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You're listening to an ono media podcast.
Hey everybody, welcome back to the podcast.
This is murder with my husband.
I'm Peyton Moreland.
And I'm Garrett Moreland.
And he's the husband.
And I'm the husband.
Welcome back.
Thank you for being here.
Thank you for listening.
Thank you for watching.
We appreciate you.
Another week.
Another podcast.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God.
Can you tell we're tired?
A little tired.
I don't know, Gary.
Your hair is like blown in the wind.
Hair is getting long.
Hair is getting crazy.
I don't have too much of a 10 seconds this week.
I'm going to be honest.
I've been sitting here while we're recording trying to think.
And I can't think.
I've just been working a lot.
So I don't have too much for you guys.
I'm sorry, but I will say thank you to everyone who conversed in DM me and commented.
Talking about last week's criminal defense attorneys and prosecutors.
I'm a pretty open book in general.
I like to hear other people's opinions and hear other people have to say.
So thanks for the conversations.
Yeah.
Kind of all I got.
Something Peyton and I are trying to figure out.
I feel like this might be a good 10 seconds is it is extremely.
And when I say extremely, I mean extremely dry in our room at night.
Like to the point where Peyton and I fall asleep and then we both wake up and it feels like
there is someone's hand over our faces.
Like it feels like I have a sore throat every time I wake up.
And we both have humidifiers.
We've tried everything.
I don't know.
Maybe we need better humidifiers, but we have big humidifiers.
I don't know.
Honestly, at this point, like I would pay for you know those air conditioning units.
People put in third like those single units.
I would pay for one of those.
Someone could hook a water line up to it and then constantly just push steam into my room.
You want a steam shower bedroom?
Yeah, I just, it was like 19% humidity in our room the other night.
And that might not seem dry to people, but...
Well, it doesn't help that we have like the worst air quality ever as well.
Like tacked on to that.
High elevation.
It's just all the things.
It's really bad.
I'm probably just complaining for no reason.
But if anyone has any ideas or thoughts, please let us know.
On top of that, thanks again for listening.
Thank you for being here.
And we are going to hop into today's episode.
Our sources for this episode are Murder and Paradise by Lisa Pulitzer.
ABCNews.go.com, Newsweek.com, NewYorkPost.com, CNN.com, L.A. Times.com, CaseMind.com, CBSNews.com, and AlexKrista.com.
I want everyone to imagine this, including you, Gary.
Your friend invites you to come stay at their vacation home on a tropical island for a week.
So you're beyond excited because your accommodations are practically free.
Plus, they know all of the hot spots in the area, all of the great restaurants to eat at,
all of the private beaches to go to, and all of the most interesting locals to hang out with.
So you pack your bags and you take off for what will surely be a trip to remember.
And it is, but not in the way you hope.
One night out changes everything.
And the next thing you know, you're trapped on this island,
spending the next few years in a cold jail cell, wondering,
how did things go so wrong so fast?
Now, this was the story of not one, but four, American men in 2000,
after a young woman was found dead where they were vacationing.
These four men insisted they were innocent,
but the question remains to this day.
If they didn't do it, then who did?
So today, we are turning back the clock to the year 1999, okay?
We are hopping on a plane to the exotic island of Tortilla in the British Virgin Islands.
To basically what the local tourist board calls nature's little secret,
it's just 60 miles east of Puerto Rico,
and the island was a hot spot for wealthy British and American families
to stay during the winter months of the year.
So just a vacation island, not only was it beautiful and a great place to surf and sail,
it also had a practically non-existent crime rate,
and only about a total of 19,000 residents at the time.
So definitely a little secret hidden spot,
which is probably why the McMillan family thought in 1999,
it was the perfect spot to escape to each winter.
Now, Russell and Josephine McMillan had been coming to Tortilla for the last 20 years,
now with their 34-year-old daughter, Lois.
They had been living in Connecticut the rest of the time,
ever since Lois was born in 1965.
Now, Russell did have children from another marriage,
but Lois was his only child with his second wife, Josephine,
and because Lois was the baby of the family,
she was given an upbringing most children only dream of,
and this is on top of having a vacation home in a tropical island in the winter.
She had horseback riding lessons, trips to summer sleepaway camps,
school abroad in Switzerland,
and obviously her annual vacation to their beach house.
Now, over the years, the family got to know the other snowbirds
who wintered in the island.
Lois looked forward to going to the island every year, growing up.
