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Dr. Drew
Craigslist Murder, Beheading & Suicide
Aired August 05, 2014 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. DREW PINSKY, HLN HOST (voice-over): Tonight, the Craigslist killings. Inside the home of this man -- police call it a hellish environment, where
he may have kept a pregnant woman captive before strangling her.
Plus, the sex spreadsheet. A husband tracks his wife`s yeses and nos, and she posts it online. Whose side are you on?
Let`s get started.
(MUSIC)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Welcome. My co-host is Sam Schacher.
And coming up: a mom charged with killing her 4-year-old. Police say she may have been jealous of her own daughter.
SAM SCHACHER, CO-HOST: Yes. And details are beyond upsetting, Dr. Drew. We`ll hear from the father, tonight.
PINSKY: Stuffed in the trunk. Just a tragedy.
But first, a pregnant teen and her boyfriend turn to Craigslist -- always smart -- for a sex hookup. The man they met suspected of their gruesome
murders, he`s dead as well. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That girl, 8 months pregnant, 18 years old, ends up dead. Her boyfriend, dead as well.
PINSKY: Did this man murder a pregnant woman, behead her boyfriend, and then kill himself? Police say they met on Craigslist for sex.
The father of my child and I are sort of involved in this weird, open relationship.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Twenty-five-year-old Charles Oppenneer was the first to be found.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don`t know what trauma was caused, because after he was murdered, his head was removed by the suspect.
PINSKY: Police say Brooke Slocum was strangled, her unborn child obviously dead.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to grieve, and I really do grieve for the father of this girl.
GREG SLOCUM: I never gave up, until the police came to my daughter and told me the bad news.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But these two individuals went seeking on Craigslist danger and something strange.
PINSKY: And something strange. They believed the boyfriend probably had head trauma, but obviously, they can`t tell for sure until they find his
head!
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PINSKY: And the head is still missing. We will talk about that in just a second.
Joining us, Evy Poumpouras.
Welcome back, Evy. It`s good to have you again. Former special agent, Secret Service.
Michelle Fields, correspondent for PJ Media, Vanessa Barnett, social commentator, host of HipHollywood.com.
And on the phone, I`ve got Randolph Beasley. He`s a forensic crime scene investigator.
Randolph, there`s no head, there`s a body that does not have any signs of trauma. Help me understand how there`s no cause of death. Decapitation is
the cause of death. What do they mean, they think it`s head trauma?
RANDOLPH BEASLEY, FORENSIC EXPERT (via telephone): Actually, Dr. Drew, it`s just not determined yet. It`s not uncommon for a situation like this
where you do not have all the pieces, literally, of the crime, and if it`s -- the head is missing, it`s undetermined.
PINSKY: Well, Randolph, they were speculating head trauma, though. And my question was -- all right, well, cause of death is at least decapitation.
Why would they assume head trauma? Is that sort of a common thing that criminals do when they bash someone`s head in, they take the head off?
BEASLEY: No, usually, my experience, no head would be no dental records, which would mean no quick identification of a body, if they were getting
rid of the body.
PINSKY: I see.
SCHACHER: Wow.
BEASLEY: That`s what that usually comes down to.
PINSKY: So this was a practical issue, practical, so to speak, for a criminal to try to slow the process down. This is before, obviously, he
killed himself.
Thank you, thank you, sir. I appreciate those thoughts.
Evy, how do you put this thing together?
EVY POUMPOURAS, SECURITY EXPERT: Well, let me say this regarding the no head, no body incident. There`s also the aspect of -- there are many
incidents where we`ve had killers decapitate their victims and keep their heads as trophies.
PINSKY: Oh, Evy, you had to go to the worst-case scenario always. That`s disgusting!
POUMPOURAS: I`m just relaying -- I`m just relaying though the actual factual accounts that do exist with certain serial killers. We have
Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy who did decapitate their victims and keep them for trophies, in addition of the possibility for it being maybe possibly
for dental records.
PINSKY: How about the fact that these two, Michelle, went out looking for somebody online. And they ended up dead, but who do you blame for this.
MICHELLE FIELDS, PJ MEDIA: I don`t like blaming the victims, but come on, how stupid can you be? Why are you looking to have sex with people off of
Craigslist? If you are putting up an ad for you to find someone to have sex with you and your 8 months pregnant girlfriend, do you think it`s going
to be some nice, normal person?
No, it`s going to be a creepy person who chops off your head! Those are the people who are looking for sex with you and your pregnant girlfriend!
SCHACHER: Wow!
