What Happened to Maddi Kingsbury?

August 26, 2024

In this episode, Payton and Garrett explore the recent case of Maddi Kingsbury. When Maddie suddenly disappears, her friends and family launch a desperate search. However, suspicions arise when her boyfriend begins behaving strangely, prompting the police to dig deeper for answers.

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AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

You're listening to an Oh No Media podcast.

Hey everybody, welcome back to the podcast! This is MurderWith My Husband. I’mm Payton Moreland.

I’m Garrett Moreland.

And he's the husband.

And I'm the husband.

Okay, uh, if you are watching on YouTube, our outfits aregoing to change in like two minutes after the intro because our intro gotcorrupted. So, hi! We are doing this intro for the second time.

I need to tell you something: we have merch available rightnow! It is our Basics line; it is monochrome. We changed the fit—it's a littlebit more boxy, a little bit more loose. These are the highest-quality shirts wehave ever done. If you've gotten our merch before, these don't even compare.They are monochrome, like I said, with stitching. You can wear it out, and itdoes not say "murder" on it—just MW MH—so you can wear this out, andpeople aren't going to be like, "Oh, that's obviously merch." They'regoing to be like, "Oh, that's a sick shirt! Where did you get that?"

The quality is, like I said, very high. The weight of theshirt is heavier, so it just feels good. It doesn't feel cheap. You can wash itover and over again. I don't care what anyone says; it is 100% my favoritemerch that we've launched to date, as far as quality and just everythingtogether. I actually wore my shirt to the gym last night, just saying.

And, if I'm correct, the price point didn’t change, right?Quality has gone up, but prices remain the same. Because, just on our end, wedo not inflate during inflation—I'm just kidding. But, okay, merch is availablenow, so go check it out!

My next announcement is a reminder that we stream on Twitchevery single Thursday at 5:30 PT. We hang out, we talk with chat—it literallyis such a vibe. It feels like an exclusive Murder With My Husband clubover there at this point. We are so close with chat. We watch true crime, wewatch body cam footage, we react to police videos, or just spooky videos. Laststream, we watched the six scariest encounters in the woods that have ever beencaught on camera. It was so fun. It was creepy, but it was really fun!

And just a heads-up: we are going to start posting our full,long—like our entire VODs, the entire Twitch streams—on Patreon. If you're anApple subscriber or a Spotify subscriber and you want to get access tothose—because right now you can only see them if you come to our lives—but ifyou want to get access and you're not a Patreon user, shoot us an email orshoot us a DM. We'll make it work for you no matter what.

We do have a separate YouTube channel called Payton andGarrett where we are posting shorts right now from those lives. We will beposting 5- to 7-minute videos from those lives. Super fun, come check it out.That's what we got for announcements. Kind of a lot today, but we wanted tofill everybody in.

Alright, and I think that leads us into your 10 seconds forthis episode. Well, if you follow us on social media, you probably already knowthis, but we were going through Dutch Bros the other day. By the way, realquick, if someone at corporate at Dutch Bros is listening to this—can we havelike a drink? It doesn't even need to be everywhere, just in like one city fora week where we can get it every single day. Or just a sticker—you don't evenhave to pay me!

Please, we go there every single day, and it would just befun. I'm not going to lie—you have two stores where every single employeelistens to Murder With My Husband. Also, everyone on the podcast knowsabout Dutch Bros, that we get Dutch Bros. Anyway, someone at corporate, pleasehelp. We just want a sticker, we just want something. Actually, we don't wantanything—we just really like you guys. Actually, I guess we do want something,to be honest.

Anyway, I was at Dutch Bros, and it wasn’t the employee’sfault—it’s 100% Garrett’s fault. We were getting our drinks, and I was bringingPayton's drink—which, by the way, is a medium blended cocoa with chocolatedrizzle. I was bringing it through the window, and it was pouring rain outside,so I had the window barely open because we were getting soaked. I grabbed thedrink, bringing it inside, but the lid hit the top of the window as I wasbringing it inside. My momentum continued to carry the drink inside,and—splash—not just a splash, a full spill all over. I was soaked, likecompletely soaked.

There’s coffee all over the car, coffee all over the window.Right now, there’s still coffee all over the car because we haven't gotten itcleaned yet. There's coffee inside the little parking button, so we can't evenpush it because it gets stuck, and our car starts freaking out. Coffeeeverywhere.