Not only was it quality time with her family,
it was a break from school, which honestly, she wasn't very good at.
Plus, it was a chance to paint until her heart was content.
So, yes, growing up through high school,
Lois was a great painter, and as she grew into a young adult,
she actually tried to find her way through a series of different colleges
and potential career paths,
from dropping out of Boston University in 1985,
to modeling classes in Connecticut, to voice and acting classes,
and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City,
she tried it all.
She actually even moved across the country to Los Angeles
for some time to try and pursue startup there,
but after meeting one too many directors and producers
looking to cast her in exchange for a date,
Lois got fed up with the entertainment industry
and the constant disappointment,
and that's when she finally went back to her roots
and decided art and painting were just her real calling.
So, in the early 90s, she attended the Parsons School of Design in New York,
and when Lois wasn't studying or painting,
she was volunteering her time with organizations
like the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Greenpeace, or the Humane Society.
But as of 1999, the time of our story,
Lois was back under her parents' roof in Connecticut,
trying to get some gallery shows going.
She already had quite a bit of success
after her first showing made her close to $10,000,
and ironically, year before she had actually made a painting called
The World Is Killing Women.
It was a piece so powerful,
her parents hung it on the walls of their home in their beach house.
Place where Lois had always felt safe,
it was consistent, the spot she knew they would go
and slow down for the winter,
and a place where she had actually met some people
she thought would be lifelong friends
in this little vacation place,
like a guy named Michael Spicer.
I've always found art really interesting,
partly because I don't really understand it,
mainly because the only artist
I've ever really looked into is Banksy.
I think it's interesting how some pieces
can go for so much money,
just have so much more value than other pieces.
I think it's definitely one of those worlds you have to be into.
Yeah, and I don't really understand you.
Appreciate fashion, right?
There's white t-shirts.
Like funky fashion.
I think it's similar to that.
Yeah.
Now, the Spicer family was another wealthy
snow bird family on the island
that had a home just up the hill from the McMillans,
and at the time 36-year-old Michael
was a law student in Virginia.
Now, he and Lois had known each other for quite a while now,
basically from kind of growing up on the island together,
but the relationship was fairly casual.
They would now go to the bars together,
go swimming together in the Spicer's pool,
but when they were back to their real lives,
it's not like they kept in touch.
It was more just this life they had
when they went to the island.
But Michael had introduced her to someone else
a few winters before.
It was a friend of his named Alex Benedetto.
Now, Alex was the son of a wealthy publisher
and now worked at his father's company back in New York.
And he had come out with Michael
a few times with his family to Tortola.
And he and Lois actually did have a brief summer romance
seemingly ended on good terms.
Because come 1999,
Lois was willing to spend time with him again
when he came out to visit that winter with his friend.
In fact, Michael had brought a couple of friends
with him that winter,
since his parents decided to stay back in the state.
So he's in his 30s,
he's going to his parents' house,
and they have it to themselves.
I'll tell you who they are.
35-year-old Alex,
which is her old fling,
as well as 23-year-old construction worker,
Evan George,
and 36-year-old William Labrador
who owned his own PR and modeling agency
in New York City.
Now, the reason that Michael Spicer,
who is the friend with the family home there,
knew some of the other boys
was William and Alex had grown up together,
which was how he was introduced to Michael.
And Evan seemed to be dating Michael Spicer
at the time of that vacation.
So it's maybe his boyfriend,
his friend and his friend's friend.
Either way, the four of them were excited
about spending the holidays on the island that year.
They'd spend their days lounging around the pool
or beach hiking, hitting the bars,
hanging out a bit with Lois McMillan,
the other girl whose family had the place
and had grown up there.
So on the night of January 13th,
Michael and his friends invited Lois out to dinner with them.
Now, Lois had a car and they didn't.
So they actually offered to pay for her meal
if she drove.
So she left her house at around 5.30 that night
and then was back home later that evening.
But then the following afternoon,
she told her mother,
she was just planning to go out alone that night.
She wanted to listen to some music
at a venue on the other side of the island
called the Jolly Roger Inn.
So that night, January 14th,
Lois left her family's home around 9 p.m.
But by 12.30, 1 a.m.
No, gosh.
Lois's parents were getting worried.
I mean, yes, she's in her 30s.
But when Lois still wasn't back by 10 a.m. the next morning,
her parents raised down to the local police station
to report their daughter, Lois missing.
But let's rewind a bit.
