyes out of focus, looking in a
Speaker 5: world of trouble. At that point, Jan says that Tracy
Speaker 5: has caused Matthew to fall out of the crib, hit
Speaker 5: his head and is really chastising Tracy. Jan spanks Tracy
Speaker 5: and scolds her for what she's just done. Cathy said, look,
Speaker 5: there's something wrong with Matthew. We've got to get him
Speaker 5: to the emergency room and they leave.
Speaker 3: They raised the baby to North Side Hospital. The staff
Speaker 3: took X rays and realized he needed more care than
Speaker 3: they could provide. He was transferred by ambulance to the
Speaker 3: cab Medical Center. As Matthew was evaluated, extended family began
Speaker 3: to gather outside the hospital, Kathy's sisters and grandparents hovered close.
Speaker 3: Uncle Butch Jane's older brother paced in the parking lot.
Speaker 4: He said, I arrived at the emergency room and you
Speaker 4: were sitting on a concrete slab where ambulances pull up.
Speaker 3: Little Tracy Riquel had no idea what was going on,
Speaker 3: but Matthew was in dire condition. He had extensive skull fractures,
Speaker 3: brain bruising, and his pupils were fixed and dilated. Doctors
Speaker 3: felt they needed to perform surgery to give him a
Speaker 3: chance to survive. Kathy signed the paperwork giving permission, but
Speaker 3: it was of no use. Before midnight, Matthew died. Racy
Speaker 3: Riquel lost her baby brother. The next paper Kathy would
Speaker 3: sign would be a release for the county coroner to
Speaker 3: perform an autopsy and permission for Matthew's body to be
Speaker 3: sent to a funeral home. But after he died, Matthew
Speaker 3: just wasn't mentioned much. Tracy Riquel, of course, was always
Speaker 3: aware of him because of the memories of that night,
Speaker 3: but the family didn't do much to keep his memory
Speaker 3: alive or to memorialize him.
Speaker 1: You told me a story about a very scary car
Speaker 1: ride when you were a little kid. Will you tell
Speaker 1: the story.
Speaker 4: I mean, I was seven. I was in the car
Speaker 4: with Kathy and she said, day after tomorrow is Matthew's birthday.
Speaker 4: And I just had this child like remark of you
Speaker 4: don't take me to the cemetery, of never go speak
Speaker 4: to you. It's funny. I can remember exactly where we
Speaker 4: were on the road and next to the highway. And
Speaker 4: her reaction was shocked.
Speaker 1: Shocked about what that you would even mention him.
Speaker 4: You're exactly right. Her and Dan were together then, and
Speaker 4: she went home and had a complete fit. She told Jane,
Speaker 4: and he beat me terribly. He really enjoyed the belt,
Speaker 4: the wrong end of the belt.
Speaker 1: He beat you with a belt.
Speaker 4: Yes, he wanted to ensure that I didn't talk about
Speaker 4: Matthew again to her, so I didn't.
Speaker 3: Although she was too young to articulate a desire to
Speaker 3: honor her brother, she craved a connection. Her father. Jan
Speaker 3: wasn't interested in the least except in teaching her a lesson.
Speaker 4: And I guess some people think we all got whoopings
Speaker 4: with belts back in the day or whatever, But it
Speaker 4: wasn't like that.
Speaker 6: It wasn't disciplined. It was so I'd never talk about
Speaker 6: this kid.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: And all this time we've been talking, you have never
Speaker 3: referred to Kathy and Jan as mom and dad.
Speaker 1: Why not?
Speaker 4: I don't think genetics makes you a parent, So now
Speaker 4: I don't refer to them as a mother and a father.
Speaker 4: They weren't that. They weren't parents to me. They were monsters.
Speaker 3: Tracy Riquel's parents had a long, complicated relationship dating back
Speaker 3: to their childhoods. Jan Barry Sandlin and Kathy Ahman had
Speaker 3: grown up into cab County, Georgia. Even decades later, Kathy
Speaker 3: would admit she had been in love with Jan since
Speaker 3: she was twelve years old. One look at Jan's teenage
Speaker 3: photo you could see something in him. Confidence maybe, or
Speaker 3: maybe over confidence is more like it. He had a
Speaker 3: handsome face in charisma even as a teenager. Reporter Jill
Speaker 3: Jordan Cedar.
