True Crime Garage /// Columbus Podcast Fest 2018 /// Brian Shaffer | Forensic Files

foreign [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] welcome everybody to the Columbus
podcast Festival remember tonight that photos and videos you're welcome to take them just please no flash photography
this is a live recording Okay so act alive all right feel free to to laugh if something's funny or to cheer
or yupp it up it's always helpful to hear the audience so don't feel like you have to be quiet go ahead and join with
with these guys and and we'll have a good time so next up we have a true crime garage and they are Hometown
favorite [Applause] this podcast usually discusses real life cases our our host Tim Fulton he's not a
host he's a moderator Tim Fulton will be interviewing Nick and Captain good to have you guys with us tonight
and they might even be taking some questions if you have a good question okay I say there are no stupid questions
but they're going to make that judgment call on their own okay there are so many
answers right so at this time I'm going to turn it over to Tim and True Crime garage
thank you Bob thank you so much Bob's uh I believe I think joining us throughout the
weekend for uh announcing as as much as much as you're available um guys first of all Captain nick uh
tell us how you started doing True Crime garage you tell the story better than I do
because this is my part of this way so um well about three years ago we were I've known this guy I've had the
pleasure of knowing him for over 30 years now so I'm the winner um no anyway we've been friends grown up
together and we've always had a love for talk shows and then podcasts came along
and he was listening to some podcasts I was listening to some podcast and we would jokingly say over the phone you
know we could do that that's something we could do that doesn't seem so hard um I never thought we could do it
we both got laid off from jobs that we had for a long time didn't know really what to do with ourselves for a while
while we were out looking for work we decided to hang out drink beer and just try to
do a little talk show and we started recording them in my garage and then one day we released them
and somebody started listening and then they told a friend and they started listening and he's missing something
three years later so we recorded like five episodes five or six episodes then we almost got into a fist fight
and then we didn't talk for about three months and then we released the shows I think he missed me a lot because we
didn't talk for like three weeks no it was like three months and he called and begging
well in all fairness though he was really drunk when we almost got in the fist fight
that'll happen that'll happen why why the subject matter for you guys I understand the talk show aspect and sort
of having the itch to get up in front of people while you're not actually in front of people but why the the true
crime or crime format well he's he's always been into it I mean I think I've told the story on the show
before second grade riding on the bus to school and he'd be behind me talking with some
other guy about Unsolved Mysteries and I'm sorry like Robert Stack unsolved mystery yeah okay every day
and um and so through our friendship because we were in a band together in high school and a little bit into
college and then we would talk about music and other things but we'd always kind of end up
talking about crime it just always went that way so he's the one that said uh let's try a podcast and let's talk True
Crime and I think my first thought was wait we're going to talk about True Crime every week
so well well and the funny thing is this is hard to believe because now there's like
300 000 True Crime podcasts right but back one to be to be fair sort of in the the context of this Festival uh True
Crime sort of made a whole lot of people aware of podcasts yeah right as well and at the time there was not that many
when we when we first started talking about this idea and started working on it there wasn't it wasn't you know as
I hate to say watered down but there wasn't so many so many kids in the swimming pool back then and so it was
kind of looking at something that that I enjoyed listening to and thinking of okay well what can we do that's
this but different right now there's a lot of pee in the pool and so what was sort of the talked me
through the model of how you guys said okay we're going to start talking about this and what's the structure and what
information do we need to have how do we choose things and you know how you're going to do it
uh well that's been a learning process I mean how did it start so well the funny
thing was so uh Nick decided we're going to talk about a phantom killer where that's gonna be the first case we talk
about and so we both went and he did his research and I did my research and then
we decided well we'll call each other and if we can talk for an hour on the phone then we know that we're able to do
a podcast and so for whatever reason he didn't research the case at all and I did and so we still talked for an
hour because I won't shut up and and then I think he realized oh I I'm because to say that he's an expert is probably
an understatement I mean we were talking to one of the comedians downstairs and he's like I love True Crime
novels I'm reading one right now I can't remember what it's called I don't know the guy's name and he gives like two or
three facts about the case and Nick's going oh that's so and so and the guy's like you're right
and then he talks about another book that he can't remember the name can't remember the perpetrator
and he's going all right so he's just been an expert from before we started recording and then on
top of that then he's had to say okay you know you can't just rely on the information that you used to know to get
through two hours a week so he does tons of research does that answer the question it
absolutely does I guess I what I wonder about is what were the early mistakes like what
you came up and you started talking about things and listeners would be like yeah but you didn't truly describe what
the pro like you know you forgot to say that guy got murdered right we've always
said that guy got murdered okay good but you have that built into the format right and we built that into the unless
the guy didn't get murdered and then we don't said no but I think it's weird because we we didn't we haven't talked
about it a lot it's just kind of been something that we've grown into doing where it's like
you know I'm the audio guy and I'm the musician of the group so oh we need the theme song I just created one and played
it for him one day and he was like oh that works and then we you know had an intro that we did differently and then
over time we're like well that kind of sucks but we didn't really talk about it we just kind of was like oh let's try to
make this better this is how we'll make it better so you get to poke them a little bit well but the other thing
though too is when we first started and still to this day we've encouraged whoever is uh kind enough to listen to
us we we want it to be it's a community you know we want it to be a you know a group
thing so we do get a lot of critiquing from the audience yeah mainly they want to kick me off and we've used
we've you know and but I mean we're going to be true to who we are and what we want to do in the first place but we
do allow that to steer us a little bit because we all can get better at what we do we all can learn
and uh and based on that feedback you you're like oh maybe we should talk about oh yeah yeah right yeah you
you're and you and you listen and you go oh yeah you know what I we didn't touch
upon that or maybe we maybe we stayed too long on this one thing that was not so important
um but yeah we we've allowed the the listeners to help us get better and I want to touch on two points then
before we sort of get into what in my head is the bulk of our conversation tonight first of all what what was that
transition like from hey we're just recording and uh we're not making any money doing this how did
you first this is your jobs now is that right yeah yeah so how how did that this
sound shitty but how did that monetization happen slow [Music] long well but how like when someone said
I want to give you money or well we're you soliciting people we were so what happened was we started so what
happened officer was uh we started the podcast when we're both laid off I never got a job
he got a job but and I'm sorry Nick what's your field I've worked in Property Management okay
I don't know how long okay so he gets a job we're doing the show now mind you the
bulk of the research comes from him so he's working the property management job he's like
dude this job is going to be great I only have to work like 35 hours a week I could spend a bunch of time on the show
like two weeks into this job he's working you know 50 60 hours a week and we're still trying to put out a show
and making no money but uh I I was actually interning at a Library Columbus library and they had
this program that I was trying to get involved and when I went in for my interview the first thing they asked me
about was true crime garage and I just they knew about it yeah they knew you did it yeah okay and the reason
why that I don't use my name is because I was teaching kids guitar lessons music