Two, three hours before the parents drove down
and made that report.
In the same area, a woman named
Winsome Manning left her home on the island
for a morning stroll.
And about an hour into that journey,
she was looking down at the water along the rocky shoreline
when she noticed there was a body based up.
The waves were crashing against it
and it appeared to her that this body
was no longer moving.
Now, when some didn't bother to get a closer look,
instead she ran to the police station
that was less than a mile away
and reported the body to the officers on duty.
Detectives obviously rushed over
and immediately confirmed what Winsome had seen.
There was a body of a young woman
whose face had been bloated by sea water
to the point that she was unrecognizable.
They start investigating.
She had no ID, no pocketbook,
and her shirt and bra were pulled up.
So her breasts were exposed.
Now, the detectives got instinct
was that this woman had drowned, perhaps hit her head,
maybe slipped.
But nearby, there were other clues that suggested
maybe there was more to the story.
So as they scanned the path from the street to her body,
they found things like a gold necklace,
a can of mace, a hair clip, and a single shoe along the path.
I mean, this is kind of some random discarded things
that the can of mace alone was enough
to signal the victim might have been running
from an attacker.
She loses a shoe, jewelry,
a police sergeant also noticed some blood stains
on the rocks along the seawall
with some tiny red spots leading down to the water,
indicating that before this victim had even made it
to the water, they were probably injured
and bleeding on their way there.
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Now at that point, the police were worried
that identifying the victim might be difficult
considering there was no missing persons reported in the area.
But then 10 AM rolls around.
And Mr. and Mrs. McMillan go down to the station
and say, hey, our adult daughter lowest didn't make it.
I just I just can't like that would just be so sad
and it happens in a lot of our cases.
And how do you receive that information?
Like how do you take that in when someone,
when the police, I mean,
even if you're like in the armed services, anything, right?
When they have to tell you, hey,
like your loved one is dead.
Well, and I mean,
I think whoever they talked to,
whether it was the front desk person first
or whoever they, hey, we need to report our daughter missing, right?
Before they've even gotten to the report.
Yeah.
Everyone in that small local police station
knows there was a body found that morning.
Oh, for sure.
You know what I mean?
So because that doesn't happen that often here.
And now there's a girl missing.
Everyone's immediately connecting the dots
and these parents have no idea.
Yeah, which is just.
It's sad.
It is so devastating.
So they are like, hey,
she didn't make it home from a night out.
At first, they suspected that Lois had gotten into
a car accident the night before.
I mean,
the roads along Tertola were pretty dangerous,
winding, not well lit.
Many of them didn't even have guard rails
to prevent a car from veering off a cliff
into the water below.
I mean, it's an island.
Yeah.
And foul play was probably the last thing
on the McMillan's mind
since violent crime is basically unheard of.
And they know a lot of people around the area.
However,
once the McMillan stepped foot into that police station
looking for Lois,
the officers put two and two together
34-year-old missing Lois McMillan
was their victim.
By that afternoon,
with the McMillan's help,
police also located Lois's car.
But when they find it,
it isn't perfect condition.
There's no signs of an accident
or anything of that sort.
It was actually discovered
less than a mile away from her body,
just parked at a fairy dock.
Now inside,
they discovered a single gold earring
and a brass-colored heart pendant
that actually matched the necklace
they had found earlier near her body,
which basically just confirms
the necklace had fallen off.
Police also noticed the floor
on the driver's side of the vehicle
was wet in Sandy.
Not that rare for an island.
Yeah.
But it's...
Something.
I don't know.
I mean, it's the driver's side is wet in Sandy,
so that means that maybe she was wet in Sandy.
So detectives tried to gather
some fingerprints from the vehicle,
thinking,
okay, maybe it wasn't her,
who was wet and got in here.
Maybe someone chased her down
and then got in her car and parked it here.
But there were barely any fingerprints
not on the steering wheel,
gear shift, or handles,
which means someone had likely
wiped the vehicle down.
So it was most likely parked here,
which does answer a question for them,
but doesn't really get them
any closer to finding out who.
The only thing of note was a shoe print
found on the rear door panel of the car.
So the next step for detectives
is to try to retrace
Lois' steps from the night before.
Her parents tell police,
you know, we had dinner with her
at our beach house after a long day of shopping.
They say Lois seemed to be in good spirits.
She was excited about going to the bar
at the Jolly Roger Inn to listen to some music.