Speaker 5: Jane and Kathy had known each other for a long time,
Speaker 5: since sixth and seventh grade, through elementary school into high school.
Speaker 5: She found him charming. He was a cut ups or
Speaker 5: at the class clown. He was very popular, very mischievous,
Speaker 5: had a lot of the girls after him, and she
Speaker 5: was one of them.
Speaker 3: Jackie Wilson knew Jan Sandland's family growing up. A few
Speaker 3: of her girlfriends had crushes on him in school.
Speaker 7: Jan didn't mind showing how much he cared about somebody
Speaker 7: whenever he did care for, but he was also demanding
Speaker 7: and domineering and expected whatever he staid to go.
Speaker 3: In the early nineteen seventies, it wasn't unusual for couples
Speaker 3: to get married right after high school. Although Jan and
Speaker 3: Kathy eventually married, they took a circuitous route with other
Speaker 3: partners first. Now, this is going to be tricky, so
Speaker 3: if you're multitasking, and I know I do that when
Speaker 3: I listened to podcasts lean in for this. In high school,
Speaker 3: Kathy wanted to be with Jan.
Speaker 4: He came from a bad name, bad family, so she
Speaker 4: wasn't allowed to be with him.
Speaker 3: But she found a way because when she was fifteen,
Speaker 3: she became pregnant by Jan, and her mother found out.
Speaker 3: You told me about something very traumatic that happened to
Speaker 3: Kathy around that time.
Speaker 7: What was it?
Speaker 4: Her mother, my grandmother told her that someone was going
Speaker 4: to come and just check to make sure that the
Speaker 4: baby and the pregnancy was okay. And the woman I
Speaker 4: actually came to do an illegal abortion. They didn't tell
Speaker 4: her what was going on.
Speaker 3: Since Kathy was forbidden to date Jan, she found another
Speaker 3: boy with a better reputation.
Speaker 4: Publicly, she dated this really nice boy, Ted Golder, through
Speaker 4: high school, but at the same time, she was seeing
Speaker 4: Jan on the side the whole time. And then when
Speaker 4: Ted was drafted, she found out she was pregnant with
Speaker 4: me she was in the army, and then he went
Speaker 4: off to war.
Speaker 3: Despite her marriage to Ted, Kathy still carried a torch
Speaker 3: for Jan and continued to see him on the side.
Speaker 3: How did Kathy ultimately end her relationship with Ted.
Speaker 4: She had sent him a Dear John letter while he
Speaker 4: was deployed over in Vietnam, saying, this is not your child,
Speaker 4: It's Jane's child. I don't love you. I'm in love
Speaker 4: with him.
Speaker 3: And it was true. Kathy wanted Jan, and she knew
Speaker 3: the baby wasn't Ted's. Ted was willing to forgive Kathy
Speaker 3: and raise the baby with her, but Kathy wasn't interested.
Speaker 3: That baby was Tracy Riquel. Soon after, however, Kathy found
Speaker 3: out that Jan married another woman, a pretty brunette named
Speaker 3: Nancy Tigeter. With Jan now married, Kathy reconciled with Ted,
Speaker 3: and during that reconciliation, they conceived Matthew. Just a month
Speaker 3: after Matthew's birth, Jan's wife, Nancy, tragically committed suicide, and
Speaker 3: suddenly Kathy's true love was free. It was only weeks
Speaker 3: after Nancy's death before Jan found comfort with Kathy, who
Speaker 3: had open arms waiting. Ted Golder was forgotten and Jan
Speaker 3: moved in with Kathy, Tracy Riquel, and baby Matthew. They
Speaker 3: lived together as a family.
Speaker 4: They were on some honeymoon phase for two days, and
Speaker 4: then there was enormous amounts of violence.
Speaker 3: The house was chaos. There was drug abuse and booze.
Speaker 3: Jackie Wilson saw the debauchery first hand.
Speaker 7: I know for a fact that Jan sniff glew because
Speaker 7: I've seen it with my own eyes.
Speaker 3: That I know.
Speaker 7: I know that he took pills, but I don't know
Speaker 7: what kind of pills. I know he drank alcohol like
Speaker 7: it was water.
Speaker 3: It was no longer a charming teenage romance. The couple's
Speaker 3: attachment evolved into a rough adult relationship, and Tracy Raquel
Speaker 3: was exposed to most of it.