So what happened next? The worker looks at us and is like,"Um, do you guys need napkins?" because I don’t think he could seehow bad it had spilled. Garrett’s in total shock and says, "No." AndI, from the passenger seat, go, "Uh, yes, yes, sir, we do neednapkins." They give us some, but it is not going to help. We pullforward—it's still pouring rain—and I said, "Garrett, step foot out ofthis car and take all of your clothes off," because literally his entire shirtand pants were soaked in coffee.

Let's be honest, Payton just wanted to see me with myclothes off.

I crawl through to the back seat to see if we have anything.I grab Daisy’s blanket that we use at the park and a plastic bag that I somehowhad back there. I bring it back up, and Garrett takes everything off until he'sbutt naked. He wraps up in the blanket, and we take his clothes, put them inthe trash bag, and drive home. We drove home butt naked. Thank you, DutchBros—what a way to get somebody naked!

But no, it was crazy. It was funny. I don’t get mad aboutthat stuff—it was just funny, a good time. And yes, that’s what happened.That's my 10 seconds, kind of all I got for everybody. No hot takes thisweek—I’ll save it for next week since we had a lot of announcements and a lotof stuff.

And on that note, let's hop into today's case.

Alright, our sources for this episode are: ABC 6 News,NBC Chicago, K111.com, KVRR Local News, CNN.com, ABC5 News, MPRNews.org, Fox 9 News, InTouchWeekly.com,and CBSNews.com.

Okay, so there’s no denying that in this day and age, socialmedia plays a major role in our daily lives, but it also plays a huge role inthe true crime space as well. There have been plenty of cases that gainedglobal attention thanks to Instagram and TikTok, and a lot of good comes fromthat.

Decades-old cases have been reopened because of socialmedia; new clues and witnesses have been uncovered. Some cases even see justiceafter a few viral posts. But with the good, as we know, comes the bad. Therewill always be people out there who hear about these cases online and then usethem as a blueprint for their own crimes. Much like the villain in today'scase, not only did they become obsessed with a famous viral murder case, butthey also tried to recreate it. And when it came time for justice, theycomplained in the same way social media had inspired them to commit thiscrime—that it was now the reason they would never get a fair trial. How ironicis that?

It is ironic. Okay, let’s get into it.

So, we're headed to a little town in Minnesota calledWinona.

Always the little towns, man. We're always starting in theselittle towns, and that's when you know everything's going to go south. Nooffense to anyone who lives in a little town, but watch out.

And if you're wondering—yes, the actress Winona Ryder wasnamed after the town, since she grew up only a few dozen miles away.

But when it comes to this town, Winona has this relaxed andreally friendly charm about it. With a relatively small population of about27,000 people, it allows for this tight-knit community, but it’s also bigenough to reap the benefits of restaurants, shopping, and maybe some more urbanamenities. Winona also just so happens to be the place that 26-year-oldMadeline Kingsbury—or as her friends called her, Maddi—called home.

Maddi was very much your girl next door. She was sweet,intelligent, and a sorority girl who had been an undergrad at Winona StateUniversity. In March of 2023, she was in her first semester of a master’sprogram at this college. At the same time, Maddi was juggling a full-time jobas a clinical research coordinator at the Mayo Clinic, which was definitely alot of pressure for the 26-year-old because she also had two young children athome, both of whom were fathered by her long-term on-and-off-again boyfriend.

So, she’s really doing the whole thing: in a master’sprogram, has a job as a clinical research coordinator, and has two kids. Now,this guy—her on-and-off-again boyfriend, who is also the children's father—is aman she met back in college during her earlier days. He was a computer sciencemajor named Adam Fravel.

Now, Adam seemed smitten with Maddi practically since themoment he met her, and Maddi was taken by his charm. He was outgoing, seeminglyambitious, and really took an interest in Maddi’s life and getting to know herfamily. But while the two were still at Winona State University, Maddi learnedshe was pregnant with her first child. Apparently, Adam stepped up to theplate. He quit school, got a job, and began doing what he needed to do tosupport Maddi and their new baby. He and Maddi got a place and started livingtogether, and at that point, things seemed to be going okay for the couple.

But then COVID hit.

During the pandemic, Adam got laid off from his job, whichmade things difficult for the couple, as Maddi was still finishing her degree.Even after she began working for the Mayo Clinic, things were tight for thefamily as Adam struggled to find another job and some steady work. And it onlygot harder when the couple learned they were pregnant with their second child.

By 2023, 29-year-old Adam had set aside any plans to use hisdegree. Instead, he had been taking flying lessons with a new dream of becominga pilot, and this is how he planned to provide. Maddi did everything she couldto be supportive of that, even if it meant being the sole breadwinner for thefamily while also attending school.

