The Appalachian mountains have a rich history and are infamous for containing things that go bump in the night. In this episode, we discuss “The Mimic.”

Before he became one of America's most infamous suspects, Robert Durst was the eccentric son of a New York real estate dynasty. In this first installment of our three-part series, we explore the 1982 disappearance of his wife Kathie Durst, the 2000 execution-style murder of his best friend Susan Berman, and Robert's flight to Galveston, Texas, where he lived disguised as a mute woman.

What connects these deaths? And who is the dismembered neighbor whose body parts washed up in Galveston Bay?

In 1983, Tracey Thurman did everything she was supposed to do. She reported threats from her estranged husband, Charles “Buck” Thurman, sought restraining orders, and pleaded for help. Police refused to act—until a brutal attack shocked the nation and reshaped how the law handles domestic violence.

In 1971, a man calling himself Dan Cooper boarded a flight out of Portland, handed a note to a flight attendant, and calmly claimed he had a bomb. What followed became one of the most famous hijackings in American history — a ransom drop, a midnight parachute jump into rough wilderness, and a suspect who vanished without a trace.

Over the next five decades, theories multiplied, evidence surfaced and disappeared, and a mysterious bundle of cash washed up along the Columbia River. Despite one of the longest and most exhaustive investigations the FBI ever launched, the true identity — and fate — of D.B. Cooper remains one of the country’s most enduring unsolved mysteries.

The horrors inside the Knotek home escalate as Shelly’s cruelty consumes everyone around her—family, friends, and anyone who dares to care. In Part 2, Marina covers the final years of Shelly’s reign of abuse and the shocking truth that finally brought it all to light.

From the outside, the Knotek home looked ordinary, just another farmhouse tucked behind the trees on the Washington coast. Inside, though, things were different. Part I traces Shelly Knotek’s path from troubled daughter to abusive wife and mother, as her control and cruelty escalate—ending with the death of family friend Kathy Loreno.

In the fall of 1982, a wave of sudden deaths swept through the Chicago area — healthy people collapsing just hours after taking Extra Strength Tylenol. As panic spread, shelves were cleared, public trust shattered, and investigators raced to find out who had poisoned one of America’s most trusted products.

In 1987, a 911 call from a Philadelphia payphone led police to a row house on North Marshall Street—and to horrors they could barely comprehend. Women chained in a basement. Human remains in the freezer. A pot boiling on the stove. At the center of it all was Gary Heidnik, a preacher and self-styled investor whose neighbors thought he was eccentric but harmless. In this episode, we unravel Heidnik’s disturbing childhood, his twisted church, the pit in his basement, and the crimes that made him one of the most notorious killers in American history.

In September 1989, Annamaria Phelps and Daniel Lauer set out on what should have been a short drive. Days later, their car turned up miles off course, and their bodies were discovered in the woods nearby. Their murders added new complexity to the string of Colonial Parkway cases and shifted how investigators viewed the pattern. This episode explores the final couple connected to the parkway, the evolving investigation, and the many theories that have surrounded the case ever since.

Between 1986 and 1989, four young couples were killed along Virginia’s Colonial Parkway. Isolated turnouts and quiet overlooks became crime scenes, and investigators struggled to connect the cases.

In this first part, we look at the early victims, their lives, and how the investigation began to take shape.