#255: She Found Nude Photos Of Herself On Her Stepdad’s Computer - So She Killed Him (Case of Jade Janks)

25:33Pat even said, once you see a butterfly come out and see it fly, it's pretty magical. I think Tom and I just got caught up in the magic of it. They even helped the local community. So there was this hospice chaplain named Frank. So Frank would go around and provide spiritual and emotional support to families who were dealing with a loss. Tom and Butterfly Farms would educate Frank on different species of butterflies and what they symbolized emotionally. tom would then even suggest frank bring these grieving family members to the farm where he would place that symbolic butterfly on the tip of their finger and they would say some beautiful words and the family members would be instructed to let the butterfly fly to am i gonna cry it's really really smart yeah to i guess the let go of the grief you know and this really did help a lot of people they were able to move on and connect with nature and connect with even just each other.

26:31And after going into business together, Tom and Pat, they didn't have any problems. Like there were no business wars. They were just very happy. They had similar passions. When Pat got a divorce, Tom was there to support him. It just, they were constantly together. Even Tom's son, Cash, ends up getting a job at the nursery later. So they had very intertwined lives, which is interesting because Pat never knew that Tom had a stepdaughter that he considered a daughter. Literally never spoke about Jade. So Jade and Tom, at this point, they're really living completely independent lives and they both seem very happy.

27:04And then one day, Tom messages Jade to tell her that he's moved into a new house in Solana Beach. This is April of 2020, so very recently. Coincidentally, Jade's lease was up and she sees a house that's literally a hundred feet away from Tom up for rent. It's almost like the stars were aligned. She's like, okay, this is perfect. She moves in down the street. And if you're watching the visuals on YouTube at Rotten Mango Pod or on Spotify at Rotten Mango Video, this is how close they were. If you're not watching the visuals, it's 100 feet away. And if you cut through trees, I could probably make that walk in one minute, two minutes.

27:40Just basically think of it as your next door neighbor, which of course means they're going to get a lot closer again. They would go on these long walks around the neighborhood with jade's dog betty jade just she just kind of felt this pull in her heart every time she saw tom you know she hadn't seen him in so long and now he just looks so old like you know when you if you're a younger person you see an older person maybe a grandparent and you haven't seen them in years they just look so old they look like they had aged so many years and she couldn't help but shake this feeling that he was really, really lonely.

28:15He's just always alone. He would make random excuses to come to her house and they would start having dinners together and Jade slowly became more like his caretaker again. Tom is still working at Butterfly Farms, but he's taken more and more time off to focus on his health. He started developing a ton of medical problems, likely a result of his heavy drug and alcohol abuse. It got to the point where he signed over power of attorney to Jade so that she could make any medical decisions for him if it ever came to that. Jade really was like a daughter he never had. She did everything for him. Bring him bandages, make him soup, deal with doctors, make sure that he stayed on top of meds.

28:53She spent countless hours taking him to hospitals, running errands for him, picking up his prescriptions. It was like a full-time job. By 2020, these are just some of the medical conditions Tom was suffering from. Alcohol, hepatitis, liver dysfunction, an enlarged heart, congestive heart failure, swollen and congested lungs, 30 to 40 % blockage in his arteries. It's just pretty safe to say it's not a walk in the park taking care of Tom. And by all accounts, Jade didn't really get much help from anyone. Not Cash, not Tom's family, and it really just, it was just her. And it's not like nobody else cared, it's just they're busy and COVID regulations, you know, it's 2020.

29:31Jade was all he had but oddly enough she did not resent him for her responsibilities they actually grew closer together jade said she never trusted anyone as much as she trusted tom they just always had this bond but now now it was truly a father-daughter bond tom would text jade all the time showing her gratitude he would even say things like no one will ever love you as much as i do which at the time is very sweet i don't think he's saying it as in like no one will ever love you like i do i think it's just like, I love you so much. No one could ever love you like I do. At the time, very, very sweet.

30:06But once she found folders upon folders of nude photos of herself in his computer, it took on a completely new sinister meaning. So let's talk about the big betrayal, the crashing and burning of their decades long family bond that would end up in a murder trial. Do I think that there's more devastating things to happen in the world? Potentially. But I also feel like there is a special kind of pain for women or men that feel like they had this true bond with someone. Maybe it's a family member. Maybe it's a friendship. And then they realize that this person was just sexualizing them the whole time.

30:40It's just a bizarre kind of pain. I think most of us might have experienced different degrees of it with maybe friends. You know, this person is so kind to you. You feel like you have so much in common with them. And then you realize that this person has only been sticking around in hopes that you would sleep with them one day. It is just a weird type of pain jade would feel that but so much worse and it all starts with a trip to mexico jade is seeing this guy named adam and the two of them plus adam's son had this big trip to mexico planned jade was even going to bring her dog betty along but while jade is in mexico enjoying her time she gets this really alarming phone call from tom he is muttering over the phone they beat me up they broke my ribs she's instantly alarmed he's slurring his words his speech isn't clear she When was this though?