On March 31st, 2023, Maddi and Adam woke up in the morningand got their 5-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son ready for daycare, just asthey did every single day. They drove together and dropped them off a littleafter 8:00 a.m. When they got there, Maddi apologized to the daycare worker forbeing late but didn’t offer a reason. Then Adam and Maddi hugged their kidsgoodbye, got back into Maddi’s 2014 blue Chrysler Town and Country van, anddrove back home so Maddi could get ready for work.

At 8:15 a.m., Maddi remembered a text she’d gotten from hersister Megan the night before. It was a funny photo from a trip they took theprevious summer to Rhode Island. She had forgotten to respond, so she justopened it up and sent back a quick “LOL.” Megan texted her back with anotherunimportant question, but Maddi didn’t reply. Megan didn’t think much of it,knowing that Maddi was busy working full-time and being a mom. Typically, Maddiwas also the one who picked the kids up from daycare on her way home from work.

Only, this day, not only did she not text Megan back, butwhen it was time to pick the kids up, she didn’t show up. In fact, herco-workers said she never actually made it into work that morning either. Ano-call, no-show, which was wildly unlike Maddi.

By that evening, both Megan and her mother knew this wasn’tlike Maddi to go all day without responding. When Megan sent a few more textsand made calls with no answer, she reached out to Adam, very concerned. Adamanswered and said, “Yeah, I’m panicking too. When I got home this afternoon, Maddiwas gone.” So Adam had to be the one to pick up the kids from daycare at around4:30.

After hanging up with Adam, Megan called one of Maddi’s bestfriends, a woman named Katie, who lived just down the street from the couple.Megan asked Katie if she could pop over to the house and maybe see what wasgoing on. Katie wasted no time; she threw on her shoes, headed over, andknocked on the door. But the house was eerily dark and silent—there was no onehome.

It turns out that Adam, at this point, had taken the kidsand gone to his parents’ house in Maybel, about an hour's drive south thatevening, which was strange. Especially if his girlfriend had been missing allday, he was going to waste an hour to go drop his kids off at his parents’house? This is probably why Katie got that weird sinking feeling that somethingwas really wrong with the whole situation. You’d think Adam would want to be inthe place where they knew she last was, trying to figure everything out.

I know this is kind of off-topic but on-topic.. The otherday I was in the gym, working out. I texted Payton and said, "Hey, are youalive?" just because we hadn't talked for a second. And I kid you not,when I texted her, I thought, "Okay, she’s dead inside the house rightnow, like the cameras are watching me, am I acting weird? Am I actingnormal?" You know, I'm at the gym, and I'm just sitting there thinking,"Okay, what would a normal person do?"

So, I just started... You went there, you pretended... I’mnot pretending, but that sounds almost like an OCD thought.

Yeah, it was. It’s like I convinced myself I had murderedyou. Yes! So, I just started bobbing my head back and forth, like, "Oh,I'm just listening to music. I'm just dancing. Everything's okay." What anintrusive thought! And then, since you didn’t respond, I was like, "Oh, shit.”Then I was like, "Okay, I'm going to look at my phone and act like, 'Oh,sad... everything's okay.'"

This is psychotic. I know it was a little weird, but youjust couldn’t control it. It was just impulsive. It was impulsive. It's becauseof the podcast. Yeah, it’s because of the podcast. You think all the time thatwe are watching these people’s behavior. It gave me OCD-like intrusivethoughts. I’ve never had that happen before. I can’t believe you were actuallyfollowing through on it.

I was. I was like, "I'm broken. I broke. Four and ahalf years into this, I broke." Yeah, no, but it wasn’t that bad. It wasjust like... And then you responded, and I was like, "Ah, okay,everything's fine."

Well, you sent me another text. Yeah, I sent you a questionmark. I was cleaning my makeup brushes and trying to find content for Twitch.Yeah, and so I was looking down, I didn’t see you text me, and then I saw thesecond text of just question marks. I was like, "Wait, did he text mesomething else?" So then I looked, and once you responded, I was like,"Ah, okay, everything's okay."

Yeah, I sent you a picture. I was alive. I literally waslike, "The cameras are watching me. I need to hire an attorney,"because I was just thinking like if... I'm sad that you're thinking I'm deadright now, and the only thing you're thinking about is hiring an attorney andhow you're acting, not "Is she dead?"

Because I’ve seen so many of these cases where I don’t wantto get wrongfully convicted. Yeah, I was freaking out. Everyone just hones inon the husband’s behavior, and I was like... Also, we were just at the housetogether. We were just hanging out, and then I left to the gym, so it’s like Iwas the last one who saw you. I was the last one that was with you.

