Hidden Killers With Tony Brueski | True Crime News & Commentary

By True Crime TodayNews True Crime News Commentary

Favorites
406
Followers
Typical duration
27 min
per episode
If it hooks
65%
finish an episode

Based on Podcast App listening data

Hidden Killers With Tony Brueski | True Crime News & Commentary episodes

March 30 Before the Duggars: The Man Who Built the Machine They Called Faith
Bill Gothard built one of the most influential fundamentalist Christian organizations in American history without a single credential to his name. Never ordained. Never married. No theological degree. Just a system — and the certainty to sell it.
The Institute in Basic Life Principles reached millions of families through the 1970s, 80s, and beyond. Governors endorsed him. Senators sat on his board. And the Duggar family attended their first IBLP seminar in 1985 and called it life-changing. They would spend the next three decades as the organization's most visible advertisement.
In Part 1 of Hidden Killers' five-part Duggar series, Tony Brueski builds the foundation — examining IBLP's doctrine of total male authority, the ATI homeschooling program that isolated children from outside institutions, and the theological framework that made reporting abuse virtually impossible from within.
More than thirty women came forward accusing Gothard of sexual harassment and abuse. Gothard has denied every allegation. A civil lawsuit filed in 2016 was dismissed in 2018 on statute of limitations grounds. No criminal charges have ever been brought.
He is 91 years old. Still running Embassy University from his childhood home. Still online.
Before the molestation. Before the trial. Before the arrest that happened this week. This is the machine — and this is how it worked.
This is Part 1 of 5.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#BillGothard #IBLP #DuggarFamily #TrueCrime #HiddenKillers #CultExposed #ReligiousAbuse #ATI #DuggarFamilySecrets #19KidsAndCounting
12 min
March 30 Joseph Duggar: Two Brothers, One House, One Pattern of Abuse
The arrest affidavit is specific. During a family vacation to Panama City Beach, Florida, Joseph Duggar allegedly molested a child multiple times. She was 9 years old. She's now 14. When her father confronted Duggar this month, Duggar allegedly admitted to it. When Tontitown police had the father call again with a detective on the line — Duggar allegedly admitted again.
He was arrested March 18 in Tontitown, Arkansas. He waived extradition. He's heading to Bay County, Florida, to face charges of lewd and lascivious behavior on a child under 12.
His wife Kendra was arrested the same day — four counts of second-degree endangering the welfare of a minor and four counts of second-degree false imprisonment in Arkansas. The counts match the number of children in their home. Reports suggest the charges stem from conditions found during a home inspection.
This family spent years on national television. Their home was documented. Their faith was spotlighted. And now a second brother from that household stands accused of child sexual abuse — with his older brother Josh Duggar already serving a federal sentence for crimes involving child sexual abuse material.
Two brothers. Same upbringing. Same household doctrine. The same silence — until the legal system finally forced its way in.
Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer brings investigative and behavioral context to a case that is about far more than one man's charges. What does this pattern say about what was happening inside that house? What does a closed system built on absolute authority and required silence do to children who grow up inside it? And what would it actually take for investigators to look harder?
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#JosephDuggar #KendraDuggar #DuggarFamily #TrueCrime #JenniferCoffindaffer
14 min
March 30 Rex Heuermann: The Evidence That Finally Ended It
For nearly three years, Rex Heuermann said not guilty. Seven women. Seven charges. Every time, not guilty.
According to multiple sources confirmed by the Associated Press, NBC, CNN, and Fox News, that is expected to change on April 8. He's expected to plead guilty to all seven Gilgo Beach murders and accept life without the possibility of parole. The families have been called. The September trial is almost certainly over before it started.
I've been covering this case for a long time, and I want to walk you through everything — not just the plea, but the evidence that made it inevitable and the story behind the story that most coverage is moving past too quickly.
A pizza crust pulled from a Manhattan trash can cracked this open. A murder manual — Microsoft Word document, all capitals, sections titled "Body Prep" and "Post Event," created in 2000, updated for years, recovered after he tried to delete it — left the DA saying he'd never seen anything like it in his career. Fake identities. Burner phones registered under "Andrew Roberts" and "Thomas Hawk." A Tinder account under those aliases. More than 500 contacts to sex workers, reaching out to at least 60 women. One of those phones was in his pocket when they arrested him. And according to prosecutors, he kept making those contacts even after investigators had already identified him as a suspect.