31:252020, early 2020. Oh, that's recent. Yeah. His speech wasn't that clear. So she's confused. Like, what did you just say? She's feeling worried. And they hang up and he starts sending her photos of bloody tissues and bloody towels. Jade was a little bit less worried after receiving the pictures. In a lot of them, she could see a bottle of Jack Daniels, which was Tom's favorite in the back. I mean, don't get me wrong. She was still very concerned. but she originally thought that he had been robbed, beaten up, and tortured, but it just seemed like he had gotten drunk and was not coherent. He called her back and reassured her, It's fine.

31:59There's no need to cut your Mexico short trip. Like, have a blast. I'll be here when you get back. Jade agrees, especially because there wasn't a lot of blood on the towels and tissues anyway. So, December 15th, 2020, Jade comes back from Mexico. So, very recent. Tom gets drunk again. he starts mixing alcohol with some pills and he ends up falling and hurting himself really badly. Jade is really concerned. She rushes him to the hospital about 10 minutes away and good thing she did because he had broken ribs and a serious Xanax withdrawal. Side note, Xanax is a schedule four controlled substance in the US, meaning it hasn't accepted medical use typically to treat anxiety and panic disorders, but it's high risk of misuse and dependence.

32:44Addiction. I mean, which Tom was clearly misusing. He was taking Xanax with alcohol frequently, which is really not what you should be doing. And once you're taken off Xanax, you may start to feel withdrawal symptoms. Even if you aren't addicted or abusing Xanax, there's a Xanax withdrawal. They range from minor to very serious. So minor is anxiety. That's the minor. Panic attacks, tremors, muscle spasms, hypersensitivity to light, sound, touch. And in very serious cases, it can cause psychosis, hallucinations, delusions, and even seizures. So it's very safe to say that Tom is not having a good time with his Xanax withdrawal.

33:21He was sent to Aviera Health Care Center to complete his recovery. Tom needed help stabilizing his heart and blood pressure. He even needed assistance walking. So Jade is really worried about Tom, but she's kind of relieved when she finds out that he's going to be taken into this facility because they're going to take good care of him. This care center was really nice. They told Jade, you know, your stepdad, he's in good hands, but we don't know. we don't know when he's going to be back up and running as normal. It could be days. It could be several weeks. Truly, we don't know. Jade's like, okay, sure.

33:53I mean, that makes sense. You don't know. So she goes back home and she writes on her schedule to go over to Tom's place, basically next door, and tidy up. He had left it in a mess because he had been drinking before he was hospitalized. He was just doing all these things. And she had no idea when she was going to get a call that he's discharged. The last thing she wants is her dad, her stepdad, to come home to a messy home. And it's while she's in his office dusting. She moves the mouse to his computer. And it felt like her life had ended. She's now staring at her nude photo, which was saved as her stepdad's lock screen.

34:27And she had, of course, never given these to him. She realized that all of these files must have been on her computer or her camera. Which, side note, she recently lost her camera along with the SD card inside. And she's now thinking he stole it. the most alarming part i think is that the photos spanned back from when she was a minor when she was just 16 to 17 years old and all of them were meticulously categorized so we can only imagine that he had started these these collections collecting for decades decades i don't know how i would react i think that's far worse than a month or two ago decades my entire world i think would shatter.

35:06Like the feeling of betrayal would run so deep. I don't even know how I would function. Jade starts panicking and she does the first thing that she can think of, which is she calls her friend Mike. She's panicking and screaming over the phone, telling him what she just found. And he just calmly tells her, just delete the photos. I just don't think that she was getting the support that she was looking for in this moment. Jade said that she was too scared. Tom had a tendency to get very temperamental, especially when he's going through a drug withdrawal, which is what he's literally in the hospital for right now.

35:36And Mike was of no use. She hangs up the phone. She calls another friend, Sarah. Sarah gave her a few better options. She said, call your landlord, show them so that he can get evicted and you don't have to live 100 feet away from him anymore. Or just call the police. Try to get him arrested. But Jade was scared. First of all, she felt betrayed. She felt confused on if she should turn her stepfather in. And even if she did, it doesn't look like he's going to get a lot of time for this type of crime. Jade had no idea what to do. She made another call to a friend named The Fixer. That's what everyone called him.

36:10Jade had actually never met him before, but they ran in the same circles, and people always joked, if you need help with anything, anything, especially the things that you don't want cops to know about, Alan Roach is your guy. That was his reputation in this crowd. So she reaches out to Alan Roach via Facebook Messenger, and she types, Alan, Sam's friend? Yes. is there something I can do for you? Sam gave me your number if I ever needed it. Not sure if you can help me. Maybe we can meet for lunch and chat in person. If Sam referred you to me, then I'm sure I can fix it for you. So they switch over to texting and Jade says, Sam said if I ever needed actual help to call you.

36:49Like actual, actual help. Like shit hit the fan and I need help and or discretion type of help. The situation is one I'm not quite sure how to handle. It's quite personal. I would like to chat with you in person, Alan. So I'm not really sure what Jade had in mind or what she was thinking, but through the initial messages with Alan Roach, it's very clear that she doesn't want to talk about this over text. She wants to meet with him in person. Christmas Eve, December 24th, 2020. So Tom is still in the hospital. He hasn't been discharged yet. Jade and Alan Roach meet for the first time. It's assumed that Jade told Alan what was going on, and she also seemed to be very nervous about what Tom was going to do.

