Story Hunter Podcasts

Ep. 1: Nightmare In New Jersey - The Bruce Curtis Story

It was supposed to be a fun summer holiday. Nova Scotia teenager Bruce Curtis was going to spend the July 4th long weekend with his American friend Scott Franz. The two eighteen-year-olds had just graduated from a prestigious private school and were looking forward to hanging out together on the fabled New Jersey Shore. But while Scott bragged about being rich to his Canadian friend, the reality of his homelife is anything but. Scott lives with his mom and stepfather who is a violent man. He keeps loaded guns in the house and isn’t afraid to use them.

Within a couple of days, Bruce realizes that he and his friend need to leave the house in New Jersey before anything serious happens. They’ll drive back to Nova Scotia. But in one fateful moment, everything changes. Now four people are missing and blood stains in the house indicate a violent struggle. Now the local police aren’t sure if they’re investigating a murder, a kidnapping or both?

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Ep. 3: Evil In Paradise

In 1996 seventeen-year-old Rebecca Middleton from Belleville, Ontario was viciously raped and murdered in Bermuda. Two local men are arrested within days, but an inept criminal justice system has resulted in one of the accused taking a plea deal with a five-year prison sentence and the other being acquitted of murder. Rebecca’s family vows to never give up in their fight for justice, and the case finally attracts the attention of a famous London lawyer who also happens to be the wife of the British Prime Minister. But can an internationally renowned lawyer finally convince the Bermudian Supreme Court that a grave injustice has occurred and will anyone ever be held accountable for the young girl’s murder?

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Ep. 2: Evil In Paradise

A teenage girl from Belleville, Ontario is brutally murdered in Bermuda while on a summer vacation in 1996. Within days two local men are charged and the case against them seems strong. It doesn’t take long for one to flip on the other, so the Bermudian crown attorney’s office makes a plea deal. They’re willing to give up one to secure a murder conviction against the other. But when DNA evidence points to the wrong man on trial for murder, the prosecutors realize they made a deal with the devil. Can prosecutors save their case and secure a murder conviction or will the young girl’s vicious rape and murder go unpunished?

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Ep. 1: Evil In Paradise

It was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime, two teenage girls from Belleville, Ontario were heading to Bermuda for a six-week summer vacation. The British Island Territory was a well-known and safe tourist destination. The two best friends were living in paradise, until something went terribly wrong.

After a late-night of drinking and partying, the girls get separated and only one of them makes it home. A frantic search of the island turns up nothing, but it doesn’t take long for the other girl to be found. She has been brutally attacked, raped and left to die in the middle of a road.

A Canadian family is left devastated, but their daughter’s heinous murder is only the beginning of their nightmare and a decade-long struggle to find justice in a foreign land.

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Ep. 2: Pushed To the Limit - The Jane Stafford Story

Jane Stafford is charged with the first-degree murder of her husband Billy after his headless body is discovered. Jane admits to shooting him but claims it was in self-defence after he threatened to kill their neighbours and her son. Her trial gains nationwide attention because her defence rests on battered women’s syndrome. The jury will hear of the horrific abuse she and her young son suffered for over six years at the hands of her violent husband and how she believed he would eventually kill her. The jury will have to decide if Jane deserves to be sent to prison but regardless, Jane will have to live with what she did for the rest of her life. What price will she ultimately pay for striking back and speaking out about domestic violence?

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Ep. 1: Pushed To the Limit - The Jane Stafford Story

When a headless corpse is found on a deserted dirt road in rural Nova Scotia the local RCMP are certain it’s the body of the town’s resident bully, Billy Stafford. He’s been a thorn in the cop’s side for years and they doubt anyone is going to miss him but they still need to figure out who pulled the trigger.

When Billy’s common-law wife Jane is arrested three days later she quickly confesses but claims she was acting in self-defence. After six years of unimaginable abuse and fearing for her life, Jane finally snapped.

Her story will make headlines across the country and ignite a much-needed debate about domestic violence and how the Canadian criminal justice system deals with abusers and their victims. Was Jane justified in her actions and what price will she ultimately pay for fighting back?

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Ep.1: Barwin’s Babies

For decades Dr. Norman Barwin was revered as a miracle worker.  His specialty for helping women and couples who had issues with conceiving their own babies earned him the nickname The Baby Whisperer.

The walls of his offices at the Broadview Fertility Clinic in Ottawa were covered with photos of the babies that resulted from his treatments.  

But in the early 2000s, his reputation would begin to unravel. It started with two lawsuits that exposed major issues with how sperm was allegedly mixed up because of lax standards in his clinic. Children were conceived using sperm that was not that of the chosen donors.

And when those lawsuits brought further scrutiny from couples and the children conceived through his lab, a shocking betrayal would unfold, resulting in the loss of his license to practice medicine, and a multi-million dollar class-action lawsuit.

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Ep. 2: Trail of Pain - The Crimes of Albert Johnson Walker

The British police have just arrested a man and his wife for suspected identity theft and possible murder. The man has been using the name of his friend who turned up dead in a fisherman’s net off Devon, England. But it turns out that identity fraud and murder are just the tip of a very extensive web of lies and deceit that goes back many years.

The English police have nabbed #4 on Interpol’s most wanted list and his real name is Albert Johnson Walker. He’s been missing from Canada for six years along with his fifteen-year-old daughter Sheena. But since disappearing together the father and daughter have been living as husband and wife and she has given birth to two children.

Albert Walker will stand trial for murder but will his daughter testify against him? And if she does what dark family secrets will finally be revealed?

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Ep. 1: Trail of Pain - The Crimes of Albert Johnson Walker

On a sunny July day in 1996 off the coast of Devon, England, a fisherman and his son caught something very unusual in their net. It was a dead man! He was fully clothed but had no identification. Yet, strangely he was still wearing an expensive Rolex watch. Tracing the timepiece’s unique serial number, the police identify the drowned man. But his identity only leads to a stranger mystery when it’s discovered that the man’s best friend has stolen his identity. Now the British police have two men with the same name and one of them ended up dead. Who is the imposter and what other secrets is he hiding? The truth will leave even the most experienced criminal investigators reeling!

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Hockey Night to Remember: The Life of Brian “Spinner” Spencer

He was a kid who learned how to skate practically before he could walk. Born and raised in a

small northern Canadian town, Brian Spencer had a dream that one day he would make to the

National Hockey League. It was an irresistible desire that came with a lot of sacrifice for him

and his dad Roy. But their hard work and determination finally paid off when Brian was drafted

by the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1969.

Sadly on the night Brian was to make his Hockey Night in Canada debut, tragedy would eclipse

the momentous event. Brian’s NHL career would be forever overshadowed by what happened

on that fateful night and his life after hockey would descend into a world of darkness and

despair that he could never recover from.

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