You could have killed me before you went to the gym. Couldhave killed you. That’s what I’m saying. My thoughts were like, "Thisisn’t good for me. They're going to think this. They're going to thinkthis." But Payton's alive, and everything's okay.

And that scares me a little. Why? I'm just disappointed youweren’t actually thinking about me being dead. Well, because I think I knew youweren’t actually dead. It was more just like... Your mind went there. Yeah, Iknew you weren’t actually dead. It was more just like, "Oh, shoot."You know what I'm saying?

Exhausted brain. Yeah.

The following morning, April 1st, is a Saturday. With Maddinow missing for 24 hours, the family goes to the police to file a report. By2:25 that afternoon, the Winona police publicly declare this a missing personinvestigation and dispatch resources to try and locate Maddi Kingsbury.

Meanwhile, her family and friends are doing their own duediligence to find her. Adam takes to Facebook for help, posting, "Ifanybody has seen Maddi, please contact the Winona PD, me, or any of her familymembers. Please help me find the mom to our two beautiful kids."Meanwhile, Megan, her sister, flocks to TikTok to spread the word about hermissing sister.

But that same day, police actually find the first real cluein Maddi’s case. They discover that the day prior, between 10:00 a.m. and 1:30p.m., they had footage of Maddi’s blue van driving on a country road and thenheading southbound on Highway 43. They were checking all the cameras to see ifthey could spot her anywhere, and this is where they found her car. The vanthen traveled back toward Winona, northbound on 43, and was parked back in thedriveway at her house around 1:30 p.m.

What they don’t have is any footage of who was actuallydriving that van, so they begin knocking on doors along that country road tosee if anyone has any of their own security footage where they can get a clearview of who was in the vehicle, but it gets them nowhere.

Of course, the first person police want to speak to is Adam,especially considering he was the last person they know of who saw hisgirlfriend on the day she disappeared. Adam seems more than willing tocooperate. He tells them that he and Maddi dropped off the kids at daycare,which they confirm via video footage, and they then returned home by 8:15 a.m.According to him, Maddi went into her home office to get a little work donebefore she left for her actual office at the Mayo Clinic. During this time,Adam says he had some boxes he needed to move to his parents' house. Heexplains that the couple had been in the process of moving out of that houseand in with his parents to save a little bit of money.

That day, he actually took Maddi’s van, which had more spaceto move things, and left Maddi his car to drive to work. He says that around10:00 a.m., he left home and headed down Highway 43, which was on the way tohis parents’ house, and this kind of explained who was driving the car.However, he says that halfway there, he realized he had made a mistake. Hetells police that’s when he realized the boxes he packed were actually the oneshe wanted to put in storage, not take to his parents. So, he turned around anddrove back to the house he shared with Maddi, which is why the van was back inthe driveway by 1:30 p.m.

He says that when he got there, he noticed his car was stillat the house, but he didn’t worry because he figured Maddi had just gotten aride with a friend to work. He said it wasn’t until he began texting her andreceiving no response that he really started to panic. Then, when there wasstill no word from Maddi at 4:30 and he had to go pick up the kids fromdaycare, he got really worried.

After this, the police decided to search the house that Maddiand Adam share.

It sounds... I mean, yeah, it sounds pretty reasonable tome.

And while they don’t find any signs of a struggle, they dodiscover that Maddi’s cell phone, wallet, and the jacket she was wearingearlier that day when they dropped the kids off are still inside the house.

Okay, that part’s weird. That’s not a good sign.

They also notice naked spots on the walls inside, where itlooks like security cameras were once installed but had since been taken down.Adam defends this, telling the police, “Guys, I told you we’re in the processof moving. I packed the cameras; they were one of the first things I packedup.”

I’m just saying right now, this is exactly why I wasthinking I need to get an attorney and start doing this stuff. But I’m going tobe honest, I’m not feeling very hopeful for Adam here.

But Adam insists, saying, “We’re going to have people walkthrough this house; I can’t have cameras up in it.”

But this isn’t the only red flag. When Adam and the policefirst talk, the police notice that Adam has pretty bad scratches on hisface—bad enough that they were noticeable. Adam claims they were caused by afriend’s dog, which, if true, is just very unfortunate timing for Adam.Scratches on his face the same day his wife goes missing, and they happened tobe from a dog?

Was it real? I’m not sure if police ever went and checked.I’m sure they did, but they never announced that to the public.

None of these things are obviously enough to arrest Adam.After all, Maddi’s only been missing for about 30 hours now. But by the eveningof April 2nd, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension knows this is notlooking good, so they issue an endangered missing person alert for Maddistatewide.