37:27She felt like he was maybe watching her, So none of the photos were taken with a hidden camera, but still her life felt like it had been turned upside down. Alan said he advised her to get security cameras in her house, but she declined, which side note, Alan would later testify that during the initial meeting, they had an instant attraction towards each other and sparks were flying. And he claims that he slept with her during that period, but it was very casual. It's kind of pertinent to note later on in the text messages, but just know that they had a sexual relationship going on. Some people think that they actually use this as evidence that Jade wasn't that traumatized by the fact that her stepdad had her nudes.

38:04I don't agree with that sentiment, but there's that. The very next day on Christmas Day, Jade starts texting Alan again. And personally, I see a little bit of unraveling happening with Jade's mental state. She starts texting him. I've been sleeping with a plastic tarp on the floor next to my bed because it makes noise when someone walks on it. And who would attack a girl who has a plastic tarp laid out next to her bed? I've got a knife and an iron rod by the bed too. So I guess worst case, the tarp will make it easier for cleaning. Insinuating that if someone tries to attack her, she's going to kill them and the tarp will make it easy to clean up all the blood.

38:36She added some emojis into that text as well, such as the shrugging man emoji. And it was just a lot. The next day, December 26th, Jade texts Alan again. Hopefully we can figure out a plan because I imagine you're too busy to watch me shower every day. Side note, Alan agreed to stand guard while Jade would shower because she was terrified that Tom would be released without her being alerted and would just ambush her in her home. But as for the plan reference, it's hard to say what she was referring to. Prosecutors would later argue that she was referring to a plan to murder Tom. She would argue differently.

39:09The next day, Jade texted Alan again. This isn't something that I can take care of on my own. I'm losing it and spinning. I think everything else is best spoken in person, Alan. I'm beyond freaked out. So just so freaked out. the next day another text anyway i'm waiting for the hospital to get back to me about his status so far it seems like he's getting his strength back i think the time is coming up so we got to come up with a plan fast again a lot of references to taking care of it or a plan the prosecutors would again argue that this points to the plot of a murder jade kept mentioning to alan that her biggest fear was that tom would be released from the care facility without her knowing she said the hospital wasn't the best of at back and forth communication.

39:52She just felt nervous. And Tom's medical insurance agreement would stop at the end of the year. So it makes sense that he would most likely be released by the end of the year. She's running out of time to figure out how she wants to handle this situation. It's already December 28th. Jade would later explain since the day she found those photos, she could not function properly. She felt like she was a zombie just throwing up whenever she was thinking about everything that she saw. She thought about what Tom was doing while he was looking at those pictures, why he even had those pictures. She started overthinking every single interaction that they ever had.

40:30Tom was never outright inappropriate with her. So if she had never found these photos, she would never in a million years think that Tom was sexualizing her in any way. But now looking back, there's just so much. and i wonder if there were instances where maybe tom had said some weird things or not touched her in a way that's overly suggestive but just i if it were me i would be overthinking every single touch every single hug everything every conversation every dinner yes every time i thought that he's looking at me with loving fatherly eyes every time he comes over yes what is he doing yeah every time i went to the beach with him like they live in san diego i mean all of that yeah i can't i mean it's something that i don't think most people can even relate to yeah like and it's it's kind of worse in my opinion because i think girls are taught at a young age to be very wary of men and just guys in general.

41:30And we kind of expect shitty dudes to appear in our life. But I think that's what makes betrayal so much harder when it's family members. You don't expect that from your stepdad, your father, your uncle. Like these are the safe people that you would never, ever expect them to do this to you. She said that she wanted to throw up 24 seven. Her world was spinning. I mean, she knew this man for most of her life since she was 12. She's now 37. This man was a firm father figure in her life. she called him dad for crying out loud. And this whole time, he was probably masturbating to her. Even to photos of her when she was a minor.

42:06She said she could not function. Her world was crashing down, and it's pretty evident in her text messages. Regardless of how you feel later about this crime or about Jade, I feel like it's pretty evident that the state of mind that she was in after she found these pictures was just not good. She kept messaging her friend Mike. So remember the guy she initially called about the pictures, the very first call that she made? She talked about how she was in a moral pickle, how she was debating between something. And then she texted him, but I will never not be looking over my shoulder. So I'm making the call.

42:39She never really elaborated on what she meant by that. But prosecutors would later theorize that she was talking about killing. The same day, Jade starts messaging Alan again. My mind is spinning, but I've got a plan. Alan responds, I need to have a clear mind now that the time is near. Which again, makes it seem like potentially they have come up with a plan to take care of Tom. and the deadline is coming soon. The deadline of whenever he's released from the hospital. Jade continues, I've given it some thought, Alan, and I have an easy solution. I do not need to speak with you tonight. I think it's time to tighten up a plan.