She had put on a new outfit she had bought
with her mother shopping that day
and then left around 9 p.m.
The officers check and a bartender said
Lois did come in by herself that night
and ordered a drink.
But some witnesses saw her talking
to an unidentified man at the bar.
And another witness claimed
they saw Lois leave the bar around 10.30 p.m.
They say she got into her car
and she did drive off alone
and they didn't see anyone follow her.
Now after that,
no one admitted to seeing
or speaking to Lois again
until the following morning
when her body was discovered
on those rocks along the surf.
Now news of this is going to spread fast.
So a lot of the McMillan's friends
and neighbors reach out
to express how sorry they are for their loss.
But there's one group
that hasn't reached out to Lois' mother, Josephine.
The she finds really strange.
Michael Spicer and his friends.
She knows that these two know each other.
They were, you know, friends on this island
and she knows they were just hanging out
together the night before.
So why wouldn't he at least
be especially upset over Lois' death
and then you also have Alex,
her old summer fling?
Why wouldn't he be upset?
Why wouldn't he have reached out?
In fact, she thinks it's suspicious.
And so she has no problem telling police.
A lot of people have reached out.
I know she hung out with this group of boys
the night before.
And this is suspicious
because they have not said anything to me
and these two were pretty good friends.
So police waste no time.
Racing up to the Spicer home
to talk to the four guys.
Because here is the thing.
You're in a small town on an island.
There's not many suspects.
And there's even less snowbirds
who know each other.
There's only a handful of suspects
that could be like,
I'm hoping it's open and shut.
I'm hoping they find out who it is.
If there's lack of evidence,
it's going to be hard,
but there can't be that many people.
So they get to the Spicer home
and they actually find the boys
sleeping off a hangover
from the night before,
which could explain why they hadn't reached out
because they weren't even up for the day
and had heard the news.
So police break the news
to Michael Spicer on why they're there
and he does come off totally blindsided.
Like the news of Lois's death
was shocking.
It wasn't even really reaching them.
Now, when detectives asked Michael
when he last saw Lois,
he says it was Thursday around 11 p.m.
She dropped off Michael
in his friend Evan before heading home.
But as they start questioning Michael,
one of the detectives notices something.
There's a few pairs of wet sandy sneakers
lined up near the pool area of the home.
Obviously, they're in a beach town.
So this might not seem that weird,
but police do have to make the connection
that there was wet sandy spots in Lois's car
and they do believe
whoever had done this move the car.
I mean,
this really does seem to set off
on alarm bells for detectives,
but it doesn't seem that out of place for me.
Eventually,
the other guys start to come out of the house
to speak with police,
each appearing just as shocked as the last
to find out why the police were there,
to find out the news about Lois,
the girl they had just gone to dinner with.
So the detectives start asking them some questions,
including what clothes they were wearing last night.
Now, the four guys go inside,
they grab the items of clothing
and happily ham them over to police.
But there's one thing on Michael Spicer's shirt
that immediately does look worrisome to them.
It's a small red stain
about the size of a quarter,
just above the breast pocket.
I mean, I get it.
It makes sense,
but I don't think walking around,
I would ever think of that.
Like, if I saw a stain on someone's shirt,
yeah, but if you're a cop,
yeah, if you're a cop shirt.
Investigating homicide.
Mm-hmm.
Oh, it's spaghetti.
Okay.
You know what I'm saying?
Not sentenced.
I mean, if it was you,
probably you do love spills spaghetti.
All the time.
Oh, major spaghetti spilling.
So, of course,
they're like, thank you.
Thank you for this clothing.
Uh, Michael,
you just handed us clothing
with a red stain on it.
What is this?
He tells the police,
um, I don't know what that is,
but you're more than likely to take it
and figure it out.
Mm-hmm.
So, police are like,
it feels like, yes,
nothing to hide.
In fact,
all of the boys deny having anything
to do with Lois' death.
Still,
the police are thinking
these four guys are their best lead at the moment.
So, they tell them
they'll come back later that day
with an official search warrant
and they do.
And keep in mind,
her mom has said,
this is suspicious.
She was with these four boys
two nights earlier.
So, I mean,
police are working on a hunch,
but from the outside looking in,
it seems abrupt.
Yeah, it doesn't seem like
there's anything.
This is, it's hard.
But as they're searching the house
and collecting potential evidence,
police noticed that Alex,
the one who used to date Lois,
is acting a bit strange
as police are there.