Meanwhile, Megan is still hitting the social media circuithard. After posting her first video about her missing sister, it gets half amillion views. Holy crap! Every day, she posts new updates about the case,hoping to reach anyone who might be able to help them find her.

Surprised we didn’t see this.

Then, about two weeks into the investigation, police uncoveran unexpected twist in Maddi’s story. She had been having a secret relationshipwith a man named Spencer Sullivan.

Okay.

And I mean, when someone goes missing and then you find outthere's a love triangle, yep, it's starting to get messy.

So, Spencer was an Army veteran Maddi had met back at WinonaState. He also happened to be one of Adam’s fraternity brothers—so herlong-term boyfriend and the father of her children were fraternity brothers.

Now, Maddi and Spencer didn’t know each other all that well,but Maddi had recently started a Tinder account. When the two matched on theapp, they decided to reconnect. Maddi told Spencer about her situation: she andAdam were still together, but they weren’t in the best of places. Adam wasn’tpulling his weight as a father, which was frustrating for Maddi, who wasbearing the weight as the breadwinner of the family. Maddi and Adam had been incouples therapy, but it wasn’t seeming to do them any good.

Surprising to me that she was on Tinder in a small town,right? And he didn’t find out?

Well, we don’t know that.

Okay, I guess that’s true. All right, let’s keep going.

So, she tells her lover that they were arguing a lot, and Maddiwas looking for ways to get out of the relationship and just move on with herlife.

Spencer was sympathetic, and he liked Maddi enough to keeptheir relationship a secret for the time being. However, the police also had torule him out as a potential suspect once they learned about him. Luckily forSpencer, he had a solid alibi—he was actually at work during the time of Maddi’sdisappearance. But that doesn’t mean that the relationship doesn’t somehow playa part in what happened.

By this point, police had a strong suspicion that Adam wasinvolved in Maddi’s disappearance. There’s just the whole, “Well, I had thewrong boxes, so then I had to turn around,” and then the, “Well, I have thescratches on my face,” and now there’s a love affair involving one of hisfraternity brothers. It concerned them that as soon as Maddi went missing, hescooped the kids up and raced them to his parents.

So they sent social workers over to his parents' house totry and meet with the kids, thinking maybe the kids knew something, which iswhy Adam got rid of them so fast and sent them away. They wanted to make sureeverything was okay, but Adam and his parents were not cooperative when policegot there. At one point, Adam actually grabbed his 2-year-old son, locked thedoor, and began shouting curse words at the police from inside the house.

Eventually, authorities did remove the kids from the home,but Adam refused to pack them a bag. After this, the kids were placed in a72-hour hold by the county before being turned over to Maddi’s parents fortemporary custody.

Meanwhile, police ramped up their efforts to try and find Maddi,using aircraft and boats to search nearby waterways. The Winona police evenissued statements to the public, asking for their help in searching woodedareas outside of people's homes, as well as vehicles, trailers,outbuildings—any place where someone could have hidden a body. The weekendafter her disappearance, more than 2,600 people showed up to help in a massivesearch along country roads and out in the farmland surrounding Winona, butstill, there were zero signs of Maddi.

By April 12th, 13 days after Maddi went missing, the policeremained steadfast in believing her disappearance was involuntary andsuspicious. They were, quote, "extremely concerned for her safety."By then, they had also taken her van in for evidence processing, but from whatI can find in my research, they determined nothing out of the ordinary with hervan.

What was suspicious, however, was the anonymous tip theyreceived two days before this. Apparently, a neighbor of Adam’s parents saw himon the afternoon of Maddi’s disappearance, riding around the area in a utilityvehicle with a shovel. So the police sent a team of cadaver dogs to theproperty in question. They got a hit with the cadaver dogs on the utilityvehicle that Adam was seen driving.

I'm never buying a shovel. I'm never ever buying a shovel,ever.

So the Fravel family had an explanation for this, though.When police told them the dogs were hitting on the vehicle Adam was seen in,they said that the previous weekend there was a dead raccoon on the property,and they used that vehicle and the shovel to pick it up. Here’s the problem,though—the dogs are specifically trained to pick up on a human's scent, and theparents didn’t know that. Not animal scent—human scent. This definitely adds tothe growing mound of suspicion against Adam.

But two days after that search, Adam put out a statementinsisting he had cooperated with law enforcement and had nothing to do with Maddi’sdisappearance. He also said, “I want the mother of my 5-year-old and 2-year-oldto be found and brought home safely. I want that more than anything.”