43:11The prosecutors again think the plan is to kill Tom. Jade would later explain, no, no, no, no, that's not the plan. The plan was to pick up Tom from the hospital when he's discharged, bring him home where Alan would be there to confront him about the photos. We would stand there together, Alan would be the muscle, and we would demand that Tom get rid of every single photo on every device because we don't know if he's got it backed up somewhere. And if he does that, we would promise that we wouldn't go to the police with this. She said that was the plan. That was the plan that she keeps referring to in the text messages.

43:42The prosecutors and most of the public do not believe that. Even the public that agrees that Jade should not get as much time as she ended up getting. But December 31st, 2020 rolls around, the very last day of 2020. Jade and Alan meet up in Jade's neighborhood, and we're not really sure what they talked about or what they did, but we do know that Jade was collecting all the evidence. She starts taking photos with her phone of Tom's computer screen of every single picture that was on there, capturing and documenting every single folder containing her private photos. When she was done, she removed all of the photos from his computer, pulled out what she believed to be his hard drive.

44:20This is like a PC. Jade had always been a Mac user, so she didn't feel super confident that she got rid of everything. She went the extra measure, the extra mile, of spilling liquids all over it. Then she jumped in her Toyota 4Runner, drove to the facility to pick up Tom. He's being discharged. Just as she predicted. 11.19am, he's discharged. His stepdaughter, Jade, is there to pick him up. How old is he at this point? I would say like in his 60s, 70s, he's quite old. The nurse that signed his discharge paper said that he was very alert and oriented times three. That's a medical term meaning Tom knows who he is, where he is, and approximate date and time.

45:02He had normal vital signs, no difficulty breathing, could communicate clearly. He seemed to be very stable and even in good spirits that he was getting out. But he did leave with a bag of goodies, if you will. A lot of meds. They were take-as-needed meds, but there were some controlled substances in the mix. and as Jade picked Tom up, she joked to the nurses saying, See dad? And you say I don't love you. Now, we don't know for sure what happened on that car ride home but it's um, it's not good. We have little bits and pieces of information and none of it looks good. On the way home, Jade stops at a Dixie Line Lumber and Home Center parking lot.

45:39So it's like a Home Depot. It's like a Lowe's. In the same shopping plaza, next to it there's a CVS, BevMo, which is a liquor store, Starbucks and a Panda Express we know that it takes 8 minutes from the care facility where Tom was discharged to the shopping plaza and from the shopping plaza it would take another 3 minutes to get back home so a total of 11 minutes but 11 minutes after Tom was discharged they should be home or at least close to home now Jade texts Alan Roach I just dosed the hell out of him stopping for whiskey then stopping at Dixieland to stall let me know so I guess let me know when you're coming The prosecutors believe this text is the smoking gun in this case.

46:21They use this message to argue that Jade drugged her stepfather on the ride back home. Jade denies this. We do know that after sending that text message, Jade walks into the BevMo, the liquor store, and purchases a large bottle of Jack Daniels. This is Tom's favorite. She also picks up some small-sized bottles of vodka, as well as chocolates. Police later find that Jack Daniels at Tom's house on his table, and the two hotel-sized bottles of vodka, or the travel-sized bottles, they were found in Jade's car along with the receipt. So maybe she took it. Or he took it. After Bev Moe, Jade walks into Dixieline and purchases what the prosecutors would later call a kill kit.

47:00Paper towels, a double-lock cable tie, spray paint, gloves, and some thicker towels, like rags. The prosecutors argue that everything on the list was used with the intention of committing murder minus the spray paint, which they thought was a red herring. For her to act like, oh no, I'm just working on a design project with the spray paint. Side note, that was Jade's argument later. She said all these things were for a project she had been working on because she's an interior designer, so she constantly buys weird things at a Home Depot. Cell tower logs indicate Jade went back to her car in the parking lot and sat around for a little while.

47:36They left the shopping plaza at 12.27pm. They stayed in this plaza for an hour, but she was only shopping for like 27 minutes of it On the way back home jade texts alan checking in i'll call you back later. I'm driving It's loud in the truck. No need for your friend. I do need help getting him home I'm, not strong enough. So please call me Side note. We don't know what friend she's referring to Some argued that alan had told her he had a literal human being friend that could help her with her plans Others speculate online that she could have been referring to a gun. You know, she just dosed the hell out of him.

48:12No need for your friend, the gun. I just need to help get him inside. That's the speculation. That's just what she's texting though. Her legal team will later say that on the way home, Tom started throwing a fit in the car immediately out of the treatment facility. He was pissed. He was thrashing around. He kept reaching for her medicine box, which was in the center console of her car. He was allegedly ranting about how the treatment center was a shithole, how upset he was said he had to be locked up there during the holiday season, but at least he was out for New Year. Tom asked her to stop by the liquor store, get him a bottle of whiskey to celebrate, and Jade said that she felt so bad, she also bought him a box of chocolate too to help cheer him up from his sour mood.