PINSKY: Samantha?
SCHACHER: Yes, I don`t think there are any normal person who go on to these personals. In my opinion, it`s become a breeding ground of
pedophilia and prostitution. And I don`t want to blame these victims here, because I do think they must have been in a very desperate situation -- at
least she must have been, to pimp herself out when she`s 8 months pregnant. That`s really sad to me.
VANESSA BARNETT, SOCIAL COMMENTATOR: But no one sounds like they`re actually really sad about this. Michelle just called the victims stupid,
and I am disgusted that we are missing the point.
FIELDS: The decisions they made were stupid.
BARNETT: Stupid decisions, but you don`t deserve to die. I can run around naked all day long in the fields, but no one gets the right to kill me.
That`s ridiculous that you would call them stupid. They`re victims.
FIELDS: Of course!
BARNETT: Leave it as such. We need to be focused on the criminal here. He is deranged. He beheaded someone.
FIELDS: But we also have to point out their stupidity --
BARNETT: We don`t have to. You have to --
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: Hold on!
We`re talking over each other and I can`t hear you. I`m going to get Evy to solve this for us.
What do you want to say, Evy?
POUMPOURAS: If I can just step in one for moment, I understand both perspectives, but there is a study within criminology where they do look at
the victims` behavior and it`s actually called victimology. What did the victim do to in some way bring or provoke the offender?
PINSKY: To put themselves in that position.
POUMPOURAS: What did they do? What was in their behavior?
PINSKY: Right, we can learn something from that.
Let me -- can you guys move ahead to Jason Ellis` comments. Do we have that up there?
We did an after show in and in that after show, last night, we had discussions about this particular crime, and Jason Ellis shared a theory
about the motive behind the murder and, Vanessa, I`ll get your reaction to it.
Play that, please.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JASON ELLIS: It`s I want money for drugs is what it is. You get the guy with some money (ph) and then he pays and then you two go and do stuff with
the money.
I mean, you can Google it, but I don`t believe there`s a guy that has an addiction to (EXPLETIVE DELETED) people have sex with his pregnant wife. I
believe it`s -- we`re pregnant and we need more money to get high.
PINSKY: What about the murder, then? What motivated that?
ELLIS: It`s who`s dumb enough, I`m a murderer, I`m looking to take somebody out. Let`s go to Craigslist, because there`s desperate people on
there.
PINSKY: All disturbed brains coming up with disturbed stories.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Vanessa, what do you say?
He`s saying it`s about drug addiction and desperation.
BARNETT: I completely disagree. Look, we know that this victim went to Craigslist. We know that she was in an open relationship with a very open
sexual lifestyle, but this was a child. She was 18 years old. This is not an adult who was making adult decisions.
I`m not saying this decision was her smartest move, but I`m not going to focus on the fact that she made a bad choice, because she doesn`t deserve
to die because of it. This girl was --
PINSKY: It`s about murder.
BARNETT: This girl was troubled with the divorce of her parents. This girl was going through a lot. And we`re bashing her. We need to be mad at
this killer.
SCHACHER: How do you prevent this from happening to other people, though, Vanessa?
BARNETT: We don`t know all the psychopaths in the world.
SCHACHER: Money was exchange.
BARNETT: But we know people that sit in their homes and don`t do anything but still die because of burglar walking and we can`t predict the minds of
crazy people by bashing the victims.
PINSKY: Thank you, Vanessa.
Michelle, I`ve got to get out of this in just a second.
But let me ask you this, the father -- her father felt that the perpetrator, the reason she was in the victim position was because of the
boyfriend. She was doing anything to hold on to him, to retain what she thought was his love. And isn`t that really what went wrong here? This
woman was really subjugating --
FIELDS: Well, I don`t know --
PINSKY: Go ahead.
FIELDS: Because they said, what I read was that she had a history of going online to find men. So, I don`t know if it was just this one incident. It
sounds like she had a problem, where she liked to go online to find love.
PINSKY: Maybe.
FIELDS: And the reason why I point this out is because we need to show people that this is stupid and they should stop doing it.
PINSKY: Evy, last word.
POUMPOURAS: I just want to ask Michelle something.
Michelle, you said this girl doesn`t deserve to die. But can I ask you this? Does anybody really deserve to die in any situation, regardless of
what the situation is?
FIELDS: Of course not, of course not. But we should learn from the situation.
PINSKY: Agreed.
Behavior bureau is here next.