From that same Gmail account, he allegedly searched the Gilgo Beach investigation over 100 times — including, per court documents: "Why hasn't the Long Island serial killer been caught." He was tracking the case from inside his own home while his family slept upstairs.
His daughter Victoria says she believes her father most likely did it. His ex-wife called him her hero. DNA linked to both of them was found on five of seven victims — transferred through ordinary household objects, without their knowledge. And when they arrested him and mentioned his $6,000 watch wasn't in his property, his response was: "I guess I won't be needing that."
A guilty plea closes the legal chapter. What it doesn't close is a lot harder to name. This episode covers all of it.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#RexHeuermann #GilgoBeach #LongIslandSerialKiller #TrueCrime #GuiltyPlea #SerialKiller #HiddenKillers #GilgoFour #ColdCase #LISKcase
29 min
March 30 Lindsay Clancy: A Father Came Home to This
He came home with dinner. She was in the backyard. The children were in the basement.
Part 1 of our five-part series on the Lindsay Clancy case begins exactly where the story begins — the night of January 24th, 2023 in Duxbury, Massachusetts — and doesn't let you leave until you understand why four more chapters are necessary to tell it right.
Cora was five. Dawson was three. Callan was eight months old. Lindsay Clancy, a labor and delivery nurse at one of the most respected hospitals in the country, allegedly strangled all three children with exercise bands before attempting to take her own life. She survived. She has been paralyzed from the chest down ever since, held at Tewksbury State Hospital while her case moves toward trial.
She has pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors allege she planned every detail of that night with deliberate intent. Her defense maintains she was in a state of active psychosis, hearing command hallucinations she could not control — the result of a serious illness the medical system allegedly failed to identify or treat. Those two arguments will go to trial in July 2026.
In the days immediately after the deaths, Patrick Clancy released a public statement forgiving his wife. That one decision — that choice — split the country and launched a debate that still hasn't settled. This is where it started.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#LindsayClancy #HiddenKillers #TrueCrime #DuxburyMurder #PostpartumPsychosis #PatrickClancy #MaternalMentalHealth #MassachusettsCrime #TrueCrimeCommunity #CriminalResponsibility
12 min
March 30 Nancy Guthrie: The Compromised Sheriff at the Center of This Case
The investigation into Nancy Guthrie's disappearance was always going to be difficult. An 84-year-old woman taken from her home in the middle of the night. No confirmed suspect. Ransom notes of uncertain origin. Nearly two months without proof of life. That's a hard case on its best day.
This is not its best day.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos has now had his own deputies vote 241 to zero to demand he resign. According to records and reporting from the Arizona Republic and AZPM, documents from his time at the El Paso Police Department describe approximately 26 disciplinary allegations in six years — excessive force, firearms discharge, illegal gambling, insubordination, threatening behavior — before he resigned in 1982 in lieu of termination. His deputies say Pima County was never told. The union that cast that vote called it a direct response to those revelations, and called his concealment of that record a disqualifying failure of trust.
The Board of Supervisors has now voted unanimously to compel Nanos to answer under oath, with removal from office as a consequence for non-compliance. One supervisor has described his 42-year Pima County career as potentially "based on fraud." Reporting from the Arizona Republic and AZPM indicates that sworn testimony Nanos gave in a December 2025 deposition — about his suspension history — may be inconsistent with the documented record.
All of this while Nancy Guthrie is still missing. While the case turns on forensic evidence processed through a private Florida lab. While the federal presence holds firm despite the chaos at the top.
Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer breaks down what institutional collapse at the sheriff level does to an active kidnapping investigation — and whether the federal presence in this case can hold things together if Nanos goes.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#NancyGuthrie #SheriffNanos #PimaCounty #NoConfidenceVote #TrueCrime #JenniferCoffindaffer #HiddenKillers #FBIInvestigation #MissingPerson #BringNancyHome
14 min
March 30 Nancy Guthrie: Savannah's Revelations Reframe the Abduction
The suspect came twice. That's the detail that changes the picture. Not once — twice. Two separate visits to Nancy Guthrie's door before the night she disappeared. What happens on that first visit? What's being confirmed, mapped, or tested? And what does coming back tell you about how locked-in someone already was before they made their move?