48:51And she said she goes into BevMo, gets out, and she's like, oh my God, there's a Dixie line. This is perfect. I need to get a few things for work. Gets a few things, goes back into the car. She claims during the 26 minutes that she took to shop, Tom was left in the car with all of his drugs next to him as well as some of Jade's own medicine that she kept in her glove compartment. So he allegedly made his own toxic cocktail. And she stated the text messages that she sent Alan Roach were absolutely not about murder. So she's just saying, When I said I dosed the hell out of him, I just gave him like panic meds.

49:22I just gave him the meds that they told me to give him so that he'd calm down. She claimed when she texted Alan that she wasn't strong enough. She didn't mean strong enough for murder. she meant strong enough to confront him about the pictures. When they finally arrive home, Tom was heavily medicated but still conscious. He could not make it out of the car.

49:44So they're in Jade's driveway, and she opens the door, and he's trying to get out, but he falls out of the car, basically, and he's just sprawled out on her driveway. Jade herself could not pick him back up. She couldn't even drag him back into the car, couldn't drag him inside the house. He was a heavier set man, and because he was so unconscious, he was practically just dead weight at this point. She immediately texts Alan, I can't carry him either back to the car or to his house. I'm not strong enough. Can you come like right now? Tom is laying in the driveway in the middle of the day. I mean, this is not looking good for anyone.

50:16A lot of people believe that she must have done something to him because if he genuinely took the drugs himself and fell, she should have no problem calling the paramedics to come get him off the driveway. But she didn't. instead she called Adam the guy that she was briefly seeing remember the one that she went to Mexico with so she's like Adam you need to come help me I got like a 911 emergency situation and he's like sorry I can't do that because I'm getting a tattoo right now but why don't you call her good buddy Chucky so then she's like I haven't talked to Chucky in freaking years you want me to call him to help me with this situation Adam has no idea what situation she's talking about so he's like yeah just call Chucky she ends up calling this Chucky guy and we don't know much about him but both he and Adam are very very shady very shady characters Adam himself has a felony arrest for stalking an ex-girlfriend of his and just doing some really bizarre things for example his ex-girlfriend filed a restraining order against him the cops arrested him for stalking and she's and he's like I am not a stalker I don't have a restraining order against me they look through his phone he texted his ex-girlfriend i will staple the restraining order to your forehead so all of it was a lie so this guy is um kind of shady we don't know much about charles chucky other than that but um jade hadn't spoken to him in years and it would be very bizarre to reach out to him now but she does she calls him and he says he's in the desert so he can't help Right as she hangs up with Chucky, Jade sees something that shakes her to her core.

51:51Her freaking neighbor, George, is approaching her, coming closer and closer, and he finally looks down. Wow. He looks bad. He's staring at Tom, who's basically sprawled out on her driveway. Not that conscious, apparently, because he's not even responding to George. Jade tries to explain, saying something along the lines of, like, Oh my god, yeah, he's totally fine. He was just discharged from the hospital, but it must be the medications he's on, making him loopy, you know? George tries to act Tom directly, like, Hey, bud, you okay? Tom just mumbles something. George hesitates for a second, but he decides, ultimately, I don't really want to get involved.

52:27So he walks off. Jade realized that she was becoming panicked, and there were way too many people that had seen this situation, that she had talked to about this situation, so she decides to open up a new notes on her notes app on her phone to take note of everyone and everything that she comes in contact with. She wanted to remember everyone who saw her that day, So she writes down 1245, George Hamilton. 1255, Gardner. From what we can gather, primarily from Jade's own phone records, she seems to be losing her mind with Tom in her driveway because Alan Roach is not coming to help her. He keeps evading her text messages.

53:01She's like, when are you going to be here? Are you going to be here? And he's just like, oh, I got something going on with my family. It's very clear he's not going to come. So, of course, she starts panic calling all of these other people that she thinks can help her with the situation. and in her panic, she ends up calling her friend Sarah Jacobs and Sarah's boyfriend Justin. I'm not sure how much she shared on the phone, but after they hung up, Jade texted them. He's alive. Please don't ask me questions. Just help me get him into the house. They show up as she waits for a response from them.

53:30She opens up her notes app and writes 1 p.m. Justin. Then she texts Alan again. I had to call someone to help me carry him inside. I wish you were closer. Alan says, so is he at his place then? Nope. My truck. I don't think he's breathing well. Jade sent the message and looked up to see Sarah and Justin arriving at her place. She ran to them and she starts explaining the situation, asking if Justin could help lift Tom up and put him back inside her car, since he's literally just face planted on her driveway right now. Justin helps Jade and there was no reason to doubt her story. She's saying, I just need to get him in the car so I can drive him straight back to the care facility.

54:07The story checked out. Jade was very caring of Tom. She even went into the house to bring out a pillow so he could be more comfortable in the car. Nothing about the interaction rang any red flags for Justin or Sarah. He didn't think anything was weird about it at all. After helping Tom inside the car, Justin and Sarah watched Jade drive off and she's on the phone. They thought that she was probably talking to the hospital to alert them that she's coming back. The police checked her phone records and no phone call was made around that time. They believe that Jade was faking a phone call as she pulled out of the driveway.