lessons I didn't want to be given a lesson to a kid and then their parents find out about the show and go well this
is kind of weird we don't want to have our kid go to this guy can I can I poke you on that a little bit sure why
what's it it is an adult show I mean we're well you're talking about gruesome things right but you're not inserting
your you are not part of the story right like it's like saying Robert Stack can't
teach my kid guitar right right right yeah it's not any farther than that um I'm sorry for the sorry I'm old
Robert Stack was the host of all the industries yeah but he just like you know walked
slow in a trench coat and spoke really well with a great voice right where us we might be like a part of our show
where we're announcing that we're drinking dortmunder Gold by Great Lakes Brewing Company
and Nick's favorite beer and the you know this this perpetrator broke into a home murdered this person and
masturbated on the bed and then left right right like I don't wanna and that's not every show that
just happens once in a while and I'm sorry last week's show okay Captain I got you off so you were at a point where
uh Nick was employed you were uh interning also doing uh garage or excuse me guitar lessons
yeah well I mean you played in a band yeah I was playing cover band gigs and and that's the other thing too is as I
was getting older and and my buddies were playing they're going hey I'm I'm starting a new band
next year and I kept on thinking this is getting really old and these the the crowd stayed the same age uh and some
guys like that I don't like that um and it it got to the point where I was like what the heck am I going to do with
my life and I just have this gut feeling well when I left my interview for the library job I had a gut feeling that I
got the job and I did not get the job and then I was just and I don't know if Nick can talk about this too much or not
or how much he remembers but I just had this feeling that it was all go going to
work out and I started emailing ad agents like every day sometimes twice a day and right I got so angry that I was
trying to do the right thing and trying to help these kids in need at the library and that that they want to give
me a job and I just I mean I seriously emailed our agent probably a hundred times so literally
you said I didn't get that job I know that this other thing can work out I'll make it happen yeah
and that's and that'll be where we are yeah and I used to like write stuff on on this board of what I thought was
going to happen like oh we're gonna get this let's go division board yeah I called him my Conor McGregor
board because yeah I watched some video on his like power of belief and all this stuff and I
was just like that's that [ __ ] must work so and then I'd write stuff on the board
and it would come true and Nick would be like hey you should write bigger numbers
on the board yeah I started believing in this board thing after I saw work a few
times right he'd say something like you know I'm hoping one day that we do could
do this and I'm like idiot bored put it on the board well I have to see it in my head first
I don't know the process I don't claim to understand the process well and it's funny to me that because
that Nick you started out as the brains and then Captain sort of became the brains of it in terms of sharing one
brain the business of it what's the what's the work look like now obviously you guys are still producing
the podcast and still doing research and we're going to talk about sort of that the research process of it in a minute
but um Captain I know I reached out to you a couple of weeks ago and I said hey I
just want to do a pre-interview and talk to you for like an hour and you were like I'm sorry I can't that day because
I'm doing merch all day right what what else what are the things that you guys have to deal with
well that's another thing that's weird is we we just haven't we don't have like a lot of meetings like hey let's have a
meeting um so the the kind of the workload just kind of happen the way it happened you know
um I know how to build websites so I built one I run the social media he hates social media and
and so Nick is nodding yes yeah things just kind of got um divvied up that way and but it's our strengths too so I mean
Nick I mean there's I mean I'm sure if you listen to the show there's weeks that I
don't know a lot about the case but I know that Nick will know whatever we're supposed you can provide
commentary then and sometimes I think sometimes there's value to not knowing yeah because then you get to ask the
questions that I think a listener may be like wait hold on what up what about that right well and there have been
it's not often but there's been a few times where I've told you like hey don't look into this one too much
yeah and it's not it's not so that I can sit there and talk about it it's so that
if he knows everything that I know has nothing to talk how organically will the questions come about that we can get
into some kind of discussion right because there's some that I know as well as he does and he starts talking and I'm
bored out of my mind because I'm just sitting there going yeah we know this already well and
you're not you're not gonna engage and you're not and and frankly I think those are the risky moments for the audience
because you may forget something because you guys just know it inherently you know we always create you know so he
goes off and does his research and I go off and do mine but we normally will text back and forth to create
some kind of loose outline of how we want to play something out another thing that I think Nick has learned is in the
beginning he he wanna sometimes report on certain things that they didn't go anywhere you know
there was it was part of the investigation but it didn't go anywhere so it would get done with the episode of
be going hey you didn't even talk about this other guy or this other suspect and
he was like well it didn't go anywhere so it really doesn't have any relevance in the case and that's true a lot of
times but sometimes that's the most interesting thing about the case so I think I think he's learned over time to
you know this really doesn't have anything to do with an investigation but it's interesting and so it's that
balance between giving them information but also being entertaining as well right well and I think and here's where
the flip happens in this conversation I want to talk about you guys this research process and I think that
correct me if I'm wrong a lot of the well listened to most feedback given episodes have been
on things where you sort of continue to pursue what the things that didn't go anywhere or the things that weren't
necessarily paid attention to given the nature of the case uh I think the folks in the audience
know because it was it was put out there that we're going to talk sort of through
a little bit uh the Brian Shaffer case uh and talk through sort of it was one of the earliest uh cases that
you guys pursued is that correct yeah okay give us first of all just sort of the Baseline here is who Brian Schaefer
was and here is is what we know from a from a public perspective about that case who here knows about the Brian
Shafer case so most you do you don't know nothing um so Nick will just do a little
reminder yeah okay so for those of you that don't know uh Brian Shaffer was a medical student at OSU he went missing
technically on April 1st of 2006 from the Ugly Tuna saluna here in Columbus Ohio
he has classified as endangered missing still to this day now Brian was born February 25th 1979 he was 27 years old
at the time that he went missing six foot two 165 pounds Caucasian light brown hair Hazel now hazel eyes now one
thing about Brian an identifier for him is he had a Pearl Jam tattoo on his arm he was last seen like we said at the
Ugly Tuna saluna and that's at the Ohio State University campus which is only a couple miles from here and the times on
these could be up for debate but for the sake of this uh purpose it was roughly between 1 30 and 2 A.M in the morning he
was out there celebrating it was the beginning of Spring Break so he's out partying it up for the night
he's seen on surveillance going into the bar there was an escalator that took you upstairs if
anybody's familiar with it it's on the second floor so he's seen going into the bar and he's not seen leaving the bar
and we don't know what happened to him after that he went there with a couple of friends This was um Clint and
Meredith and I believe he knew Clint for quite some time they were close the friends did leave without him that night
they stated that he at some point said he was going to there's a little debate on this but
either use the restroom or go talk to the band go talk to the band seems to be the majority the belief here
Brian was a musician he played the guitar so that makes sense uh he goes off on his own thing
they have his friends have a little information other than now the bar is closing and we don't know where our
friend is they wait around for a little bit and eventually they leave without him
they probably assume like anybody else that's gone out with their friends you get separated especially if you have if
your friend is Brian wasn't single but you know if you go out with your friends and your your
buddy's single or your girlfriend is single and yeah you don't always end up at the same place at the end of the