On May 5th, 2023, with still no sign of Maddi, the familydecided to hold a vigil to offer their prayers. More than 200 people in theWinona area came out to pay their respects. It’s unclear if Adam showed up.June 1st, Maddi’s 27th birthday, came and went with no sign of her, and policewere no closer to figuring out what happened to her. Megan once again went toTikTok to spread awareness about her sister’s disappearance, hoping someonethere might have details that could move the needle.

On June 5th, Adam filed a petition with the court to havesole custody of the couple’s two children. He was like, “Hey, give me back mykids.” His petition was denied, which meant Maddi’s 2-year-old son and5-year-old daughter remained in the care of her parents. This turned out to bea blessing, considering everything in this case was about to change just twodays later.

It was June 7th, 2023, when police received an importantclue—digital evidence connected to Maddi Kingsbury had been found 46 milessouth of Winona near the town of Mabel, which is where his parents live. I’mnot sure what the digital evidence was, but I know it was a good tip becausearound 1:30 p.m. that afternoon, a Fillmore County deputy followed up on thelead. This lead took him down Highway 43 to a gravel road and then to a morewooded area just off of that. Sure enough, lying in the brush where this tiphad led them, wrapped in a gray fitted bed sheet with black duct tape, was thebody of Maddi Kingsbury.

The most incriminating part? It was literally steps awayfrom Adam’s parents' property—where her body was found was just steps away.What’s crazy too is that his parents knew, and they were hiding everything.Those mother effers, dude.

So two hours later, police arrested the 29-year-old Adam onsuspicion of murder because, at this point, her body was found on his parents’property, essentially, and there was the utility vehicle someone saw him with.We still don’t know the source of the tip, though—this will probably come outat trial. They didn’t feel the need to publish it.

For those who knew Maddi and Adam, his arrest was hardly asurprise because many had been suspecting Adam from day one, considering therelationship between him and Maddi had been on the rocks, and she wasn’t reallysecretive about it. Apparently, there was a lot more going on than just thefighting and the infidelity. According to Maddi’s family, there were plenty oftimes when Maddi would call them sobbing about the way Adam was treating her.

One of Maddi’s friends, Haley Scott, said she witnessed Adamscreaming at Maddi during a FaceTime call. He yelled about how dirty the housewas, and when Maddi told him maybe he could clean the house, he walked over andslapped her across the face.

Holy sh— I was going to say, I mean it doesn’t sound like Maddi—she’sthe breadwinner and going to school—I was going to say it doesn’t sound likethere’s any physical abuse, but there was physical abuse.

Well, this was supposedly just one instance of physicalabuse. We also don’t know what was going on behind closed doors that Maddisustained. In September of 2021, he began doing something that terrified hermore than ever. This was 18 months before Maddi disappeared. She called thatsame friend, Haley Scott, who she kind of confided in. And—

I know Haley Scott, Nathan Scott, okay, it’s a One TreeHill thing, but it’s okay. I just had to point it out.

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Maddi calls Haley to say that Adamhad been weirdly obsessing over the Gabby Petito case. Remember—

Wow, okay. Uh, yeah, you guys all know the Gabby Petitocase. He wasn’t the only one weirdly obsessing over it, I will say, butthis—like Maddi calls her friend and is weirded out. He was like psychoticallyobsessing over it. So, quick rundown—does that make sense?

Gabby was 22 years old. She went on a cross-country roadtrip with her fiancé, Brian, and when he came home to Florida without Gabby, itsparked this massive search. It went completely viral on social media, and itgoing viral on social media is actually what led to her case being solved, orher body being found in Wyoming. It’s because there was another YouTuber—Ithink a couple, if I remember correctly—another YouTube channel heard about thecase. They were going through their footage, and they saw his car—theircar—driving.

Yes, and the only reason they went back through theirfootage was because they were like, “Well, we were in an area that they’resaying maybe possibly they had been.” And they literally caught his car oncamera, and then that just sparked a search, and they found her body there.

Yep, so I mean, literally without social media, I’m not sureher body would have ever been found because no one actually knew theirwhereabouts. It was like, “They could have been here, they could have beenhere, they could have been here.”

It was also probably, I would dare say, the first case in along time or the first case on TikTok that really—

It was different. It was different than other true crimecases. Like when we say it blew up, it blew up. It was—

Okay, you have cases that blew up so big. You have caseslike Laci Peterson, the Menendez Brothers. You have cases that true crimepeople are obsessed with, right? Like, “We need to know.” Then you have GabbyPetito, who people who didn’t even like true crime were obsessed with. Likeanybody and everybody—like your normal— even people who didn’t really like truecrime—like everybody was talking about it.