Speaker 4: I remember Jan and Kathy were at Jan's mother's apartment
Speaker 4: and there was this huge domestic situation that was going on.
Speaker 4: She was screaming bloody murder, and he was beating her up,
Speaker 4: and his mother was yelling at her.
Speaker 1: And where were you?
Speaker 4: I was sitting outside and there were people walking on
Speaker 4: the sidewalk across the street, looking and obviously taking notice.
Speaker 4: Nobody did anything.
Speaker 3: Keep in mind, Tracy Raquel was observing these acts as
Speaker 3: a small child.
Speaker 4: She would put her through horrible beatings and rapes, but
Speaker 4: she would say, it's love of my life.
Speaker 2: It's loved my life. It was one of these things
Speaker 2: that I didn't understand.
Speaker 3: But she had something inside her that was very strong.
Speaker 7: Even measures buttons and makes buttonholes down.
Speaker 3: She found ways to see refuge from the toxic, dysfunctional
Speaker 3: environment that surrounded her.
Speaker 7: Here's the story.
Speaker 3: To quiet the noise, just be a kid.
Speaker 4: I would get two cookies in milk and I could
Speaker 4: watch the Brady Bunch.
Speaker 3: Yes, she watched the family all of America embraced, and
Speaker 3: she dreamed, it.
Speaker 2: Is escape watching that family work. It was hope. It
Speaker 2: was hopeful, That's what it was.
Speaker 1: It was hopeful.
Speaker 3: Despite her escapism, Tracy Roquel was haunted by the loss
Speaker 3: of her baby brother. He was a ghost, an ever
Speaker 3: present ghost. Let me describe him to you. I'm looking
Speaker 3: at a photo of him at four months old. He's
Speaker 3: wearing a blue pinafore with a white starched collar. He's
Speaker 3: got a little tuft of hair on top of his
Speaker 3: head and has this wide eyed look. There's baby fat.
Speaker 3: The little ones start getting wrinkles around the wrists and
Speaker 3: folds around the neck. He was adorable. Tracy Riquel didn't
Speaker 3: attend Matthew's funeral, but relatives shared details with her over
Speaker 3: the years.
Speaker 4: Matthew was buried in Alabama. Our family is stretched from
Speaker 4: Alabama to Georgia, so with a lot of people. I
Speaker 4: was told that the procession from the church to the
Speaker 4: graveside for Matthew, that Kathy and Jan were in the hearse.
Speaker 5: They did say that the vault that Matthew was in
Speaker 5: was Ian coffin that Jan had paid for.
Speaker 3: The funeral was strange. Jan and Kathy displayed odd behavior
Speaker 3: on the way to the cemetery on what should have
Speaker 3: been one of the hardest and most painful days of
Speaker 3: their lives.
Speaker 4: They pulled into McDonald's and went and through a drive
Speaker 4: through to order food in.
Speaker 1: The middle of being in a funeral procession.
Speaker 3: Yes, their dead baby lay in a coffin in the
Speaker 3: back of their car, but that didn't stop them.
Speaker 4: And they pulled over and stopped and ate before they
Speaker 4: proceeded to the graveside to barry Matthew.
Speaker 1: What was your family's reaction to that?
Speaker 4: It was explained to me that everybody was just mortified.
Speaker 4: Grandmothers and great grandmothers and aunts were just sobbing in tears.
Speaker 3: After Matthew's death, Kathy couldn't cope.
Speaker 4: Kathy's attempted to aside. A couple of months after Matthew died.
Speaker 3: She took Tracy Riquel onto the balcony of their apartment
Speaker 3: and then, right in front of her own two year
Speaker 3: old child, Kathy climbed up on the railing and jumped
Speaker 3: jumped right off the two story balcony.
Speaker 4: She said she said at me there so that the
Speaker 4: police would find me. I think she broke both legs
Speaker 4: in both arms.
Speaker 3: It was only two floors, so Kathy survived, but was
Speaker 3: badly injured, immobilized. Jan couldn't be counted on, and Tracy Riquel,
Speaker 3: a toddler, was thrust into the caretaker role. It was
Speaker 3: mind blowing.
