Dawn of Mantis: True Crime, Mysteries and More

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January 18th of this year, then 25 year old Joshua Graham-Caskey abruptly left his home in Winterset, Iowa and drove nearly 600 miles south to Mena, Arkansas. Since being spotted on an ExxonMobil gas station security camera in Mena, only unverified eyewitness sightings of him remain. 

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In the second and final part of our series on Mary Ann Cotton, we cover her third and fourth marriages, the many more suspicious deaths that occurred in her presence, and finally her capture, trial and execution. 

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Lots of people seemed to get sick and die when Mary Ann Cotton was around. Over the course of twenty years, several of her husbands, most of her thirteen children, and even her mother and best friend died in Mary Ann's presence. Finally, in the early 1870s, someone became suspicious enough to investigate a few of the many deaths associated with her. In this episode, we cover Mary Ann's early life, her first two marriages and her foray into murder. 

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In this episode, we cover the strange case of Zona Heaster Shue, who died suddenly in early 1897, just three months after marrying a blacksmith named Erasmus Shue. Her death was initially ruled as "natural", but in the weeks following her funeral, Zona's heart broken mother claimed to have been visited by the ghost of her dead daughter. She further claimed that Zona's spirit had told her she had not died of natural causes, but had been murdered by her new husband. 

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In this episode, we cover the cases of Christine Skubish and Jackie Poole- two women who died in very different circumstances, but share one thing in common- both of their cases were solved after someone supposedly witnessed their ghosts. 

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In the summer of 2020, 53 year old Sandra Hughes went on a solo camping trip in California's Sierra National Forest. Days later, her campsite was found abandoned and her car was discovered in the bottom of a ravine. Strangely enough, there were several sightings of her throughout the park over the following month, looking lost and disheveled. However, none of the people who saw her realized she was a missing person. She eventually disappeared, and has not been seen since.  

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In this episode we cover the absolutely bizarre case of Julie Mott, who quite literally disappeared from her own funeral in 2015 and has not been seen since. 

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We've all heard the children's nursery rhyme, but several years ago an urban legend began alleging that back in the 16th century, an actual muffin man had moonlighted as a serial killer. In this episode,  we cover the history of the song and examine whether or not there was ever a real life "Muffin Man Murderer". 

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John Thurman McCool was a successful entrepreneur and business man who lived and worked in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. After serving a brief prison sentence for fraud in the late 1950s, he was found shot to death in his car, and the killer has never been identified. (Episode Content Begins @ 8:30) 

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In this second and final episode on the disappearance of Jason Jolkowski, we cover the police investigation and end by discussing the various theories as to what could have possibly happened to Jason.  (Subject Matter Begins @ 5:42)

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