And later, the sex spreadsheet. A husband tracks his attempts at sexual encounters with his wife. Including the time she said, no, and what her
excuses were. On a spreadsheet! And she posts it on social media. Fantastic!
Vanessa seems to be laughing. Maybe Vanessa is running through the fields naked again. Still trying to get that out of my mind.
We`ll be right back after this.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Brooke Slocum, eight months pregnant when police discovered her body in the trunk of a car.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why is a girl who is eight months pregnant looking for a threesome on Craigslist?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is not the first time that she`s been soliciting sex online.
PINSKY: Is it true your daughter did have a history of meeting people online?
SLOCUM: Yes, she did. She has met men online, looking for love. But all she really found was that it made her feel cheap, dirty, and used.
And love is not manipulation. Love is unconditional. And she realized that. And she didn`t want to do it anymore.
But she also wants to stay with the man who`s the father of her child, and she would do whatever it took to do that, even if it meant sacrificing
herself in this sort of manner.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Back with Sam and the behavior bureau. Evy Poumpouras, Erica America, psychotherapist and Z100 Radio personality, Leeann Tweeden, social
commentator, host of "Tomboy`s Podcast" on Blog Talk Radio.
Brooke Slocum`s father believes she was manipulated by her boyfriend to seek out this sex on Craigslist. Police say the man the couple met
decapitated this boyfriend, then strangled her. Later, the suspect committed suicide.
Leeann, what are your thoughts on this one?
LEEANN TWEEDEN, SOCIAL COMMENTATOR: Well, you know, Dr. Drew. Anytime that you`re looking for sex online -- I mean, there`s obviously something
wrong. Why would you go for that? When you were talking to the father, he knew that his 18-year-old daughter, who was eight months pregnant with her
boyfriend, knew that she was soliciting sex online through Craigslist.
I mean, right there, doesn`t that tell you something`s off? Something`s completely dysfunctional within this girl. And if she kept doing it,
looking for love, because she said, oh, her parents got divorced and she had a hard childhood, she was bullied.
I was bullied. My parents divorced when they were 8. I`m not looking for sex on Craigslist. What do you think is going to happen?
I mean, I don`t want to say anything. They`re both dead and that`s sad and the baby is dead, let`s not forget about the third casualty in this.
PINSKY: Right. There`s a third casualty.
TWEEDEN: But it`s like, what are they thinking? When nothing good is coming out of that.
PINSKY: That`s right.
Evy, from a victimology standpoint, can we understand that 18-year-old`s behavior?
POUMPOURAS: I mean, you see this pattern of behavior. I do agree with Leeann, because there`s a pattern of behavior where she`s been doing this
previous to the boyfriend, so I don`t necessarily agree with the father, although I grieve for him. But this is something in her pattern of
behavior. She`s looking for attention --
PINSKY: And in no way am I --
POUMPOURAS: -- all the wrong things.
PINSKY: And in no way am I blaming bullying. Bullying didn`t help things, but that is in no way the cause of this thing.
ERICA AMERICA, Z100 RADIO: Right, right.
PINSKY: Erica, do you want to comment on that?
AMERICA: Yes, sure. Yes. I mean, of course, we want to see, what can we learn from this situation? It was high-risk behavior to be involved in.
And we want to tell people, you have to be careful in meeting anyone involved, whether there`s money involved, money for sex, or on a dating Web
site. You have to be very careful.
But then, at the same time, it`s the randomness --
PINSKY: Erica, I have to stop you. If you`re exchanging money for sex with somebody you met online, there`s a problem --
SCHACHER: A serious problem.
AMERICA: No, no, there`s a problem --
PINSKY: More than just be careful. That`s not OK.
AMERICA: But that`s an entirely different topic. That`s wondering why are prostitutes prostitutes? I mean, that`s completely different.
PINSKY: Right, right.
AMERICA: The fact of the matter is, she shouldn`t be doing it, but she got linked up with somebody who had an obsessive fetish, that was obviously
maybe a personality disorder as well. And he killed them.
PINSKY: Or desperation, or there was drugs and they needed money, that`s what Jason Ellis was saying.
TWEEDEN: Or looking for money for rent. It sounded like they were looking for a new place to live and they`re having those problems.
PINSKY: I asked his father why his daughter was attracted to bad relationships, here`s what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SLOCUM: It starts with bullying in school, being judged, being picked on, and you know, it causes such self-esteem problem, especially in young
girls, when they don`t feel pretty or don`t feel loved. And they want the kind of love that a father can`t give them. And they look elsewhere for
it. When they`re neglected and picked on.