54:39Jade's phone would later ping next to the treatment care facility. According to prosecutors, she never went in. It didn't seem like she ever really contemplated it. She just starts driving around aimlessly for the next few hours. Jade would argue, I actually went into the care facility. I guess nobody documented it, but I went in and I couldn't get an appointment because of COVID. The prosecutors believe Jade was aimlessly driving around, waiting for Alan to come meet with her so that he could kill Tom for her. tom wasn't dead yet he was just heavily intoxicated she wanted him to die but she didn't want to be the one to do it is what the prosecutors argued so she's driving around tom's drugs start to wear off and he starts moving around she panics grabs her phone text alan he's waking up i really didn't want to be the one to do this dot dot dot alan just keeps making more and more excuses and then finally he's like you know what i'm not close by but a buddy of mine brian solomon he'd be more than happy to help you.

55:36Jade has never even heard of a Brian Solomon. And now Alan is like, do you want this complete stranger to come over and be an accomplice to murder and help you with whatever you're doing? She's getting frustrated. She had a freaking long notes list of people that she had talked to today and that knew what was going on, at least to a degree. She was fed up. She texted, I don't know, Alan. I just don't want to involve that many people. He doesn't respond. But do you trust him? Alan responds, definitely trust him. I told him to just help you get him in the house. I'm super uncomfortable. I'm really trusting you with this.

56:10It's okay. Don't worry. You're in good hands. My other buddy had a great idea, just like I thought. So I'll tell you when I see you. It's pretty much done. I don't need to talk to anyone, but how soon do you think your friend will get there? It's going to be weekend at Bernie's. This is another huge point of contention in the story. The prosecutors believe Jade is referencing a movie called weekend at Bernie's. it's a dark comedy where Bernie, a man, is killed and his death is staged to look like an overdose and the protagonist parade him around pretending like he's still alive but he's actually just dead.

56:39Jade would later argue that the phrases used to describe someone who's super drunk or out of it but personally I've never heard of it. But I also don't run in circles where there's a lot of drinking so maybe if you're more aware is that a term or is it kind of kind of iffy? So back to the situation in the car. It's believed that Jade starts freaking out that Tom's drugs are wearing off and she decides to strangle him. It's debated whether or not she actually wanted to kill him by strangling him or if she just wanted him to stop moving. Evidence shows a lot of weird stuff. There was a plastic bag that had Tom's DNA on the inside of the bag and Jade's DNA on the inside and outside.

57:14We can presume that Jade had tried to put the bag around Tom's head to strangle him. There were plastic gloves that Jade had bought at Dixie Line. Jade's DNA were on the inside, indicating she had worn them, and Tom's DNA was on the outside. There were also three towels on the dashboard of the car, the ones that she bought at Dixie Line, and they were tied together. Imagine you tie together a bunch of sheets to like get out of a fire. Like that's where I see it most. To make one single long piece of rope, and they had both their DNAs on them, leaving prosecutors to believe she tied the towels together to try and use to strangle Tom.

57:50Jade said, no, I tied the towels together to try and use it to hoist Tom back into the car the first time he fell down in my driveway. None of it mattered, though. If Jade couldn't get Tom inside the house to make it look like a suicide slash overdose, if he was found in her car, she would be responsible. She would have to answer a lot of tricky questions. 3 p.m. Jade's been driving around practically all morning, all afternoon. Alan is like, Brian's at your place. She rushes back home. And side note, before Brian arrived at Jade's house, he was told by Alan to go buy some gloves at CVS. His girlfriend, Maria, drove him to CVS and he just bought the gloves.

58:27He later said, I had no freaking idea what was going on, but it's the time of COVID. So it seemed pretty normal to be wearing gloves. He gets dropped off at Jade's house by his girlfriend and his girlfriend drives off and he steps inside, inside to Jade's house. He doesn't look inside Jade's car that's parked outside. He just goes straight into the house and he immediately notices that this woman doesn't look all there. She's not all there. He walks up to her and introduces himself. Hey, I'm Brian. I work with Alan. He said, you need me to help someone out? Yeah. He's in the car. He has a pillowcase over his head and a rope around him.

59:04What? Brian's like, what? Alan did not tell me that. In fact, Alan told me that I was doing a good deed and your dad was very ill and you couldn't get him into the house and he couldn't get himself into the house. So I was coming over with some gloves because I don't want to get COVID and I was going to help your elderly father into the house like hospice care. Brian says Jade responded no I don't need you to just bring him into the house I need you to strangle him and then bring him into the house and then I'll take care of the rest Brian said at that moment there was some massive miscommunication okay because Alan told him he was helping someone not killing an elderly man he didn't know that Alan had effectively signed him up for murder he paused and he said okay hold on a minute let me make a call to my boy He booked it.

59:55He booked it outside the house, booked it down the driveway, screaming, crying onto the phone, calling his girlfriend Maria like, you better U-turn and come pick me up, mom. I'm scared. Brian claimed that he never saw Tom's body. He didn't want to look. And when his girlfriend came to pick him up, his girlfriend was furious. She'd never liked Alan to begin with because he was known for lying and omitting important details. Unfortunately, Brian would not call the police. Even when he saw the reports of Tom's death, he never called the police. it wasn't until police reached out to him that he would tell them what happened he said he didn't want to be charged with murder when he didn't have anything to do with it he didn't think that the police would believe him i will also add brian is a very questionable character there are several reports of domestic violence against him he even pushed his ex-girlfriend out of a moving vehicle at one point and his story about what happened changes a lot so i don't know if he's a star witness at first brian had told the police that jade just asked him to bring tom inside later he said, oh, Jade asked me to strangle the man.