He blocks the door to the room
he's staying in.
And sort of goes on about,
I don't want you going in here.
This is an infringement
of my rights.
Can't do anything wrong.
Michael,
who is also there,
says,
this is actually
typical Alex.
He's the kind of guy
who is not going to let
cop searches room
just because
it is an infringement
of his rights.
And he's going to be honest about it.
I mean, he,
but they have a search warrant.
He's also a lawyer.
Oh, okay.
I mean, he's in his 30s.
He's a lawyer.
So,
even if he has nothing to hide,
there is something about like
sticking it to the man.
For sure.
And, and Michael,
his friend is like,
yeah, this is totally
something he would do.
He's the guy and a guy
would make a scene.
But the police find it suspicious.
Now, eventually,
they move past him.
They collect a bunch of items
from the room he's staying in,
pillows, bedding, clothing.
By the end of the search,
they've taken more than 85 items
from the beach house,
including fingernail clippings,
and tampons that they found
in a waste basket inside
Alex's bathroom.
Okay.
Which obviously the police
find particularly strange
because the men
had told them lowest
was never inside the house
the night they hung out.
But police also know
she was on her period
when she died.
Oh, that's actually
really interesting.
Okay.
And she did have
the exact brand of tampons.
They found in Alex's
waste basket in his bathroom
inside her purse.
Yeah.
So they're going to test them
for DNA, see if they match.
I mean, almost most girls
do get a period.
So if he had any other girl,
but it is weird, I will say.
Yep.
So by later that afternoon,
all four men are being called
down to the station
to give more formal statements
to the police.
And all of the men
give the same story they initially
did.
They say they saw lowest
the night before.
She was last seen
on January 13th.
But not the final night
of her life.
January 14th.
They said the night she did
die.
They had dinner at the
Spicer's home and then
went out around 11 p.m.
to a club called
Kitos.
But William Labrador
actually did stay home
that night.
He said he was tired
since they were up
at 730 that morning,
hiking.
Now, well, the other guys
were out partying
till 3 a.m.,
which other witnesses
at the club do confirm?
Okay.
William was home
at the Spicer's home.
He just watched
some TV and then went
to bed around 12 p.m.
But there was one thing
that raised red flags
for detectives.
William Labrador did have
a small cut on his nose.
He said, oh, I got it
earlier in the day, hiking.
And apparently,
Alex also had a few
scratches on him,
which he said, no,
that was from the hike
as well.
But there was
something else
the police found suspicious.
All of the men
had recently cut
their fingernails,
like very short,
to the point
where it was hard
for detectives
to cut them again
for samples.
I mean, I'd be scared,
I bought my nails
every single day.
Okay.
They figure.
Yep.
Between the lack
of reaching out
to Lois' family,
which the boys claim
they were asleep,
the wet sandy shoes
out of beach house,
the stained shirt,
Alex's reaction
when they searched his room,
the tampon,
the cuts
and the scratches
on two of the men,
the cut fingernails,
they believe
someone here is guilty.
This is hard
because it's very
circumstantial.
Right.
Like, from the outside
looking in right now,
it's extremely difficult.
Like, I don't think
you, there's no way
this gets
pass a jury
like this.
It's all circumstantial.
It's all kind of
random stuff, too.
Like, oh, these guys
cut their nails short.
Okay.
It feels definitely
like there's
what shoes
K, you're by a beach house.
A lot of coincidences
but also
not saying they didn't do it
because I don't know
what's going to happen yet
in the case,
but
difficult.
On the flip side,
the mom's gut
thought it was suspicious.
She was just
with these boys.
She had dated
one of them,
so there's an ex-boyfriend.
Yes.
They do find a tampon
in the bathroom
of that ex-boyfriend's
bathroom.
The same tampon she was
wearing.
So there are like,
you understand why
they're suspicious,
but it doesn't feel
like enough to
arrest them.
Now, despite that,
that day,
January 15th,
this is literally
the next day.
They arrest
all four of them
on suspicion of murder.
Now,
Keep in mind,
we're in the British
Virgin Islands.
Yeah.
They can hold people
for days or weeks
without officially charging
them with a crime,
which is why they probably
just make the arrest.
I'm sure America
would do that, too,
if you weren't on a time
crunch.
So that is basically
what ends up happening here.
Now, after confiscating
the men's wallets,
they find something
interesting in
Alex's.
It is an ATM receipt
from that night.