Speaker 4: I remember days later she was on the couch in
Speaker 4: this pretty much full body cast yelling at me, telling
Speaker 4: me how to scramble eggs. That's the first time I
Speaker 4: scrambled eggs because she didn't do it.
Speaker 3: Can you imagine scrambling eggs at two? It's hard to fathom.
Speaker 3: Kathy became more dependent on Tracy Riquel for other adult
Speaker 3: tasks as well.
Speaker 4: I was buying cigarettes for her when I was five, all.
Speaker 1: By yourself as a little kid. Why do you think
Speaker 1: she did that?
Speaker 6: Your electricity gets hut off or your water gets cut off,
Speaker 6: and you send your child to stand in line with
Speaker 6: a bunch of adults who are paying their bills because
Speaker 6: you don't have enough courage to stand in there and
Speaker 6: pay her and by bill.
Speaker 3: Kathy didn't want to stand in line because her bills
Speaker 3: were being paid late. That's why she sent her daughter
Speaker 3: to do it. I have this image of this little
Speaker 3: blonde child reaching up to a cashier with a money
Speaker 3: order and then asking, in a tiny voice, please can
Speaker 3: I have a pack of Virginia slims. It all feels absurd.
Speaker 3: As time went on, life presumed and nobody seemed to
Speaker 3: talk much about what happened to Matthew. He was just
Speaker 3: there one day and then he wasn't. A few years
Speaker 3: after Matthew died, Kathy and Jan had another son. He
Speaker 3: was named Jason. Tracy Raquel had a new younger brother,
Speaker 3: but another baby in the house did nothing to quell
Speaker 3: the violence.
Speaker 4: I guess chaotic people do chaotic things, so lots of
Speaker 4: violence and abuse. We would be settled somewhere from the
Speaker 4: time I was a little child, and he would just
Speaker 4: show up in the middle of the night and throw
Speaker 4: us on the street.
Speaker 1: Where would you guys go?
Speaker 4: We spent lots of time just sleeping on a park
Speaker 4: bench just wherever. One time, I think I was seven
Speaker 4: or so, he showed up in the middle of the
Speaker 4: night and beat the door down and beat her up
Speaker 4: really bad and took Jason.
Speaker 3: But Tracy Rikel could hardly look to her mom for comfort.
Speaker 4: Kathy was equally as bad as Jan, just in a
Speaker 4: different way.
Speaker 1: In what way.
Speaker 4: I was in the first grade and got gom in
Speaker 4: my hair. Her answer to that was just to shave
Speaker 4: my head and then send me to school.
Speaker 3: Wow, that story hit me in the gut. And when
Speaker 3: Tracy rou Kel first told me this, my thought was,
Speaker 3: didn't any nobody else notice or try to intervene?
Speaker 4: My aunt Jane is Kathy's older sister. She's the oldest
Speaker 4: of the five of them. It's my understanding that she
Speaker 4: and my grandfather tried very desperately to take me away
Speaker 4: from Kathy shortly after Matthew died. The system just wouldn't
Speaker 4: allow it. So I think you do what you can
Speaker 4: do when you can, and that's what they did.
Speaker 3: But her family was also fearful of offering shelter to Kathy.
Speaker 3: They believed Kathy would always take Jan back and they
Speaker 3: would put themselves in harms way for nothing. No one
Speaker 3: wanted to be on the receiving end of Jan's rage
Speaker 3: only to find Kathy back in the same situation days later.
Speaker 3: When Jan threw Kathy and the two kids on the street,
Speaker 3: she would take the kids two motels and then Jan
Speaker 3: would show up. It was a cycle. So as a child,
Speaker 3: Racy Riquel was basically homeless. Her life was completely erratic,
Speaker 3: going through her day avoiding what emotional or physical land
Speaker 3: mind she could step on. Next, her mother was beaten down, broken,
Speaker 3: and her dad well, there was another side to Jan
Speaker 3: Sandlin that I haven't shared yet. Her father was involved
Speaker 3: in criminal activity.
Speaker 4: He was connected to an organized crime group in the South.
Speaker 3: She was even a witness to some of it.
Speaker 4: I must before at the time, I remember all of
Speaker 4: these men being in this apartment living room and they
Speaker 4: were making a plan. There were guns everywhere, and they
Speaker 4: were getting ready to do something.