night even though you went to the same bar so um the crazy thing about him though and
the the many interesting things about his case and we've only found this to be the case with a handful of other cases
and typically it works out with these missing persons cases is that you can take one thing that happened
that night and you can analyze it and you can really put together a good argument for
many different reasons why that happened because you don't know the conclusion we
don't know the the result of what happened so and and the reason why Brian falls into
this category for us is because there is some thought that maybe he would have left on his own maybe he just walked
away from his life maybe something terrible happened to him and I want to cut you off there and just sort of talk
before before we get into the the study that you guys have done is talk about how
impactful this case was to the Columbus Community as a whole this was a uh and I apologize if I'm stepping on any
toes uh there was a whole lot of conjecture surrounding the fact that the um the Gateway complex where this bar
was was not finished in its construction hence there was not uh first of all nothing was finished there was a whole
lot of security cameras that could have been there but were not there but we're simply there right surrounding that bar
this was a a frankly this was a white guy in his mid-20s that that was in medical school
that had nothing but success ahead of him a girlfriend and it was like what a terrible loss
let me go for a second not because I want to address the the first part of it as far as you know
the thought of how impactful this was to the area to to our city and that was the
main reason why we wanted to cover this case yeah so nowadays we typically we don't pick I mean we pick the cases we
cover but we have a long list that's been presented to us by by the listeners and so we just cherry-picked from that
list but back then when we covered this case we we were more in control of that because we didn't have so many
suggestions we get 20 30 40 suggestions a week now yeah and so back then the reason why we wanted to cover it is both
the captain and I like to go out and you said I'd go and sit in a bar and I would
overhear some people next to me and somebody go you would hear this from time to time
you go hey you remember that that dude that went missing from some place on campus so what was that like two years
ago right and then you know and and then other times I would hear people having a
similar discussion and somebody going oh yeah yeah they found that guy he was in
the sciota river and then another time I'd hear the story and it was oh they found that guy he was living on an
island somewhere he's perfectly fine right and so he and I kept having this conversation we're like this was a story
that was very impactful for literally two weeks or a month to the point where kind of everybody was
paying attention to it if you walked around in the area you saw Brian's picture somewhere
but after that month went away people kind of came up with their own conclusions people started listening to
the rumors that were going around and they became truths to these people just as a point of matter there's been a
story in the dispatch on the around about April 1st every year since it happened right
and then we're coming up on 12 years right and they just had a March for him the narrative becomes well this happened
and then we just make up what happened you know well and who gets to because it's not a murder it is a and
I'm sorry there's a a term of art it's a it's not a missing person but a missing
person in danger they have him listed on on some places is endangered missing got
it endangered missing and that's a term of art for for the police what who gets to
Define that narrative in my head it's it's a lot the Press right uh because that's they're trying to Define things
that are interesting but also that narrative I imagine gets defined within the police the existing family it should
be noted that the the father has now passed away how did that narrative when you guys
explored the case get defined well well it seems like and we're talking about backstage about that if you have a
murder victim right The Narrative becomes from the victim's family and friends oh and we hear it all
the time she was you know a great mother and she was this and but then we have another thing that comes out is that we
have a bunch of evidence and once we have the evidence come out that's a part of the narrative as well and so if
there's you know there's been plenty of cases that they're saying oh well she's happily married and she's this and she's
that and then you find out well she had a boyfriend on the side and that because that becomes part of
the narrative well in this case or any missing person case we don't have evidence
so the only narrative that we have normally is the the missing person's family but in this case it's even
stranger because we actually have two narratives so we have you know his mother passed away
and so we have a surviving father and we have a surviving brother and to be clear
she passed away before he he went missing like three weeks yeah very shortly three
weeks later okay she passed away with cancer yeah so we have the the newspaper saying hey we're willing to write
stories so who's this narrative coming from it's going to come from the father and of course you're not going to kick
back on anything on the father because his son went missing but in this case it's a little more
interesting because it was covered a little bit by like Dateline and it was on some other shows and then now we have
the internet and if you really look into this case that's where the second narrative comes in it's man walks into a
bar man disappears and that's the second narrative yeah it's like a yes if anybody saw the um I
think it was a dateline right yeah they basically made it like a like a nine ten
minute ghost story right you know this guy walks into a bar boom disappears Into Thin Air never seen again when
really there's so much more going on here there's things that happen before there's things going on in this young
man's life before uh and maybe after too I mean right and now a word from our sponsor
from this point forward I want to as when you introduce we're not going to talk about how you
guys sort of research the facts we we will but this is this is a a fantastic example of how you research them now
and so uh please be courteous to the audience about what you guys have presented before and what is a a known
fact and what is uh something that was not known before let me jump in real quick here go ahead you don't have to
ask permission well you got you looked excited I always look excited okay so when you say how we present how
we research the cases now um this because you're not just presenting here's something we saw on
Wikipedia that was cool let us tell you a story about this case so with this particular situation and this has
happened with several other cases that we've done so what we will talk about here tonight will be
significantly different than what you will hear on the show because of one one fact it's this sometimes when we cover a
case we get someone will reach out to us after the shows are released these aren't
people we would have known to talk to not people that we would would have known wanted to talk right before we
covered a case but sometimes we will someone will reach out to us it might be somebody that knew the victim it might
be a family member we've had many family members reach out to us with with good responses and with bad responses
um mostly they're like me so with this case in particular we since we covered this one back in 2016 and the
early part of 2016 we've had two years for people to decide to reach out to us so we'll talk about some things tonight
that we didn't talk about when we covered this case back then but keep in mind some of this information that we
covered is stuff we went looking for or went looking for something else and found this along the way and other
things that we talk about are things that were brought to us that were presented to us so I want everybody to
take most of this with a grain of salt it was you know some of these are second or third-hand stories
um but yeah so when we're actually doing this show we don't we don't if we're speculating on something we'd say we're
speculating right right and in this case it was missing person cases are actually
easy to cover on some level because there's so much speculation if there is no evidence that there was a
crime then did they go missing because they wanted to go missing did they start a
new life were they killed are they kept captured you know did somebody have them
locked in the basement somewhere you know and you can just kind of dive into what evidence you know beforehand
on how we think that might have happened so this one with Brian's mother passing
away so recent the thought is that maybe he would leave and start a new life somewhere and then
so when we covered this case we dive into all these little bits and pieces we I don't think we're going to go over all
that again right no we don't need to do yeah we don't need to do that for two hours so
this beer got to me uh I had a thought this is why we edit I'm sorry I have a oh where am I at I
lost my train all right well how about I set it up a little bit for you because there is some stuff that we do know that