Yes, people in my life who never talked to me about thepodcast or true crime were talking about it, and that was when I was like,“Okay, this is different.”

Yep, so I need to mention that Gabby Petito’s cause of deathwas manual strangulation by Brian.

Adam Fravel was not only pouring over this case on socialmedia; he was talking about it to Maddi. She told Haley that one night, Adamactually grabbed Maddi by the throat, pinned her down, and told her that if shewasn't careful, she was going to end up just like Gabby Petito. Holy hell.

So, Maddi said, "Hey, we got in this fight, and hechoked me and held me down and said if I'm not careful." That's insane.But I think it's important to tell you that Haley was not the only person Maddidisclosed this to. Apparently, she also sent a text to her other friend, Katie.This is the one who showed up on the night Maddi disappeared, looking for her.This meant there was cold, hard evidence in writing that Maddi was feelingthreatened by Adam.

Oh, she texted her?

Yes, and texted her and told her that he manually strangledher. Now, Katie, of course, panicked after she heard this from her friend andbegged Maddi to get out of the house with the kids. "Hey, it's not justyou; you have kids there. You need to get help." But Maddi never reportedany of these things to the police, and she told Katie she was afraid of Adamgetting arrested.

Eventually, though, she did tell her parents about whathappened and about the Gabby Petito threats. So they went to the house, helpedher pack her things, and she and the kids went to stay with her parents for acouple of days. Less than a week later, Maddi moved back in with Adam. Herparents tried to stop her, but, I mean, this is the father of her children.Even when they told her if she didn't get out for good, it was possible thatAdam would kill her. They told her that, yeah.

So, just a month before Maddi disappeared, she told a friendat the Mayo Clinic that everything was bad with Adam at the house. Sheconfessed that he had been physically abusive towards her for years. She wastelling another person about what was going on and that she would never leaveher kids under any circumstance. So, if she ever disappeared, it was definitelyAdam's fault. This was the first person she told at work, "Hey, if I gomissing, it's on Adam."

Eventually, Maddi also worked up the courage to tell Adamthat she'd met someone else, that she was looking for an apartment to take thekids to, and that she was leaving him for good. So she confronted Adam with,"I've met somebody. I am moving out, and I'm taking the kids." Thiswas six days before she disappeared.

Yikes.

Okay, obviously, when Maddi went missing, her friends andfamily went to the police and said, "Here you go. She literally toldsomeone if she goes missing, it was him."

But now, with her body being found, the evidence againstAdam was finally being put to use. Amongst it was a screenshot of a textmessage between Maddi and Adam. Maddi told him, "You know I'm not reallyokay with or over the fact that you put your hand around my neck and pushed medown in front of the kids earlier. So, I'm not okay with it at all, butespecially with them there."

To which Adam texted back, "You'll adjust."

What?

So she basically said, "I'm not okay with you puttingyour hand around my throat, but especially in front of the kids," and hesaid, "You'll adjust." What does that even mean? "You'll changeyour mind. You'll learn to be okay with it," is basically what he toldher.

Dude, that's scary. I don't really have many words becausethat is a killer.

So, along with those incriminating texts were the facts thatAdam had wiped his location tracking from his phone the day that Maddi wentmissing and that the cameras removed from the house were, of course, not donebecause the couple was moving. We know that it was Maddi moving.

Yep, police also knew there was a 25-minute gap from March31st when Maddi’s van was not picked up on any camera footage. They believethat 25-minute gap was when Adam was at the dump location disposing of Maddi’sbody.

Now, two days after his arrest on June 9th, 2024, AdamFravel was officially charged with four counts of murder in varying degrees,and a judge set his bail at $1 million. Again, I’m just going to say it: Did wenot learn from the Susan Powell case? If a husband has already killed his wifeand his two kids are still out there, why is he getting out on bail?

Yeah, I mean, he probably won’t post a million dollars. Ijust—

Why is it even an option? No, it shouldn’t be an option.

It should not. If you are charged—oh gosh, it’s hard becauseI want to say if you’re charged with murder you shouldn’t get bail. I want tosay maybe if you have—I guess it’s case by case. I just—

How many times have we seen family annihilators? All thetime, all the freaking time. It’s not that uncommon for a father figure in afamily to annihilate the whole family when the actual target of his rage wasthe wife. Or if they get out on bail, they should have zero access to the kids.Even then, I mean, Josh Powell was supposed to have supervised access and gotthose kids to run inside.