Savannah Guthrie spoke publicly for the first time since her mother vanished — and she didn't just describe anguish. She described operational details that investigators have been working with for weeks. Her brother, a former fighter pilot, identified this as a targeted kidnapping for ransom within minutes of the call. That's not panic. That's pattern recognition.
The theory investigators are now pursuing: the masked figure on the doorbell camera may have been a lookout. Someone else may have already been inside. Nancy was 84, barely mobile, living in serious pain. Moving her out — no shoes, no medication, in the dead of night — required more than one person. The suspect knew her address, knew she lived alone, and knew exactly how vulnerable she was. That kind of targeting requires time, proximity, and access to information most people don't have.
FBI canvassing has shifted from broad neighborhood sweeps to a specific focus: former residents who recently relocated, and construction workers active at a nearby property. That level of precision reflects investigators working toward a conclusion, not searching for a starting point.
Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer joins us to break down what this surveillance profile looks like, what the family's public responses to ransom communications have done to the investigative dynamics, and what nearly two months of silence on proof of life means for how this case is now being worked.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#NancyGuthrie #SavannahGuthrie #MissingPerson #KidnappingCase #TrueCrime #JenniferCoffindaffer #HiddenKillers #PimaCounty #FBIInvestigation #BringNancyHome
25 min
March 30 Kelsey Fitzsimmons: The Testimony, the Verdict, and the Question Nobody's Answering
The prosecution's version: she raised her service weapon, pointed it directly at Officer Patrick Noonan's face, pulled the trigger on an unchambered round, racked the slide, and was shot before she could fire again. The defense's version: the gun never left her own temple. This was a suicide attempt, not an assault — and she nearly died proving it.
Kelsey Fitzsimmons took the stand and gave her account directly. She never pointed that weapon at Noonan. She raised it to her head. Pulled the trigger twice. Then she was on the ground with a collapsed lung. In the ambulance she kept saying she was an idiot for trying to end her life with an unloaded gun. She kept pulling the oxygen mask off. She still wanted to die.
Both sides have rested. The defense site visit — fought over for two days — was quietly cancelled after she stepped off the stand. Closing arguments are next, and a verdict may follow the same day. A single judge will decide which version of that moment is true.
Criminal defense attorney Bob Motta breaks down what the bench trial decision signals strategically, what the grand jury's pre-trial rejection of the top charge actually means for what the prosecution is working with, and how you build a mental health defense without letting the prosecution reframe it as an instability narrative. Robin Dreeke brings the behavioral layer: what "Kelsey, no" — the words spoken by the officer who fired — tells us about what everyone in that house understood in real time.
The verdict will settle the legal question. It won't settle the one underneath it: at least one officer walked into that house knowing Fitzsimmons had been involuntarily committed. There was still no mental health professional anywhere in that response. That gap is what put everyone in danger. A verdict doesn't fix that.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#KelseyFitzsimmons #PoliceTrial #BenchTrial #TrueCrime #HiddenKillers #BobMotta #RobinDreeke #MentalHealthCrisis #MarthaCoakley #NorthAndoverPolice
51 min
March 29 Nancy Guthrie: Nanos, the Compliance Loophole, and a Case Losing Momentum
Two hundred and forty-one deputies. Zero for confidence. Every ballot cast said the same thing: we don't trust the man running this investigation. The Board of Supervisors responded unanimously — invoke the statute, require sworn statements, or remove him. Supervisor Heinz called the entire 42-year career "fruit of a poison tree." Called the December deposition answer disqualifying.
And then Nanos said he'll comply. Which may be exactly how he survives it. The statute's removal trigger is non-compliance — not bad answers. If he shows up, the board may be left without a legal mechanism to act under this process. County attorneys are working through that. April 7 is the next board meeting. That's when the process either has teeth or it doesn't.
This episode maps the full institutional picture — the vote, the statute and its limits, the deposition, the recall effort's realistic path — and then hands it to someone who can tell you what it actually means for the search. Robin Dreeke spent his career as Chief of the FBI's Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program. He knows what a department under genuine investigative pressure looks like from the inside. He knows what an official's repeated reassurances signal when they're not backed by results. And he knows the difference between an investigation with real momentum and one performing momentum.