are facts okay so as he was telling us that Brian's father passed away it was a freak accident remember the Windstorm
that we had um I think this was um what's that yes so during the Windstorm Randy which is Brian's father he was a
falling tree hit him and killed him so one strange Twist on this story is that when it came time to have Randy's
funeral now mind you Brian is missing at this time and who was leading the charge
looking for Brian it was Randy his father right so The Columbus Dispatch they set it up so that people could go
online and you could sign into the guest book for Randy Schaefer's funeral for his memorial
and during the course of this Somebody went online and they signed in as Brian Schaefer
stating something very simple you know like I miss you Dad I love you Dad something to that effect
well in a claim that it was coming from the Virgin Islands well remember we've already covered that there's some
thought that maybe Brian would have taken off on his own to start all over again so people were going oh this was
the one thing that was powerful enough to bring this young man back even if it was just for a little
blurp on a on a website just on the internet yeah and so the Columbus Police Department got a hold of this
information very quickly and they filed the proper subpoenas they went and they tried to track down where did this come
from did this come from the Virgin Islands they reached out to media and law enforcement in the Virgin Islands
no tips ever came from the Virgin Islands nobody's claimed to have seen Brian nothing was reported to law
enforcement now back home what happened was they discovered that and I wish we could
pinpoint this a little better but the best that we can say is that they discovered that that came from a public
computer in Columbus proper somebody used a public computer so there again like we discussed there's an
argument for either side did Brian go to a public computer after all these years of hiding and leave a
message for his father or was some jackass out there playing a bad taste you know tasteless joke and just a
point of order that is a established fact that has been that's yeah I wanted to set it up with some
facts so you can kind of see how these things can steer you in either direction and neither is wrong but it's it's
interesting to ponder these these different items okay we're going to be talking about stuff if you don't know
the case super well I'm sorry if we lose you because some of this information is
new and I'll ask some clarifying questions but so like we said we have this missing college student
um we were actually contacted by this guy named Nicholas West that guy right there
I hate his guts you can clap for him if you want so but you don't have to so Nicholas contacts the show and he
says you know I'm we're looking in I'm looking to do a series on Brian Shafer uh which he has put out it's called come
back the The Disappearance of Brian Shafer so we would communicate back and forth
quite a bit to see if we could because basically he called saying I'd like to get you on the show and we're doing a
series and then we're like oh well that's a case that we keep looking into maybe we can team up and do something
together um unfortunately because Nicholas is stupid he just no no no but so it was mainly
we're so busy with our show and he's trying to push his show forward that we couldn't
you know for us I mean we're already doing a case every week so for us to take on a series
would take a lot of time and effort and stuff so we were basically we basically became um BFFs and texting and calling
and all this new information is coming out years later and what what the interesting thing to me was is that when
we covered the case we talked about it for two hours but we're talking about it from The Narrative of his father
and we're talking about The Narrative of Dateline and all these other people and what we've really realized is that
narrative was very false so what was the just to give a general idea of what the
narrative would be coming from Randy and from what we've all been told early on in this case was
that Brian his loved ones described his disappearance as highly unusual because he was a second year medical student at
OSU at the time of his disappearance he made excellent grades he had a girlfriend
they were planning a vacation in Miami Florida for that spring break and we're scheduled to fly there on April 3rd just
two days after his disappearance his family reported him missing after he missed the airplane flight to Miami
Florida now Schaefer was in love with his girlfriend and reportedly please note he is giving air quotes in
love plan to marry her and as we stated his mother had recently passed away from
cancer however his family and friends stated that he was not depressed nor suicidal at the time of his
disappearance um there there is another weird couple more facts before we get into some of the the
more out of the box stuff but in May of 2006 someone broke into Brian shaffer's apartment the burglar returned out to be
unrelated to his disappearance and at the time of his disappearance Schaefer's father
um they they searched the Olentangy River for his remains and this search obviously turned up nothing so that's
the narrative and based off that we did two hour show and that's not really the correct
narrative as what we came to find well we shouldn't say correct because that's the what we've come to learn is
that is not the narrative that is shared by everyone right and I kind of wondered this too because
you know when I think about my parents um if I would go missing I believe that my father would tell
the truth and I think my mother would paint a great picture of what kind of man I was and all this crap that
probably is not true and so in this situation it's Unique because Brian's mother has passed
so now we only have one family member that's creating the narrative and to later learn that Brian and his father's
relationship it wasn't even good at that time that they went missing they were barely speaking
so now you have this parent that you are upset with that is controlling the narrative and so
I'm sorry that's not a point of fact uh is that a new fact or is that a is it something that you guys have posited
before no I I mean there anything that we're giving in this is there are sources
we're not going to State the sources and I'm sorry so you can speculate it all to
be clear what I'm asking is that something that you guys have said before no okay no so we we always took it from
the approach of what was in the papers that he's close you know we knew that he was close with his mother but we also
thought he was close with his father because the night he went missing he had dinner with his father do you have uh
can you either talk about what leads you to believe that uh Brian Shaffer was not
close to his father as supporting evidence or talk about the nature of the source that told you that Brian Shafer
was not close with his father or semi-estranged or whatever language you want to use yeah so the loose story is
that Brian's mother was sick um that his father was have an affair on the mother and Brian knew about this
Brian was more a mama's boy and um had issues with his father doing this and wasn't speaking to him
and basically the dinner that night before he went out drinking was to and again this was April 1st
thank you so the dinner with his father we always wondered I mean we talked to I
mean I've talked to thousands of people about this case and they'd say I think he met with the dad before he went
drinking because he knew he was going missing and it was his way to say goodbye yeah so the the story that that
comes out after he disappears is that he was meeting with his father for dinner because he's getting ready to go out on
this trip to Miami so hey Dad let's get together for dinner before I leave on this trip in a day or so and that's
verified that they did indeed have they did in fact have dinner together and then once the the young man goes missing
then you have this speculation of well maybe that was his way of you know sometimes when people and I'm
not saying that Brian committed suicide but the thought would be if he disappeared of his own will or if he was
planning to take his life there are some people that will secretly say goodbye to their close love
loved ones uh and the the person that they're saying goodbye to may not understand what that meeting is about
until after the fact and so the thought was that Brian was very close to his father Randy and this was the final meal
together this was the the goodbye dinner right but it changes the narrative and like like I want to talk about we have
two narratives here we have The Narrative of the father and we have Narrative of the media and the internet
saying a man walks into a bar and the man disappears never seen again so I just want to point out that just
that information alone that if it's fact which we believe it is fact that that narrative that Randy is
creating is then false right not saying that there's any he's not being delicious about well and
it brings but what it does is it brings a new argument into the room it brings a new
possibility so where it wasn't a let's have dinner before I go on vacation because I love you Dad or
dad I love you and I want to say goodbye to you before I do whatever I'm planning
