Moms and Mysteries: A True Crime Podcast

When twenty-four-year-old expecting mother Jade Benning suddenly collapsed during a quiet date night at her Nashville apartment, it was initially reported as a severe allergic reaction. But when paramedics arrived, the scene didn't match the story being told by her boyfriend, former NFL scout Blaise Taylor. Jade was rushed to the hospital where she was placed on life support, but both she and her unborn daughter, Ivy, tragically passed away days later.

As investigators began uncovering what really happened inside her apartment on February 25th, 2023, they discovered a chilling timeline of events. A frantic final phone call overheard by Jade's best friend, a deleted photograph, and a toxicology report showing an extraordinarily high concentration of cocaine in Jade's system painted a terrifying picture. In this episode, we cover the story of a successful young chef, a highly respected college athlete turned NFL scout, and a devastating betrayal driven by an unwillingness to accept a future he didn't want.

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In 1996, the quiet community of Horseshoe Lake, Arkansas was shattered by the brutal double murder of seventy-five-year-old Sally Snowden McKay and her fifty-two-year-old nephew, Joseph Lee Baker. The historic Snowden House, a landmark family estate that had belonged to Sally's family for generations, was set on fire to cover up the crime. Investigators eventually arrested fifteen-year-old Travis Lewis, a local teenager who lived across the field in a home his family rented from Sally. Travis eventually pleaded guilty to the murders and was sentenced to twenty-eight and a half years in prison, though he never publicly admitted to pulling the trigger.

Decades later, Sally's daughter, Martha McKay, made a decision that shocked her family and friends. A practicing Buddhist who believed deeply in redemption and forgiveness, Martha began writing to Travis in prison. She visited him, supported his parole, and eventually hired him to work as a handyman at the newly restored Snowden House after his release in 2018. For a while, the arrangement seemed to work, but when a large sum of cash went missing from the home, Martha suspected Travis of stealing it and fired him.

On the morning of March 25th, 2020, an alarm was triggered at the Snowden House. When deputies arrived, they discovered the back door open and a man fleeing the scene. The pursuit ended at the edge of Horseshoe Lake, where the suspect jumped into the water and drowned. Inside the home, deputies found sixty-three-year-old Martha bludgeoned and stabbed to death. The man who drowned was Travis. In a heartbreaking twist of fate, the very man Martha had forgiven and tried to help rebuild his life had returned to the Snowden House to take hers.

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In the fall of 2023, Steven Edward Riley Jr. was living in Minot, North Dakota with his longtime partner, Ina Kenoyer, when he received a letter claiming he was the sole heir to a $30 million estate left behind by a relative he had never met. For months, Steven communicated with a man named Richard Eglin, who identified himself as the estate's attorney, as the two worked toward a meeting that would finalize the inheritance. On September 3rd, 2023, Steven collapsed after attending a series of airport meetings where Eglin never appeared. Two days later, he was dead. His official cause of death was ethylene glycol poisoning. Antifreeze.

As investigators began piecing together what happened, witnesses came forward with disturbing information. Several people told police that Ina had previously talked about poisoning Steven with antifreeze specifically, and she had already begun trying to sell his belongings before she even knew he had died. What followed was one of the most contradictory police interviews investigators had ever conducted, full of shifting timelines, bizarre theories, and a woman who could not stop talking even after she asked for a lawyer.

But the detail that makes this case truly unsettling is what investigators discovered about the inheritance itself. The $30 million fortune that Steven believed was about to change his life almost certainly never existed at all. He was not murdered over a fortune. He was murdered over the illusion of one.

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This episode has been one of your most requested since we first released it, so we are bringing it back.

Lake Lanier, Georgia's largest lake, is one of the deadliest bodies of water in America, with over 700 deaths since its creation in 1956. But the lake's dark history goes deeper than tragic accidents. Built by flooding entire communities, including a predominantly Black town that was never properly evacuated, Lake Lanier sits atop homes, churches, and even cemeteries. Locals believe the lake is cursed, haunted by the spirits of those whose graves were disturbed. We explore the eerie history of Lake Lanier, the mysterious deaths and disappearances that continue to this day, and the folklore that has made it one of America's most haunted places.

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Shirley and Virgil Best were beloved, hardworking members of their Riverview, Florida, community. For forty-five years, they built a life centered around their faith, their family, and their successful tropical fish farm, Quality Fins. They were finally looking forward to a well-earned retirement traveling the world together in their RV.

But beneath the surface, the couple spent decades dealing with the constant crises of their oldest son, Robert Best. A convicted con artist who had once defrauded a blind woman out of nearly a million dollars, Robert was facing a new, deeply disturbing criminal trial set to begin on the morning of November 12, 2015. Hours before he was expected in court, Robert and his wife, Marisol Best, drove to his parents' home, supposedly to pray with them. Instead, they found Shirley and Virgil brutally shot to death.

While investigators initially confronted a staged burglary scene, the physical evidence quickly pointed to an insider. When a pair of missing handguns belonging to a family friend were uncovered, Marisol confessed to a crime that shocked the community. She admitted to shooting her mother and father-in-law after a tense argument about Robert's lack of family support, pulling the trigger just as they stood up to hold her hands and pray with her.

This week we cover the tragic murders of Shirley and Virgil Best, the bizarre web of manipulation surrounding their son, and the ultimate act of misguided loyalty that resulted in a double life sentence.

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