1:00:56I just think it's intriguing when someone's story goes from zero to 100. Maybe he just felt more trust in the police, to be honest. Or maybe they offered him something in exchange for a more smoking gun statement. But after Brian leaves, Alan texts Jade like, I ordered Brian to leave because I don't want my boy involved in that. Jade sends Alan a series of text messages, you know, and it's just her panicking that she's on her own. He's waking up. he's gonna get aggressive he's super medicated but she can't she can't just keep a kicking body in her truck she needs help she's not strong enough to get him back into the car i mean she's full-on freaking out almost being like i depended on you you told me i could trust you and now you're backing out like why are you not even responding please just get back to me her text messages become so much more unhinged i can't necessarily say that she was thinking rationally before all of this but I think this is when all logic and forethought just go out the freaking window.

1:01:53Alan is ignoring her text messages, and in her panicked state, she thinks that he has been arrested. She uses her phone to Google San Diego Sheriff's crime website, and in the search bar, she writes, who is in jail? But right as she's scanning the pages to see if there's another way to find out if Alan had been arrested, he texts her saying, like, I got some family stuff going on and finally Adam texts her back now Alan is the fixer Adam is the man that she went to Mexico with remember Adam is like hey I just got done with my tattoo like what's going on so he shows up at Jade's place and he said the first thing he remembers was that Jade's energy was so off it felt so weird she felt unpredictable it was bizarre he didn't know what was going to happen next he walked in and he greets Jade's dog Betty then he went to the bathroom to wash his hands It was just so tense.

1:02:43He shoved his hand in his pockets and was trying to come up with some sort of small talk. He saw a bunch of computer gear laying around, so he said, Oh, like you're using webcams now for the interior design business? Like, how's that going? Jade stares at him. No, I found naked photos of myself on Tom's computer. Oh, okay. Yeah, okay. That's not the bad part. I killed him. I drugged him. I suffocated him with a bag and I choked him. he shouldn't have bruises on his neck because it wasn't that hard but he may have marks on his hands i just have to get his body in the wheelbarrow and then over to his house and then get him into his bed this is what adam claims jade had said so he starts stumbling just like brian and he he straight up tells her i don't want anything to do with this like i've got a life i've got a son i wish i could help you i really wish but i mean you should have called me beforehand so that i could have told you all the phone that i can't help you and she's like that's why i didn't call you It's going to look like an overdose.

1:03:40I gave him a bunch of drugs and he may have bruises on his hands from struggling with me, but I don't really think so. I just need to help him get home. Can you please just help me get him home? He said that he couldn't help and he ran out of there. Side note, Jade's attorneys would later argue that Adam had a strong incentive to lie about this conversation. So Jade is saying this conversation never freaking happened. Adam has an ex-girlfriend that he was accused of stalking. She was very jealous of Jade and refused to get back together with Adam because of Jade. Maybe if he testified against Jade, that proved his love for his ex.

1:04:12And Adam had a tendency to lie about things, you know? Remember he lied about the whole restraining order and stapling it to his ex-girlfriend's forehead? We don't know if this conversation took place or not. But we do know no one came to Jade's rescue that night. Tom was kept in her car overnight. He was still alive. the next morning jade decides i gotta do something but she wasn't the only one adam decides the next morning new year new me i gotta do something he ends up calling the police and reporting everything so now the police are on the hunt for a missing man named tom jade on the other hand she's driving back to the care facility with tom in the back seat of her car she picks up a wheelchair thinking that she could get Tom from the car to the wheelchair and then wheelchair to the home.

1:05:00That was her plan. She literally throws the wheelchair on top of Tom in the car, drives back to her driveway. And now the police haven't really caught up with this case yet. You know, it's New Year's Day. There's a lot going on. A lot of people need help. A lot of people are in trouble. There have been crazy bar crimes. Like there was an uptick of crime, right? So they're a little bit busy. Meanwhile, Jade is trying to get Tom out and put his body in the wheelchair. She claims she did not know if Tom was alive or dead at this point, but when she went to grab his legs, they were cold. She tries to drag him out of the car so he would land on the wheelchair, but it doesn't work.

1:05:36He was on the ground. And in the end, all she could do was drag his lifeless body across her driveway towards the end, where she had a pile of empty boxes and trash, and she just buried him under it, until hopefully maybe Alan could come get her. This is in broad daylight. At around 3.30 p.m., her neighbor George testified that he saw Jade loading some things in her car, and he offered to help, but Jade declined. George didn't think too much of it, but she did seem to be not doing great. Like, she looked very stressed out. She would even apologize. Hey, sorry, I made a mess in the driveway, but I'll clean it up soon, I promise.