to do without you knowing but now it brings in the argument of was the was this dinner more of uh we're
either going to try to mend our relationship right or we're never going to have a relationship right
and I think so here's the thing that keeps tripping me up is there are four scenarios here there is uh a man was
murdered uh a man accidentally died a man committed suicide and a man's self-disappeared right right no other
than those four I don't think anything well what else is it yeah right right those are what are what what are
the additional facts that could steer you other ways well well let's stay on the
narrative though okay so so all I want to bring up and there's going to be more information that comes out later and we
don't want to we don't want to give too much away because the podcast is still being recorded
but that I I bring up that conversation about Brian and his father his relationship because you once you find
out that his father is cheating on his mother that that is dying allegedly allegedly
that just puts a a damper on that narrative so the next narrative that we have to figure out is man walks into a
bar seen on video footage and is never seen again right so it really becomes could he got out of
the bar is everybody that was actually my next Point okay regardless of those four
there is still not footage of him leaving the bar right so when I when I was in communication with uh Nicholas West uh
one of the big questions on the Internet is so before Brian goes to leave he's either going to the restroom
or he's gone to talk to the band so everybody believes that he actually said to Clint Meredith
I'm going to go talk to the van I'll be right back and the band's name was never released
I know what the band is just for our listening audience a man in the audience not the name of a band so
I mean we're talking 10 years it was 10 years when we covered the case and we didn't know who the band was I'm
a local musician I was going well [ __ ] if we can figure and a lot of people's idea was if we can figure out
who the band was then we can talk to the band did he ever talk to Brian so you know I'm really invested into this
case and I'm talking with Nicholas West on the phone and he says to me and his awful
OU accent Athens it's Athens not oh yeah well come on yeah he says this is going to be a bad impersonation
but he says I know I know what the band's name is I literally I think I I [ __ ] my pants
and uh and I go who's the band and he said Rock House so that probably means nothing to
anybody in the room but I [ __ ] my pants again because I know every single guy in the band
and so rock house was uh at one point was a four piece cover band then turned into a three-piece cover band and they
were playing at The Ugly Tuna saluna because they were a very popular cover band
so Brian played guitar my thought was let me talk to the guitar player I end up calling him up I'm just going
to call him Chris S so I don't use his real name I haven't talked to the guy in about
three years and I and I say to him hey got this police report that says you played the ugly Tunis Luna the night
Brian Shaffer went missing he was like yep that was me and I haven't talked to him for a while
so he had no clue why I was calling to ask him this and he and so I don't know we've talked
about all this other nonsense I had to explain to him uh what a podcast was what true crime was why the hell I was
calling him but there this is a guy that I played with for years and years and years and
um he remembers it really well because they only played there twice and they played so many places hundreds
and hundreds of times but they only played there twice because it was a new bar new bars would spend a bunch of
money on getting the really good bands and then once they didn't have the money they'd start bringing in the shitty
bands so this was the second time he believes the second time that they played there he even named some people
that he was there with uh which I won't say their names on on them I just texted him again yeah we
keep texting them to get more information so they play that night he does not remember talking to Brian
I said does you know Brian played guitar so chances are he would talk to you and he said well you know you know man
uh if you don't have tits I don't have time that's what he said can't make that [ __ ]
up but he was talking to you yeah but I mean but at the gig if you don't have tits I
don't get time okay it's the after after you're done with the shell if you're a musician if there's a chance to meet a
girl it's going to happen within a five to ten minute window because you gotta pack your [ __ ] up so anyways he
remembers going into the bar and he remembers that it was roped off pretty well like you couldn't just go wandering into
construction sites there were parts of this building that were very skeleton yeah it was a new new build
um but he remembers a lot of dirt which I thought was really interesting because you wouldn't think
dirt on the second floor of a building being built but he remembers a lot of dirt but there was a path so he could
wheel his guitar amps too now this is where I'm getting into information if you don't know about the
case I'm sorry if this is going to bore the crap out of you but so staying on the on the idea of did he leave the bar
and not having video footage of him leaving the bar I'm getting to that okay so so like I said I wanted to just talk
about the two narratives we kind of blurred the Randy narrative now we want to blur this idea that he couldn't have
left the bar so Chris asks remembers Wheeling into the bar playing the gig it's done
he is there with we'll say Q we'll call the guy Q and we're going to call the girl
stripper Sarah now that's the name that he gave her not me he remembers that there was some kind of
uh confrontation not a fight but stripper Sarah got mad at somebody doesn't he can't remember if it's a guy
or a girl doesn't know but knows that there was somewhat of a confrontation and he remembers that Q
was there because Q had it in for stripper Sarah right now we have this story confirmed by Q as
well saying yes I was there yes I was watching Rock House blah blah blah I would just like it to be known I'd left
the room yes to pee but also to confirm this story specifically right and it has
been confirmed oh see so after the gig what's weird is I played with Chris S a long time and he
would pack up he'd load in and load out the same way every time and he was a little bit older than I was so when I
played the gigs with him I learned oh there's like this method to his Madness that's why he remembers all this crap so
he remembers that behind the Ugly Tuna there was this um it's kind of a pathway that you could
pull your car into it's not really so much an alley because like people could walk on it
it's really kind of hard to explain but anyways he Parks his Explorer in the back and there's a door
and if you see the door today there's camera well he claims there was no camera he claims there was no camera both times
and where it gets more interesting is there was some kind of disagreement with a guy or a girl with stripper Sarah
but why they were leaving and this would be after closing or right around this is
right around closing so he is packing up his stuff and the ban is going to hang out with
stripper Sarah a couple other other friends not because of her name and well maybe who knows uh and Q they're going
to all hang out somewhere afterwards because it started spring break all this stuff but what he can say definitively
was every there was a lot of people leaving you know so I'm on the phone with this
guy that I haven't talked to in years getting information about a case that we've worked for years
and to have somebody confirm that not only did people that worked at the bar leave the
same way that he left he also confirmed that there was other people that weren't working the bar
almost like they corralled a bunch of people like anybody that was still hanging out around the band or talking
the band was corralled through this exit so what we've been able to do is to like
I said it's the two narratives that I think are the most important and the one was that he couldn't leave the bar
without being on camera and I think that we've been able to prove that and we only have we could have left the bar
without being on camera right and then the other narrative being that not everything that Randy was saying made a
lot of sense well and the thing though just to do expand on what you just talked about
there with the band saying that other people were using this other exit that evening right even we went down there
now he's played at the Ugly Tuna and across the street at what World of Beers right
a bazillion times so he knew the area real well well but also at the time that was the only establishment that was open
in this large complex yeah and and so we covered the story 10 years after he disappeared so I had never been inside
the Ugly Tuna so I thought well I'll go down there this was a couple months before we decided to record the show and
so I went in there to see what it would look like um but the the quick thing that I spoke
to him about almost immediately was now mind you this is 10 years it's not so much it's not a skeleton building
anymore but what I did notice immediately was there were a lot of doors that seemed to go in and out of