And right there is the ultimate start of why these girls get on the Internet, searching for other things.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: I don`t know about bullying --
TWEEDEN: I don`t believe that.
PINSKY: To me, there`s something that set up the bullying, Sam.
SCHACHER: Right. Well, not only that, Dr. Drew, she is 18. This boyfriend was in his late 20s, and he is actually the one who was arranging
these arrangements through Craigslist and then sitting by and just watching, and then collecting money.
So, he was, essentially, also acting like her pimp. And I think that`s where she was seeking the wrong relationship. Not necessarily on
Craigslist, but online, meaning Facebook. That`s where she met the boyfriend.
So I think people are getting confused between like her Facebook contacts and then the Craigslist, which I think was completely done by the
boyfriend.
PINSKY: Right. Now, following the suicide of the suspect, the police recovered restraints, knives, dozens of firearms, ammunition in his home.
He also reportedly held this 18-year-old girl captive before killing her, and take a look at this photo from his Facebook page. He is holding a baby
there, of course, there`s a handgun there.
We`re zeroing in on it. But if you look off to the right, there was a handgun.
Evy, last thoughts on this case?
POUMPOURAS: This is another situation where we`re dealing with weapons. Again, how did the guns get into the hands of individuals who are not
mentally and emotionally stable? This is a problem you`ve got. I mean, look at the irony of this photo. You`ve got a baby on one side and a
weapon on the other. What does this tell you?
PINSKY: It tells me this guy is ruptured in many ways. Yes, this is not a good situation. And, again, I wonder what we`re going to find out about
this guy.
We`ve got to go.
Next up, a terrible story next. A child`s head bashed in, the body stuffed into a garbage bag and then found in the trunk of a car. Police say her
own mother perpetrated this.
And later, is someone keeping score in the bedroom? One woman`s husband, in fact, was. There is his spreadsheet. She put it on Reddit.
Back after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This young girl`s life is over.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who would kill their baby? Who would kill their baby?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Four-year-old Victoria Wyatt`s shoes and toys sit in a room, never to be used again. The child`s mother, Stacy Parsons, was
arrested when she told police she had killed Victoria at one location, before bringing the body back to the family home.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Something told me to open the trunk, and there she was. In a little plastic bag, you know, with dirt. And I saw her little leg
hanging out of that bag.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When they pulled the child`s body from the trunk and attempted CPR, water came out, indicating to them, she may have been
drowned. The child`s father says the night before, he told Parsons he wanted a divorce.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Told me, if I`d leave her, that she would kill the baby. I never for a minute thought she would actually do it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Back with Sam, Michelle, Vanessa.
And joining us for the first time here DR. DREW ON CALL, is Leila Ali, TV host, fitness and wellness expert, and world champion boxer.
And, Leila, I brought you here today to separate Michelle and Vanessa should they begin to get into it again. So, I`ll be looking to you for a
little bit of refereeing.
LEILA ALI, TV HOST: OK, no problem.
PINSKY: Father of that 4-year-old girl you saw there says the girl`s mother killed the child he reportedly said out of jealousy. The county
sheriff confirmed to us that the young mother is in jail tonight. No other children in the home -- thank God.
And, Vanessa, you cautioned to us reserve judgment on the hot car death. What do you say about this one?
BARNETT: This situation, for me, is just a little bit different --
PINSKY: A little bit?
BARNETT: Yes, she did -- she confessed. So, there`s no issue about whether or not she did this.
Now, what we`re now looking at, was there a way to prevent it. I know that this father said several times that she was verbally abusive to this
daughter, 24/7, that she disliked the child, that she was just angry all the time.
And I`m just wondering as a parent, if I saw another person, whether it was another parent or not, being that way to my child, those are red flags. I
stop it right there. There`s no way that anyone is going to treat my child like crap for a minute, let alone for her entire life.
PINSKY: And the father, Leila, the father gave me creeps there in that video we saw. I don`t want to be too harsh on him, because we don`t know
the context of that video, but you`ve got to wonder what his role was in this.
ALI: You know, I was definitely disturbed by this story. And I did notice his demeanor. You know, I was surprised that he would be able to stand
there and have that composure, the same morning that he found out that his wife killed his daughter.
PINSKY: Right.
ALI: And another thing that disturbed me about the story is that he said, that she had said before, that she would kill her daughter instead of --
and go to jail for the rest of his life instead of be with him. But now he`s saying now, he said if he would leave her, she was going to kill the
daughter.