Money was taken out
around 11.15pm
in an area super
close to where
Lois was last seen
by the Jolly Roger.
In.
But the three men
who went out
never even
mentioned to police
that they were
in that part of town
that night,
which only bolsters
their case
against them further.
So by January 19th,
all four men
are officially
charged with murder,
but their families
and many locals
alike say,
these boys didn't do this.
Like, these four
snowbirds did not
do this.
They are four
professionals
with careers.
They have no history
of violence.
They come from good
families who have lived
here, like they
haven't established
life here.
There was no motive
for all four of them
to want to kill
or harm Lois.
Which is interesting
that I feel like this
happens a lot.
People say there's
no way this person
could have done this.
That happens
like every single case
we have,
unless it's the
serial killer.
And it just comes
down to,
you don't really know
something.
We understand
gang mentality,
but also all four
men agreeing to murder
does seem odd.
For sure.
Yeah.
But maybe one.
I mean, there's
so many things.
So a lot of people
are like this just
doesn't make sense.
And it starts to spread
around some locals
believe that because
Lois's car was found
by the docs,
that the person
who drove it there,
probably drove it there,
got out and hopped
on the first
ferry out of town
that morning.
Which does make sense
because that's how
you get off the island.
The car that they believe
was driven by a suspect
is found at the
ferry dock that you use
to leave the island.
So they're like,
whoever did this,
obviously parked
the car in the left.
It's not these boys
who were asleep.
Okay.
The locals are like,
this person was long gone
by the time police
were looking for suspects.
They think it seems
more likely
that the local police
aren't used to dealing
with a homicide case
like this.
And B, they want to
wrap it up quickly
and place blame on someone.
So it doesn't affect
their tourism,
which is a major source
of income for the island.
They can have this
unsolved murder
on the island.
So regardless,
a preliminary hearing
is scheduled
for the four men
in March of 2000.
But that gets pushed
to July as the prosecution
waits for DNA results
to come back.
So are they just
sitting in prison
this entire time?
Yeah.
I mean, you're not
in the British
Virgin Islands.
That sucks.
And when it does,
it sucks if they didn't
do it.
The DNA is not
exactly a smoking gun.
This stain
on Michael's shirt
did test positive
for blood,
versus spaghetti.
It didn't
belong to any
of the guys.
Now, the results
show it could have come
from Lois,
but it also could have
come from tens
of thousands
of other people.
I mean, it wasn't
like a solid hit.
What few prints
they were able
to find on the vehicle
were also not
a match to any
of the four suspects.
And when those wet
sandy shoes were tested,
only 15% of the sand
on them matched
the sand found
where Lois's body
was discovered.
Wow.
They were obviously
worn in other beach areas.
And that shoe print
that was found
in the back of Lois's car
wasn't a match either.
In fact, 90 items
in total were tested
from clothes
to shoes to hair samples
found in Lois's vehicle.
And all of it
told the same story.
None of it connected
to any of these four men.
So, the case is
purely circumstantial.
That was,
until a man
named Jeffrey Plant
came into the picture.
Jeffrey Plant
was a businessman
from Texas
who had been caught
trying to pass
bad checks.
He happened to be
in jail,
awaiting trial,
at the same time
with the other defendants.
And he told police
and prosecutors
he had seen
and heard some stuff
from the suspects
that might be of interest
to their murder case.
Apparently,
Jeffrey had witnessed
Alex and William argue
on more than one occasion
in jail.
And at one point
he claimed Alex
pointed the finger
at William accusing
him of being guilty.
Jeffrey also claimed
that William asked him
once if he thought
God would forgive him,
if he had had
something to do
with Lois' murder.
How do you trust this?
I don't know.
How do you trust that?
This is even true information.
Jeffrey said
during this conversation
with William, he was like,
well, were you involved
and William told him,
yes.
Apparently,
William confessed to Jeffrey
that on the evening
of Lois' death,
he was in her car.
They got into an argument
over money she owed him.
She tried to pull
into the police station,
but he chased her down
to the water
and drowned her
by putting his foot
on the back of her neck.
And so in his story,
the other guys
weren't there
because they were
out partying.
Remember?
Yeah.
He was the only one
who was supposedly
home alone watching TV.
Yeah.
Now, when the prosecutors
hear this, they find
the statement interesting
because Lois did die
by drowning,
not by any other
manner like strangulation.