that building on the ground level and a handful of them didn't have cameras 10 years after he went missing so I called
him up and I said you know I don't know how many of these doors were here 10 years ago but if but
from somebody looking at it you know usually you don't build a concrete building and then decide later
let's put a bunch of doors in right so it occurred to me you know this Dateline Narrative of a guy that walks into a bar
and vanishes into thin air doesn't hold a whole lot of weight here because there there were other options
there were other ways to leave that building right but like like we said I mean that's that's what's sad about this case
is because you have the two narratives I think it stopped a lot of people from doing research that they could have done
to maybe bring some closure to this case I want to wrap you guys up a little bit
and I want to open it up to questions but before anybody else has the opportunity to ask the question
what do you think happened to Brian Shafer Captain's on you first Well mine's not going to be a
Pleasant ending um and I said this on the show and I still you know I've been pulled a few
different ways since we've covered it and looked into some different things but I still kind of think this is the
most likely scenario is that I I believe that somehow he left that building that night whether it was
through the exit that the captain just explained was a very likely option or one of those other doors I think he was
one thing we can see on the video before you know there's not just him going into
the bar but there's a part where he comes out and he engages these two young ladies in conversation and either he's
super happy and dancing while he's talking to him or he's super intoxicated right because he's not standing still
very well he he looks like he's been out partying a lot because for the first time in a long time he
ain't got nothing to do in the morning staggering and his mom died right yeah so I think he probably made it out and
we we're very lucky that they've done a a very good job of cleaning up that area
in the past 10 years my guess would be that a couple of guys were driving or walking somewhere he
decided to walk home the his apartment was what six blocks from the bar so I'm thinking he was heavily
intoxicated these guys see a clean-cut dude walking in at three in the morning by himself visibly
intoxicated that's a great guy to Rob where was this apartment it was I don't I don't have the it was a
king Avenue so six blocks from the Ugly Tuna that's an easy target for a group of guys to Rob and sometimes
sometimes people Rob people they they have the intention of committing one crime and they end up committing another
a completely different crime in the process um those dumpsters in the area were checked
yeah but some of them weren't checked right away they weren't checked some of them weren't checked until after he
missed that flight on Sunday so when were the when were those dumps yeah when were those dumpsters checked could
he have been put in one of those dumpsters um one in the dumpsters were only checked in a small radius I didn't you
know they probably didn't check every single one from the Ugly Tuna to King Avenue yeah so I unfortunately I I I I
and I hope that I'm wrong but I think that that Brian was probably robbed and killed that night placed in a dumpster
and he's probably in the landfill Captain do you have any different thoughts on that well that's
horribly depressing um I think this case I think any case that sticks with you it's because you changed
your opinion of what happened and so I think the Ugly Tuna saluna is closing so I'm hoping that we were able
to at some point run some tests and try to definitively answer the question is he still in the building did
he fall into some kind of construction or anything like that I don't think he did I think he left with the band I
don't think he went anywhere with the ban um but I also think that there's going
to be more evidence that I mean there's ton of stuff that we could talk about tonight but would be here for like 10
hours and he'd be like wow this guy knows way too much about Brian Shaffer he well I think there's going to be
evidence that comes out that there's reason for the police to believe that he's still alive and which is which is
interesting because when we first covered the case Nick came to me and said I think he's possibly still alive
and I remember thinking uh you're you're a dope you know but now after researching it more and looking into
more things I think there's a very good possibility that he at least was alive for a time period
after that night so I think you're both hedging I'll say that but I do want to open it up for
questions um we do have a microphone this is a podcast Festival does anyone have any
questions for Nick or the captain there's zero questions that that makes a man feel please one at a time one at a
time coming up and just grab the microphone that's here on the table oh this one right here
fantastic um after work what I wear on them okay normal but um why was the band's name not released or
why what was that all about well I think why was it important well I don't know if it was that I don't
know if it's that important I think it's more the idea that they interviewed the
band the band was cooperative they told them everything they knew and they then they didn't think that there was any
reason to release the band name because we know that Brian went to talk to the band so then you'd have how many people
researching this band and then trying to figure out who was in the band and then
harassing them well there's more information well the most likely situation is that
they're here the reporters reporting on this are hearing this story from the two
friends that he was with that night or people that knew he was going there that night or had spoken to Clinton Meredith
right and so in the course of of natural storytelling what happened that night I
don't know he went and he spoke to the band in the moment the name of the band doesn't seem important to the person
telling the story or the person hearing the story right so then you report on it
and then years later somebody goes should somebody check with that band to see if he actually spoke to him because
if we can trace it's all about tracing one person's steps right kind of the nature of what you guys are
doing right so if we can trace his steps 10 steps further or 30 steps further or a block
further we can get closer to the truth and then years later when somebody has that great idea it's been lost for so
long it takes some sifting to find right but like he said I mean the cops had that great idea that's why they talked
to the band so I think the cops didn't release it because they already went down that rabbit hole and they and like
I said and they don't care about selling newspapers right if that makes sense well I have another
just comment I do like I of course totally appreciate facts and all your research but
anyone that listens to you is also I mean we have our own opinions and I do appreciate your opinions too so
that was the question I have no question comment comment on me okay I love you okay oh thank you well thank you
I think she was trying to say that we like your opinions as well we actually have a Blog we have on our
website truecrimegarage.com hello that you can go to and we encourage people hey if you've got a
theory on a case or a question on a case you can go there click on that specific
case and join in the conversation so when you talk about opinions we love to hear them
all right hey guys I want to say that I really appreciate the cases the the ones
that really bother me are Brian Shafer right Brendan Lawson right the guy in Texas who you did a great episode on
that by the way with the audience really how can I forget the Brandon Lawson really quick just for the
the future listeners Brendan Lawson uh so super sentences well it's pretty simple so Brandon Lawson calls 9-1-1 and
he goes missing period that's pretty much it and so we went to cover the case and we got to talk about
it for two hours and what I kept on seeing on the Internet is that if you listen to the 9-1-1 call you will be
convinced that you can make out what he says and so at midnight I listen to it I'm convinced I can figure it out and
I'm an audio engineer so I'm gonna slow down and speed it up and I was up till about seven eight o'clock in the morning
couldn't figure it out and and so we did two hours of me playing clip by clip slowing it down speeding it up and it's
it's kind of like what did he say I don't know because I want to get to the question no I don't know but that's
the Brandon Lawson all right yeah and also the Maura Marie case is another one that so you're just a missing person
well no but those are the ones that just bother the hell out of me I'm a missing
person too but the Brian Schaefer case the reason it's so close to me is one of the girls that last talked to him was a
friend of mine right and I saw Pearl Jam in 2010 and I had no idea that she was there yeah and so I mentioned her I'm
like oh they played comeback tonight did you ever hear the story about Brian and
she's like I was the one that talked to him before I went missing right and it was kind of probably like a [ __ ] your
pants moment when you when you got the band name it was like what yes like this has been something that's been on my