Honestly, there just needs to be stricter laws. There needto be more strict regulations and laws around this. I know it’s case by case,but honestly, if you’re 99% of people who are charged with murder, usuallythere’s something wrong with them. And obviously, you have your 1% or 2% whoare wrongfully convicted, and so on and so forth. But if the rule is the sameacross the board, it would just save so many lives and so much trouble.

So, after an autopsy was performed on Maddi, the medicalexaminer determined her manner and cause of death as homicide and homicidalviolence. I couldn’t get more detail than that. Again, the trial will help withall of that.

The only other thing I found was that a towel had beenknotted around Maddi’s head and neck, which likely made her cause of deathstrangulation or asphyxiation, which is a lot like the way Gabby Petito died.Police also learned that Maddi had a $170,000 death benefit through her workthat Adam was probably aware of, but what he clearly didn’t realize was thatshe had not listed anyone as her beneficiary—especially not him.

So, on June 12th, 2023, just a few days after his arrest, Maddi’sparents filed a motion with the court to ensure that Adam doesn’t have contactwith his children while he awaits his trial. From what I can tell, he iscurrently allowed to have supervised visits if he is out on bail, but I’m notsure if Adam was ever able to post it. I do know, however, that the bail wasraised to $3 million with no conditions or $2 million with conditions a fewmonths later.

So, it seems unlikely that he'll get it now. Adam's trial isset for the fall of this year, 2024, so this case is still ongoing.

Okay, here’s the ironic part: Adam and his attorneys arecurrently pushing for the trial to be moved out of Winona County.

Why? Because of all the media coverage on the case. Adamdoesn’t feel he’ll get a fair trial with a jury from Winona. According to themotion, 98% of people surveyed in a local poll said they had interacted with anews story about Adam’s case and had already formed an opinion on the outcome.

This brings up an interesting point: How do you, in an ageof social media, keep a jury from forming an opinion about a highly publicizedcase? I think this is something we’re going to find getting more and morecomplicated as social media becomes a bigger part of everyone’s life,especially as people take an interest in true crime. It is hard because whatare you supposed to do about that? At this point, it’s impossible—people aregoing to hear about these big cases whether they’re on the jury or not.

So, do you just trust that people don’t form opinions? Youcan’t because people are going to have preconceived ideas. I don’t know how youdo that. And then, it also is hard because it gives more power to the peoplewho are being convicted, right? Because they can say, "I didn’t get a fairtrial, I didn’t get a fair trial."

I mean, if we’re going to be honest, we form opinions onpeople within seconds of meeting them. So many times, a juror does have theirmind made up the moment they step into the box, which is kind of insane. It’snot just because they’ve heard of the case. I mean, a lot of times, jurors willget in and be like, “Seems like it was him.”

I swear, if you ever want to convict someone guilty, justhire me. Put me on the jury. I’m 99% going to say guilty. You can pay me off alittle bit if you want.

Will a change of venue make it so Adam gets a fair trial? Idon’t know. My guess is time will tell. He’s guilty; that’s the crap.

So, while the outcome of this case is still unclear, thereis one thing that’s crystal clear: Adam was set off by losing Maddi forever.Not only was he at risk of losing his kids and his girlfriend, but he was alsoat risk of losing his free meal ticket with Maddi. She was cleaning the house,keeping him happy, and paying their bills, which was probably the majority ofhis concern.

The devastating thing is that just four days before shedied, Maddi had sent a text to their landlord saying she was ending her leaseand finding her own place. She had finally worked up the courage to leave herabusive partner, something that, as we know from doing this show for so long,is not easy. It takes a lot of guts.

Yep, and many people stay in abusive relationships becausethey are terrified that if they leave, they will end up like Maddi. But if youor someone you know is in the same situation, please know that there areresources. There is a way to get out safely. If you're in the U.S., you cancontact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233. You can alsovisit the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence at their website,ncadv.org, or find a local shelter through resources like the National Networkto End Domestic Violence at nnedv.org.

And that is the story of Maddi Kingsbury. I’m surprisedbeing on social media—I mean, I guess I’m not nearly on social media as much asI used to be—but I was getting tagged. I was seeing... Oh, you were gettingtagged quite a bit. I’m surprised I didn’t see it. I probably did and justdidn’t realize that’s what her name was.

Yeah, just because around tagged—we get tagged in a lot ofdifferent cases—and around that time, honestly, there were a couple of yearswhere, I mean, TikTok was going crazy with how many cases it was. It’s sad.It’s sad how many cases there are.

Sorry, no sources available yet.