And that was something
that wasn't exactly
public knowledge
at this point,
but she was found
in water,
so it's not that big
thing that she drowned.
William tells his lawyer,
this is complete nonsense.
He never said
anything like this
to Jeffrey in prison.
In fact,
Jeffrey had a history
of being a prison
snitch because he did
the exact same thing
when he was in jail
back in 1995.
He lied about another
inmate to try
and lessen his own
sentence.
We talked about this,
I think last podcast,
last episode.
You can,
trusting an informant
seems extremely difficult.
Especially one
who has a history
of lying,
like knowingly lying.
Yeah, I get
out of here now.
But the prosecution uses
it to bolster their case
and in the spring
of 2001,
all four men are
in the courtroom
being tried together.
And I just say
you are innocent.
Say you are innocent.
You go out with this girl,
you're just on vacation
with your friends
and police show up,
wake you up out of sleep,
tell you this girl died
and the next day
you're arrested,
you've been in jail
since and now you're a trial.
Yeah.
Like that's low-key
wild if you're
100% guilty.
Yeah.
I don't know what to expect.
I don't know how
this is going to go.
Also, it's kind of a
an example of
last time we're talking
about criminal defense
attorneys,
how now prosecutor,
prosecutors will
take stuff
and run it with it.
It's interesting.
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So there is basically
a month's worth
of testimony that the
judge hears against
all four men.
And after a month,
he decides
there simply isn't
enough evidence
to uphold the charges
against
Michael Spicer,
Evan George,
or Alex Benedetto.
All three of them
are acquitted immediately
and freed.
The judges
like you have no
evidence on these three men.
And that probably
would have been the case
for William as well,
except for Jeffrey,
the jailhouse snitch.
I- this is wild.
If he goes to prison,
I mean, I don't know
who did this,
but I don't think
you can put someone
in prison for a life.
If you get to this
base off of an informant,
that was a liar previously.
That's not fair.
Okay. And say
William's innocent.
He decided to stay home
because he was tired
and not go out with his friends.
Yes. Yes.
You know what I'm saying?
Yes.
But maybe he's not.
So unfortunately
for William,
the trial continues.
So they paint a very
similar picture
that after a heated argument,
William was actually
with lowest that night.
And he chased her
down to the water and drowned her.
So with hardly
any concrete evidence,
the jury's decision
comes down to one thing.
Remember,
there is no DNA.
There's no nothing.
I mean, the tampon
in Alex's room now
has nothing to do with this
because they're saying
it was William
who just wasn't
with his friends that night.
The jury has to decide,
do they find Jeffrey plant
a reliable witness
or not?
That's all this case
basically boils down to.
William's lawyer tells
the jury about Jeffrey's past.
How he had been married
ten times.
He was a proven con man.
He was currently in prison
for Grand Larceny.
What wasn't mentioned
in the courtroom was how
after Jeffrey had told police
about William's confession,
he was released from jail,
his charges were dropped,
and he was put up
in a sea front villa
with a nice little stipend
from the government waiting
to testify.
This is nuts.
This is nuts.
I will say six months later,
he was back in jail.
This time in Texas,
with 34 new counts of fraud
and theft.
Still,
Jeffrey's story is enough
to send jurors away
for seven and a half hours
of deliberation.
I mean, this is all they've got.
Come on.
We've got to have smarter jurors.
Despite his inconsistent
account on the stand,
the jury sides with him.
They find 37-year-old
William Labrador guilty
of murder.
Oh, leak wrap.
And in the British Virgin Islands,
that means an automatic
sentence of life behind bars.
Now, there's no way.
He doesn't stop here.
The story does not end here.
There's no way.
There's no way.
William obviously continues
to maintain his innocence
filing appeal after appeal.
I mean, even if he's guilty,
this trial was not enough
to put him away.
So finally,
on April 7, 2003,
the British court
overturns William's conviction
due to what they call
judicial errors.
They point to the fact
that the prosecution's
key witness was a proven,
quote, habitual liar.
Yeah, that's ridiculous.
And they were like,
you, the prosecution made
some improper comments
during the trial.
100%.
Their ruling also comes
with another win for William Labrador.
It bars a retrial,
which means after nearly three
years behind bars
in the British Virgin Islands
for murder,
he's finally allowed to return
to the States,
get back to his life
without fear of being retried.
Now, one of the first things
he does before getting
on the plane to go home
is actually take a swim
in the ocean.
Keep in mind,
his parents didn't even
have this place.