mind for years you know and I actually know somebody that was there but I wanted to touch on the thing that you
mentioned earlier about the people that were being corralled now I've read so much on this over the years and I don't
know where I heard this but I know that they mentioned that they were able to account for every person that went into
the bar that left the bar now if people were being crowd out of the back as they possible you think
that's a lie yes because I don't think they know how many people left the back because that's one of the things because
they have that camera in the on the outside of the ugly well I think you're partially right and and it's not
necessarily you being right or wrong it's the story that we are all being told right the story that we're being
told is that and and especially when you watch the Dateline version and there's other versions as well they're going to
show you a parade of people and characters coming up this escalator to go into this bar and get drunk right and
it's a little grainy and it's almost black and white um and you look at this and while
they're showing you this they say everybody that went into that bar that night's accounted for except for Brian
Shaffer what the truth is is and what's what's much more closer to the truth and
maybe not the exact truth but what's closer to the truth is everybody that everybody that is seen in
that particular footage everybody seen in that particular footage is accounted for okay with the
exception of Brian Shaffer now who does that leave out well that leaves out employees and banned security it leads
it leaves out more than a dozen people okay so they're just referring to the outside of the of the ugly possibly but
it's why everybody kept asking who's the band yeah because that is can be considered staff right and then
obviously the band is not going to be on the video footage of leaving the escalator
okay awesome thank you guys thank you hello hi I just recently graduated from OSU so
congratulations thank you so much please thank you hey Don't Clap too loud you got like a 1.8 the future of America
she was high the whole time no not at all a little bit my boss is in the audience so I'm sorry oh hello it was
just a joke he doesn't know her is this a joke yeah um but yeah so the theory that I was most obsessed with was that
he left and went through the construction zone and I was wondering um I read some stuff speculation of course
that the father company to the construction site um they were known for getting into
lawsuits and stuff like that every every construction company gets in the lawsuit
that is not true about every construction most construction companies get into lawsuits
but well um so I was talking to a friend who is a forensic scientist and she had
the theory that he was buried in the floor because it wouldn't change the structure of the building had he
decomposed so I was just wondering I believe all the floors were poured at that point okay I mean
the problem is when they say construction zone that's so blurry and it's so like well what it I mean we're
talking about people are going into a bar and going out of a bar it was a working bar uh based off of the band's
reports that yes there was some construction going on but it wasn't like crazy major construction well and the
other thing too sorry Nick the the other thing too though in in what makes that theory interesting is then after the
fact you have people who walk it and then they go I had a hard time navigating through there to get out when
I was sober right now keep in mind we just described the the area that was most under
construction is mainly being used by the band to get in and out now let's keep in
mind there's not a lot of sober bands one and two they're carrying equipment with them
as well so if if a drunken Soldier playing guitar can navigate his way through there now yes was Brian pretty
intoxicated 100 there's no arguing that um could something have happened there's
also the thought though which is a similar Theory to yours is that something went down inside that building
that night and someone chose to dispose of him in that construction area yeah and I think we're look
ugly tuna is closing and I think it's up to Columbus and people that actually care about this to to have a voice to
say hey we need we need these tests done to see if that that's a possibility because to go a little bit further on
your theory the what she's talking about is that the theory is that even if he was drunk
and that that the construction workers came back and they found him drunk in a thing that they covered them up it was
simply easier too right right but listen to this though so you're a foreman you work for a company
you probably don't really give a [ __ ] if they get sued and you find a dead kid
27 year old kid are you going to be a horrible piece of [ __ ] I'm just not saying anything
so you can save your company's ass it's not it's probably not your company it's something that doesn't hold a lot of
weight when you think about it that way I mean but on top of that though too is it's been 12 years and one thing that we
have learned is that okay this is there's no easy way of putting this but law enforcement would much prefer if I
were to be murdered tonight that three people kill me rather than one because on a long enough timeline one of those
people out of the three are very likely to tell somebody or to talk about it and
so if you have a situation where three you know one or two or three guys decide to pour concrete over some remains
somewhere of a person that they had nothing to do with their demise how easier is it for them to tell
somebody 10 12 years later yeah and and I think if that did happen I think it would have to be a
complete accident that he got wherever that he was covered up but I still think that they have an obligation to do a
better search because I don't think the searches were enough and all that search
I think would do is prove that he's still not in there and if they could prove that that at least eliminates one
Theory do you not believe that that that a sufficient search has been done for that I don't think so I don't think so
Captain how old are you 37. Nick 38 did you live in Columbus at the time yeah yeah yeah we were both born and
raised in Columbus okay if someone were to ask the lottery thank you what they thought happened to Brian Shafer what do
you think happened moderator there are the back hallways of that building are built the way the back
hallways of any University Building are they are very nondescript and there is no way finding signage
and it is very possible and also that building there was no Film Center it was not done literally that
there was a bar and a bar that is all that was done of the Gateway at that point
it is entirely possible that a person walks down that hallway and walks literally into a shaft
and I believe it's negligence I don't believe there is any um I don't think anybody covered anybody
up on purpose but I believe that a particular set of circumstances could have lent themselves to that guy being
The Bottom Of An Elevator Shaft which is which is possible but depending on how he was found I mean
a decomposing body is is an awful smell so not when he's covered in concrete yeah it depends if he was covered in
Cotton but it was like at the end that's what that's what I'm saying is that you
have the the people that are tenants in this in the space they're leaving and it's going to be open and I think it's
the it's campus Partners it's everybody's responsibility to do a actual search like an actual search that
I I just don't think they did one and if they just did if they just did cadaver dogs and he's in concrete the kid I
don't think there's any way that the cadaver dogs would know he's in the concrete
next question my question is if you believe he was robbed where do you think his body is
I think that they would have if if he were robbed by one or more person and it didn't go well
um I think they would have put him in a dumpster and just dumped him in the dumpster and then it could have been a
nearby one it could have been one not nearby yeah the college campus is interesting because there's big
dumpsters like on every corner right and I'm the mother of a soon-to-be sophomore
at Ohio State so and my husband used to work at Sky Bar which is relatively across from Ugly Tuna so this is you
know definitely has a meaning to us and I'm very you know very curious on your thoughts of where you think you know
every time I see that or every time I walk by I think where is where is this young man where is this child yeah I
think there's I mean there's no there's no evidence to suggest that he made it home that night so
if something happened to him it happened either at that location in my opinion or
or on his way home from there so you think he may have just dumped him in a dumpster and that was never leave him in
a dumpster they're emptied at some point right you got to remember though they're
not they're not really starting the search you know until they know for a fact that
he is he wasn't reported missing to police uh until he didn't show up for that for
that flight and actually what had happened was uh if I if I understand it correctly they called the police and
said look this dude's missing our loved one is missing and I believe that there was a police officer that was stationed