Speaker 3: Jan was focused on the task at hand, and when
Speaker 3: Kathy objected, Jan got her out of his way.
Speaker 4: They had a protest about something, and he locked her
Speaker 4: in a tiny little closet while they went and did
Speaker 4: their I don't know, robbery, whatever they were doing.
Speaker 1: How long was she stuck in there?
Speaker 4: She would be able to tell you how many hours
Speaker 4: she stayed in that closet, but a long time. And
Speaker 4: there was also this this Cab County police officer was
Speaker 4: murdered and Kathy said, yeah, he killed that police officer.
Speaker 4: She didn't even know his name.
Speaker 3: There were rumors that Jan was involved in the murder
Speaker 3: of the officer. Only twenty four years old. The young
Speaker 3: police officer had been shot execution style while working at
Speaker 3: a part time security job.
Speaker 4: But Kathy said, he killed that police officer. And then
Speaker 4: we drove to Alabama and through the gun in a light.
Speaker 3: I'll tell you more about his story later in the series.
Speaker 3: It seems like there was never a moment of stability.
Speaker 3: Tracy Riquel has vivid memories of Jan breaking into the
Speaker 3: house and kidnapping her and Jason as a way to
Speaker 3: get a Kathy. Jan had a special affinity for Jason
Speaker 3: because he knew for certain that Jason was his son.
Speaker 4: I believe that Jan is the personality type that's very primal.
Speaker 4: I only take care of my own, so to speak.
Speaker 3: In Jan's mind, Tracy Riquel's paternity was a little more
Speaker 3: dubious considering the overlapping relationships Kathy had with Jan and
Speaker 3: her first husband, Ted Golter. But Tracy Riquel was useful
Speaker 3: to Jan in one way, used her to look after
Speaker 3: her younger brother. She has a memory that plays almost
Speaker 3: like a short film in her mind. Jan had kidnapped
Speaker 3: her and her brother Jason.
Speaker 4: When it was time for Jason to take a nap.
Speaker 4: He would put us both in there and we would
Speaker 4: take a nap. And I had this little girl, and
Speaker 4: she knew what was going on. She knew that he
Speaker 4: had kidnapped us or taken us, that this was a
Speaker 4: violent situation.
Speaker 3: The little neighbor girl started coming to the bedroom window
Speaker 3: every day at lunchtime to try and help Tracey, Raquel
Speaker 3: and Jason escape.
Speaker 4: Then I would be like, Okay, I can do this.
Speaker 4: I can pick him up and hand him down there.
Speaker 1: Did you have a plan.
Speaker 4: This place was at the end of the decab airport
Speaker 4: and my uncle Steve worked at the airport.
Speaker 6: I just thought if I get him out, I could
Speaker 6: front him down this roadway and we'd be fought.
Speaker 4: But I was so afraid I was going to hurt him.
Speaker 3: She had already lost her younger brother, Matthew. She couldn't
Speaker 3: bear the thought of doing anything that would harm Jason.
Speaker 1: We tried every day for about two weeks, and then
Speaker 1: what happened.
Speaker 4: The police came one day. This nice police woman came
Speaker 4: and took my hand and he was arrested and off
Speaker 4: we went.
Speaker 3: It sounds like a disconnect, but here's what happened. The
Speaker 3: police showed up because justice had finally caught up with
Speaker 3: jam In the spring of nineteen eighty one, ten years
Speaker 3: after Jan and Kathy got together, he was going to prison.
Speaker 4: He drove to Panama City, committed armed robbery and a
Speaker 4: gas station or Comenius or something like that, and then
Speaker 4: got into a shootout on Panama City Beach with the
Speaker 4: Panama City Police Department, and then he was arrested and
Speaker 4: sentenced in Florida, and I understand it was like twenty
Speaker 4: five to life.
Speaker 3: He had done time for crimes like forgery and breaking
Speaker 3: and entering, but this conviction would be the one to
Speaker 3: put him out of their lives.
Speaker 4: I thought for sure everything was going to be great.
Speaker 3: Life would be great without jam.
Speaker 4: Sometimes you just don't see the forest for the trees.
Speaker 3: Kathy didn't physically abuse Tracy Riquel, but the relationship was broken. Dysfunctional.
Speaker 3: Kathy was a battered woman and couldn't see much beyond
Speaker 3: her own pain to offer any love or comfort to
Speaker 3: her daughter.