So, I`m a little confused. I think there`s more to this story. And I wouldn`t be surprised. They have a dysfunctional relationship for sure.
PINSKY: I agree. I think there`s more to the story.
Samantha?
SCHACHER: Yes, if your husband or wife threatens to kill your child, that is your red flag to call the police --
PINSKY: Oh, by the way --
SCHACHER: -- and get the hell out of there. Yes.
PINSKY: By the way, what worse could the mom say than, I`m going to kill the kid?
SCHACHER: It`s unbelievable to me. This definitely could have been prevented in my book. It`s crazy!
PINSKY: Now, Michelle, I`m interested to hear who you say is the stupid -- you like to use the word "stupid" a lot. So, is there a stupid person in
this one?
FIELDS: Well, no, I would say there is just an evil person. And that is the mother.
And, you know, I get the impression that maybe she never actually wanted a child. Maybe this was an opportunity for her to trap this guy and she
never actually wanted or liked the child. And now that the husband was going to leave her, that she wanted to just get rid of the child and also
get payback to her husband for leaving her.
PINSKY: Vanessa?
FIELDS: But who knows, the point is the woman is evil.
PINSKY: Vanessa?
BARNETT: But is she just evil? Do we need to then -- Dr. Drew, you`re all about mental health. So, do we need to look at her mental health?
PINSKY: Yes.
BARNETT: She was adopted, had a horrible relationship with her birth mother. We don`t know if something there -- the adoptive mother says that
there was something really bad happening in that household when she was with her biological mother. Is there something there we should be looking
at?
PINSKY: But sometimes environment -- you see, I think we all use -- we should mince our words. In other words, evil or a psychopathy, or
sociopathy, those are the same thing in my head, different words described in the same thing. And the way you get to evil, sometimes, you can be born
that way or sometimes you got horrible environmental stressors that make you that way.
Either way, I agree with Michelle, there`s some evil stuff, but I also sniff drug -- it smells of drug addiction to me, the kind of detached
quality of this, the confusional state that she seemed the to be in when she did this -- all of a sudden, too, by the way. It wasn`t like she was
in a postpartum psychosis -- and by the way, the child was 4 years old.
FIELDS: But there are people who do drugs that don`t kill their kids.
SCHACHER: Yes.
PINSKY: I`m not saying it`s the cause, I`m saying I think that`s part of the mix here.
SCHACHER: But it wasn`t all of a sudden, Dr. Drew. It was the day after he said, we`re going to get into a divorce.
PINSKY: But what I`m saying is --
SCHACHER: It`s pure vengeance.
PINSKY: I agree with you. I don`t disagree with any of this. We all are mincing our words again.
But I`m saying that it wasn`t like she was in a confusional state the day before, but when the father opened the trunk and confronted the mom, she
was walking around in a confused state. She was out of it completely. What was that all about?
The mom`s attorney told us he got the case yesterday, has not met this woman yet, but sent us a statement that read in part, quote, "In this world
of social media and instant communications, public opinion can affect a person`s basic right to a fair trial. I ask that the tragedy not be
compounded by pre-judging this woman."
Michelle? Michelle, give her a chance to not pre-judge.
FIELDS: We absolutely can pre-judge. She killed her child!
SCHACHER: Thank you!
FIELDS: We absolutely should judge this woman.
PINSKY: Yes, I agree. We don`t need to know more than that.
BARNETT: But don`t we need to do more research? Like, yes, she`s guilty!
(CROSSTALK)
BARNETT: I see that. We all know that. She said that. We get that point.
But let`s take it further. You just said in the last block that we need to understand how we can prevent these things. Where do we go from here?
PINSKY: Vanessa, I`m all about it.
But also, Michelle, there`s different kinds of murder, right? You have to understand they`re going to find out what kind, was it premeditated, was it
extenuating circumstances, that exists in the law, Michelle, I`m sorry. They don`t just have "evil murderer," they don`t have that category.
FIELDS: OK, if you have to decide if this woman is awful or not, I think it`s safe to judge her and agree she`s an awful person.
PINSKY: I agree. Leila, last words?
ALI: I definitely think that both of these parents need to be judged, because there`s a child here who`s dead. And I think that anybody who --
when someone shows you who they are, you need to believe it. So when she first started telling her husband she would kill that child, he should have
taken that baby and run.
PINSKY: Here we go.
Next, we`re going to hear more from the murdered girl`s father.
And later, the sex spreadsheet that has gone viral. We will show what one husband mailed to his wife and then she put it up on social media.
Back after this.
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