at the uh the boarding area for that flight because you know the police said well look he's an adult he can he can
leave if he wants to leave but we want to help you out with this because there's concern here
um if he doesn't show up to this flight then he's missing missing right endangered missing so okay
[Music] this is why we have a podcast because we talk and talk and talk so just swallow the bug probably did my
question is actually not about this case but just what has been your favorite case to cover is thus far
so we I mean we do so many that they actually it's the strange thing is that sometimes I
forget I forget the case we did last week because we we've covered so many of them we've covered about a hundred now
at this point so for me I it's more of what is my most recent favorite case that we've covered and and favorite
sounds strange to say uh but what held my interest longest recently would be the Lane Bryant shooting which came up
it was from Tinley Park Illinois we just passed the uh a little over the 10-year
anniversary of it where where several women were taken hostage at that lane bright during the course of a
robbery and and killed execution stop yeah and mine mine are always just going to be those cases that
some weirdo you know sends me an email saying I know some stuff about Brian Shaffer
and I mean I get asked you know women that listen to the show they ask for my number a lot on social media and I'll
never give it out it's because of that voice but but a guy that I don't know says hey I know some stuff about Brian
shaver I'm like here's my number so let me ask you do you get like do folks contact you and like it's just
like total [ __ ] yeah I mean there's been some emails that you just you know they don't feel right you know
like if they're giving you well they're trying to like hey I heard that you said
this and because of this I think this yeah and don't have actual information yeah or sometimes they'll say that they
were involved somehow in some way shape or form not not that they actually hurt anybody but they were friends of a
friend or whatever actually have a little bit of a follow-up I actually I really enjoy the
fact that you guys will give history of locations like uh the Lane Bryant case you gave a history of the Lane Bryant I
like that it's different and I really appreciate it and I also just want to know what side of town are you guys from
um well I live in North Columbus but I'm South California but we but we both both grew up in Grove
City all right so as a longtime fan I always really wanted pick one episode to introduce a new fan
to what would you pick because I feel like the person who introduced me to your show picked the most perfect
episode can I wait till you answer to tell you yeah yeah oh yeah we gotta answer yeah now you
have to answer it well I've been drinking so I've I was kind I was half listening what
were you talking about no I know okay come on get with it um I don't know I think there's there's a
handful of cases that that have always interest me I think they're pretty big in the True Crime
world I mean West Memphis Three is a big one there was a lot of documentaries on
it I think if you watch every single documentary and then you listen to our three-parter I think maybe you'd realize
that we kind of know some stuff about some stuff so I I would say a case like that or a case like Brian Schaefer
because the interesting thing with Brian Schaefer or any missing person case for me is that there's all these what uh
what if some and so many possibilities that I think it becomes a thinking game and I think those draw people in so I
think one of those uh Brian Schaefer West Memphis Three um missing maramari so uh Brian Schaefer is an interesting one
because the captain and I are roughly the same age I mean within months of his age so
um and being a Columbus case we you know our heart is there and and we try to be
with every case but some sometimes you know when you're reading something and you're reporting on something that
happened in the 60s in a far away place it it almost feels like a story rather than something that was real where Brian
seems very real because it's close for me I would say it's a similar situation to uh probably there was a case from
here in Columbus in the early 80s a young man of by the name of Anthony Muncie was murdered he was 15 years old
you can't but you couldn't tell a new listener to listen to that one because it's a bonus episode I can tell them
whatever I want hey you should check out this podcast but you're gonna have to pay for the first one so the drug
dealers give it out for free and then they charge you so Tony Muncie would be my case that's the one that that I
dragged behind me everywhere I go and um the other case would be Amy maholovic from up in Bay Village Ohio from 1989.
those would be the two which one was yours well I I learned to love you guys in Texas and she was a Texas native as
well so the Ohio ones were perhaps so personal but she told me Casey Anthony yeah and I was like that and she loves
the captain well Casey Anthony too I mean she she was she was caught wearing Ohio State shirt so that drives me nuts
over there yeah that's true I want to wrap up with one thing and a uh thank you so much you can
tell me I'm an [ __ ] for doing it but when we first asked you guys the podcast Festival you said we don't want to do an
episode he said it's it's not appropriate for us to do a live show about a case um and we ended up settling on sort of a
a mixture of it yeah um I sort of want to know how you why you made that choice and why what
what sort of ownership and responsibility do you guys feel about what you're doing
well there's a lot there's popular uh True Crime shows that are in the category of Comedy
I think that's okay that I mean that they can do whatever they want uh we do sometimes have jokes on the show but
none of this stuff is funny you know this happened to real people and we just felt like if you do a live
show and there's some really popular um True Crime shows doing tours and um sometimes I will say something as Nick
is presenting the case and sometimes it's just some something stupid that popped
into my head at the time and sometimes it's not against the victim so we leave it in
and it just lightens the air a little bit while we discuss this case and sometimes we'll say something that
crosses line and so we have the way one the ability to edit that out but also I think it
would be really I wouldn't feel comfortable having a room full of people laugh about
somebody's tragedy or death or disappearance if that makes any sense well and the
other part of that too is that we do spend a ton of time on the show and we put a lot of thought and a lot of
effort into it and we're able to do that in the safety of the garage and here we're not able to do that so that's kind
of the the bar that we've set for ourselves and here we're out of our element a little bit
um it's a little more free for you have your notes you don't have like your reference you can't just hit pause right
that's right this is not how we sit in the garage no so a lot of people think we face each other
yeah that's that's the you don't no actually that's what most people think that that it's like are you back happens
there and then I'm here wow I don't want this is it just weird like especially when there's no audience it's even more
weird like these are there's two guys why would we sit this close and just stare at each other while we're talking
usually he's staring at a computer because he's recording and editing as we I don't even look at him go and I'm I
sit near the refrigerator and the window back here and I have my hole set up yeah I don't even know what he looks
like no but yeah it's just I think there's a you you do look and like I said I'm not bashing on
any of the other shows that are that are comp they're comedy based shows that's however that showed up that's what their
um that's what they're how they're choosing to do it I just think that it's for us to do it
be disrespectful to the victim so ladies and gentlemen Round of Applause thank you guys
thank you everybody coming out here tonight thank you guys so much for coming out of the Columbus podcast
Festival [Music] [Applause]

True Crime Garage /// Columbus Podcast Fest 2018 /// Brian Shaffer

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

Brief Summary

True Crime Garage hosts discuss their podcast journey and the Brian Shaffer case, exploring narratives and community impact.

Key points

The Fist Fight Incident. A humorous moment where they almost got into a fist fight during recording.
Gut Feeling of Success. Captain reflects on his belief that their podcast would succeed.
Determination to Succeed. Captain shares his relentless pursuit of podcast success through emails to agents.
The Disappearance of Brian Shafer. A medical student goes missing under mysterious circumstances, leaving behind a complex narrative.
Conflicting Narratives. The narrative around Brian's disappearance is shaped by family and media, leading to confusion.
Public Computer Mystery. A message signed by Brian appears online during his father's funeral, raising questions about his fate.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

We're going to talk about a phantom killer.

Deciding on their first podcast topic.

6:01WatchFeb 26, 2023

Tension

65/ 100Some tension

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