1:06:11So I don't know what her plan was. But the next day, the police would find Tom's dead body, and she would be driving. They would pull her over. She was brought into the police station, questioned, and while the police were working on the search warrant for her house and vehicle, like I said, they found Tom's body, and Jade was arrested. The police didn't initially tell Jade it was all thanks to Adam's call, but she would later find out in court. So let's briefly talk about the autopsy. Tom's cause of death was revealed to be an acute intoxication with contributing factors of enlargement of the heart and liver.

1:06:46So the drugs found in a system were all his prescription pills, with the exception of one, a medicine that is used to treat seizures, which was prescribed to Jade, which Jade claimed he took in her car because it was in her glove compartment. Now, the drugs that were found in his system were not enough to kill him, but because Tom had severe liver dysfunction already, his body could not cleanse the effects of the meds. There was no evidence of strangulation, asphyxiation, or suffocation, which I was like, wait, what? But what about the plastic bag, the ropes, and all of that? An expert in forensic pathology said that if a victim is already intoxicated, it only takes 11 pounds of pressure to kill them, which could easily not leave any marks because they're not resisting.

1:07:27They're not even fighting to keep breathing. 11 pounds of pressure sounds like a lot, right? But for reference, it takes 12 pounds of pressure to pop open a beer can. Wow, okay. Jade was arrested and released on a$1 million bond. She was made to wear an ankle monitor. The sheriff's office was very concerned about her fleeing to South Africa. where she was released on the million dollar bound yeah and during her time waiting for her trial she told anyone that would listen that tom actually died of cancer she even told tom's family members this she celebrated her birthday worked on her business and even posted on facebook hi friends if anyone knows of a granny flat type place in solana beach west of the freeway for rent please let me know betty and i need to find a new home looking long term so kind of implying that she thought that she would get away with it meanwhile tom's family said that they were heartbroken.

1:08:16Their mom was elderly and sick, so they tried to keep as much of the news away from her, but it was inevitable. Tom's family said the media was particularly gross about his death. There were even whispers and loud rumors circulating that Tom wanted to open up the butterfly farm so that he could be in closer proximity to younger children. Tom's family was pretty upset about this. They said that the news of what he did overshadows his death. They're arguing that regardless of those pictures found on his computer, nobody deserves to be murdered. Now, I do agree on that point. Nobody deserves to be murdered.

1:08:49But I do think that his the photos are pertinent to the story and the case. And it should be talked about in court, which it was, in my opinion. However, I don't think it's like the feeling of good riddance. We shouldn't even care about this case because he was a bad person, too. I don't think he deserved it. But I do see why it was such a big conversation. I think if you were to just say woman murders stepdad in anger. It's a completely different narrative. It's very complicated. So March 6, 2023, Jade Jenks was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years. She said a few words for Tom and his family.

1:09:28It's on YouTube. And she said, Tom came into my life when I was just a little girl. He started influencing my life at an early stage of development when I was still figuring things out. Unfortunately, that influence manifested itself into inappropriate touch, coercion, reckless behavior, and complete violation of what I now realize was years of psychological manipulation. All this came crashing down on me when I found hundreds of naked photos of me on his computer. I'm still trying to pick up the pieces with the sincere hope that over the next few years, I can put the pieces back and heal from this trauma.

1:10:01I'm sorry that I didn't act the way I was supposed to that day. I think about it every day since then. And to Tom's family, I understand you hate me for what you believe I did to Tom, but there is more than you will ever understand. So with this and the fact that she said inappropriate touch, coercion, psychological manipulation, a lot of netizens believe that there is more to the story than just those photos. Maybe those photos brought up memories of things that had happened that at the time she, because humans are really good at trying to be like, no, that didn't mean anything. That didn't mean anything.

1:10:33But maybe now it was kind kind of more of connecting the dots. And she feels like that meant something. I was trying to tell myself that that wasn't creepy and everyone does that. But do you know what I mean? There was just a lot of speculation that maybe more had happened. Since then, Jade and her legal team have appealed this decision. But another sad situation to come out of this is the butterfly farms had to close down. All the allegations of the perverted intentions with the butterfly farms just caused so much outrage. Pat had no choice but to close the business. So just a lot of grief. And it's really complicated, you know?

1:11:07I think anywhere you go online, people are having heated debates about this. Is Jade Jenks a cold-blooded killer? Or is she an anti-hero? Or maybe she's something in between. My question is, you know, why didn't she go to the police? Maybe she felt the police couldn't do anything to her. Maybe it was like a collection of all these little incidents that technically aren't red flags, but collectively it's this big mountain. Maybe there was no crazy crime in the photos that could lock him up for a long time. Maybe she was genuinely scared of him. I mean, she always looked up to him to be this consultant that knew everything and they had known each other for so long.

1:11:43I don't know. What are your thoughts on this case? So where are we at right now? She's in prison for life with the chance of parole in 25 years, but she is appealing that decision. So it's solved, but not really solved. It's just kind of complicated. But what are your thoughts on this? Do you think she deserves that much time? Less time? Do you think she doesn't even deserve parole? Let me know in the comments and please stay safe and I will see you guys on Sunday for the mini-sode. Bye!