Speaker 4: When I was fourteen years old, I was very ill
Speaker 4: and ended up in the hospital and they diagnosed me
Speaker 4: with a seizure disorder.
Speaker 1: I was just done. What did you mean you were done?
Speaker 4: There was no way out, There's nowhere to go. I
Speaker 4: just really didn't want to be in that environment. I
Speaker 4: didn't know how to get out. There was just not help.
Speaker 3: So she saved thirty days of a medication tagridol, an
Speaker 3: anti convulsivet drug, and she took it all at once.
Speaker 4: At the time, I thought I'd be with Matthew or
Speaker 4: I'd be in some better place. Seems kind of hokey now,
Speaker 4: but at the time seemed like there was probably something
Speaker 4: far better than what was going on.
Speaker 3: She figured a month's worth of the tablets would have
Speaker 3: been enough to kill her, and it should have.
Speaker 4: I woke up to Kathy standing over me, shaking my face, saying,
Speaker 4: oh my god, what have you done now?
Speaker 3: That is not the reaction you'd expect from a mother
Speaker 3: who just discovered her daughter had attempted suicide.
Speaker 4: And all I could think was, Wow, I'm really still here.
Speaker 3: It's remarkable that she survived. Maybe it was luck, maybe
Speaker 3: it was fate. Perhaps she was destined for a greater purpose.
Speaker 3: There was a lot of wrong int Tracy Raquel's childhood,
Speaker 3: enough to break anyone, but for Tercy Raquel, her upbringing
Speaker 3: only instilled a strong sense of right and wrong, and
Speaker 3: something with those medical records did not seem right.
Speaker 2: It stays child was thrown from krib by sister.
Speaker 4: Rather than just looking at my own abuse and suffering,
Speaker 4: I took on this wholeful thing, and I'm going to
Speaker 4: find out what happened to Matthew.
Speaker 3: On the next episode. A Burden of Guilt, Tracy Raquel
Speaker 3: persuades an investigator to look into Matthew's debt.
Speaker 4: In someone of great important just the child that died.
Speaker 7: It's terrible, yeah, but why would I take it?
Speaker 4: But Tracy says some things did intrigued.
Speaker 3: Me, and later this season, there's.
Speaker 6: No way in hell that this child died from being
Speaker 6: pushed out of a crib.
Speaker 3: I'm Nancy Glass. That's all coming up on Burden of Guilt.
Speaker 3: Stay tuned for Burden of Guilt, the documentary coming in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty four and airing only on Paramount Plus. If
Speaker 3: you would like to reach out to the Burden of
Speaker 3: Guilt team, email us at Burden of Guiltpod at gmail
Speaker 3: dot com. That's Burden of Guilt Pod at gmail dot com.
Speaker 3: If you or someone you know is worried about maltreatment
Speaker 3: or suspect that a child is being abused or neglected,
Speaker 3: call the Child Help National child Abuse Hotline. You can
Speaker 3: call or text one eight hundred four a child. That's
Speaker 3: one eight hundred four two two four four five three.
Speaker 3: One way to show support is by subscribing to our
Speaker 3: show on Apple Podcasts and don't forget to rate and
Speaker 3: review Burden of Guilt five star reviews, go a long way,
Speaker 3: A big thank you to all of you who are listening,
Speaker 3: and also be sure to check us out and follow
Speaker 3: us on Instagram at Glass Podcasts. Burden of Guilt is
Speaker 3: a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group,
Speaker 3: in partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show is hosted and
Speaker 3: executive produced by me Nancy Glass, written and produced by
Speaker 3: Carrie Hartman and Andrea Gunning, also produced by Ben Fetterman
Speaker 3: and associate producer Kristin Melchiori. Our iHeart team is Ali
Speaker 3: Perry and Jessica Crincheck. Special thanks to Tracy Riquel Burns
Speaker 3: and her husband Bart. Audio editing and mixing by Matt Delvecchio.
Speaker 3: Burden of Guilt's theme composed by Oliver Baines. Music library
Speaker 3: provided by my Music and For more podcasts from iHeart,
Speaker 3: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
Speaker 3: your podcasts. Stay tuned for Burden of Guilt, the documentary,
Speaker 3: coming in twenty twenty four and airing only on Paramount Plus.