Nearly two months. No arrest. DNA that matched no one. Ransom notes that couldn't be verified. Searches scaled back. A tip line gone quieter. And a sheriff still at the podium saying they're getting closer.
Your questions. Dreeke's answers. No press conference language. Nancy deserves more than that.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#NancyGuthrie #ChrisNanos #SavannahGuthrie #TrueCrime #MissingPersons #HiddenKillers #PimaCounty #FBI #BringNancyHome #RobinDreeke
36 min
March 29 Kouri Richins: The Witnesses Are Talking — They Always Do
Every long con requires silence forever. Kouri Richins built hers on the cooperation of people around her — a friend, a boyfriend, a housekeeper. One by one, they took the stand in a Utah courtroom. One by one, the foundation cracked.
This week on Hidden Killers, Tony Brueski examines the structural reality of the long con — and the documented case that proves how it always ends. Denise Williams held hers together for seventeen years after her husband Mike Williams vanished on a duck hunting trip in December 2000. Official story: drowned, taken by alligators. Denise collected $1.75 million in insurance, then married Mike's best friend Brian Winchester — the man who shot Mike and buried him in the woods. They built a life on his grave. Raised his daughter. Mike's mother Cheryl fought for seventeen years against the official story — and she was right the whole time.
Brian Winchester cracked when his own survival was at stake. Divorce. Kidnapping charges. He confessed. Led investigators to Mike's body five miles from Cheryl's home.
The mechanism is identical in every case. The con holds only as long as everyone inside it decides silence is in their best interest. The moment that calculation changes — and it always changes — the whole structure comes down.
Psychotherapist Shavaun Scott joins Tony and Robin Dreeke to examine the full psychological arc underneath the Richins case: the targeting, the love bombing, the coercive control, the sustained gaslighting, the trauma bonding that keeps victims from leaving — and the specific, documented escalation pattern that emerges when someone in a controlling relationship starts moving toward the exit. Prosecutors allege that Eric Richins' quiet move toward freedom preceded his death. Shavaun explains why that sequence is not a coincidence in cases like this.
This is Part 5 of The Perfect Wife.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#KouriRichins #EricRichins #DeniseWilliams #PerfectWife #ShavaunScott #RobinDreeke #HiddenKillers #TrueCrime #LongCon #CoerciveControl
1 hr 19 min
March 29 Duggar Family: The Doctrine That Made Abuse Inevitable
Before the arrests. Before the federal prison sentence. Before any of it went public — there was a system. And the Duggar family isn't the exception to what that system produces. They are the product of it.
This week on Hidden Killers, Tony Brueski, Robin Dreeke, and psychotherapist Shavaun Scott examine the Institute in Basic Life Principles — the organization that shaped the Duggar family's theology, household structure, and approach to discipline, authority, and silence — from the doctrine outward.
The IBLP's Umbrella of Authority framework assigns absolute authority to fathers, submission to wives, and obedience to children. Questioning that chain is framed as spiritual rebellion. Leaving it is described in the organization's own materials as witchcraft. Sex education was systematically excluded from the homeschool curriculum. Fear of dying in pregnancy was characterized as satanic. Published IBLP material described rock music as more addictive than crack cocaine. These are direct quotations from the organization's own published doctrine — not characterizations.
Bill Gothard founded and led IBLP for decades. More than 34 women have accused him of harassment and sexual assault. He has never faced criminal charges. The organization continues to operate.
Shavaun Scott — a thirty-year licensed clinician specializing in trauma recovery and violent behavior psychology who grew up inside a fundamentalist religious system — examines what this level of institutional control produces in the families living inside it. Robin Dreeke addresses the specific consequences of raising children without the vocabulary to identify or report abuse — and what it means for disclosure years after the fact, when those children are finally outside the system.
Former members don't describe leaving the way people describe leaving a church. They describe deprogramming. Robin addresses the clinical weight of that distinction.
This is Part 1 of 3.
Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/
Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/
Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod
X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod
This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.
#IBLP #BillGothard #DuggarFamily #ReligiousAbuse #ShavaunScott #RobinDreeke #HiddenKillers #TrueCrime #19KidsAndCounting #CultExposed
47 min