He was here with friends,
was in jail for three years,
gets out and is like,
well, now I have to go home.
Somewhere I haven't been
in three years.
He tells Good Morning America
quote,
that's when I finally felt
my freedom,
being able to do that
without someone turning
a key on me.
Unfortunately,
for the Macmillan family,
this means
justice hasn't really
been served,
because in the eye of the law,
no one,
no one has been charged
officially now
with her murder.
And there are still plenty
of theories about
who might actually be
responsible for Lois's death,
because she,
she was murdered.
One of the names
thrown around
was Lois's
former boyfriend
at the time,
Luigi Lungorini.
Luigi was an architect,
who was pretty well known
on the island.
Apparently, the two began
dating in the spring
of 1998,
two years before her death,
they even
were engaged at one point.
But people who knew
Lois and Luigi
said the relationship
was really toxic,
hot and heavy
one minute,
and then they were
screaming at each other
in public the next.
One source even claimed
that after her parents
told her to break things
off with Luigi,
Lois listened.
But he continued to
stalk her,
refusing to accept things
were over.
Luigi also did have
a history of domestic
violence with his ex-wife
and previous
girlfriends,
and Lois had tried to
get a restraining order
against him in the past.
There were also sources
who claimed she approached
Luigi a few times
since their breakup,
to ask him about a death
that he needed to
repay her father.
So we have someone
in prison with no
motive.
Why?
Why wasn't this guy
talked to before?
And we have an ex-boyfriend
who has domestic
violence, has a record,
had motive, owed her money.
And he wasn't a witness,
or he wasn't a suspect
at all.
Right.
I do want to mention
what is strange here
is during the investigation
like Garrett said,
police never took any DNA
or fingerprints from
Luigi.
In fact, they never
even reached out to him.
They didn't even take
a statement.
I don't know.
I mean, it could be
multiple things.
It could be lack
of experience.
It could be.
We're protecting
their quote-unquote
own people that were
part of the British
Highlands, and not some
Americans that are visiting.
I mean, it could be
so many different things.
Or I mean,
or it could still be them.
I don't know.
Yeah, I want to say,
I don't know.
I have no idea.
This is a legit.
We're obviously discussing
potential suspects
at this point.
No idea.
I'm not trying to drag
Luigi's name through the mud
because this is a legit
but we do also have to
point out every suspect
in a case that is
unsolved.
Yeah.
Police do answer
or why they never reached
out to him.
They claim they had evidence
he was on his boat
during the time of the murder.
And Lois's family
didn't suspect him.
It's pretty apparent
they trusted.
Okay.
I mean, if you had an
I'll buy them.
Okay.
I guess.
I don't know.
Now, there's a ton of
other loose ends
regarding Lois's case,
like the fact that
it was proven she had
in her course within
48 hours of her death.
But she didn't
appear to be sexually
assaulted.
And Siemens tests
were not a match
for any of the
four men suspected
of murder.
There's just no way.
I mean, I just,
I don't think it's them,
but I could be totally wrong.
There was also some indication
that she had fish bites
on her body, which
would suggest she drowned
further out from the
shoreline and then her body
washed up in more shallow
water.
So maybe she was on a
boat.
And then her body
washed up.
There was also never
an ID made on the man
that she was talking
to at the Jolly Roger
Inn, the night she died.
Remember, she was
talking to a man.
But there is one
terrifying truth
in this case.
What began as a dream
getaway turned into a
walking nightmare
for a lot of people.
And sometimes it
doesn't matter how
friendly an invitation
seems or how safe you
think you are.
One single night can
change everything,
whether victim
or suspect.
One wrong reaction.
One sandy shoe.
One drop of blood is
all it takes to turn
paradise into hell.
And that is the murder
of Louis McMillan
and the attempted
trials.
That's crazy.
So it's just never
been solved.
They'll never know.
Nope.
That sucks
for her family.
That's horrible.
I mean, who else could
it?
I mean, if here's a
thing, there isn't
enough evidence for me
to think it was them.
There's no other suspects.
Like, how does that happen?
Just a cold case.
Gone.
Just nothing.
And I will say sometimes
we see unsolved cases
that the investigation has
been like pounded
into the dirt, right?
Like they have attempted
and attempted and
attempted.
And they just don't
know where to go.
But there's so much
investigation done.
I do feel like
this investigation was
just handled
improperly from the beginning.
Yeah.
And got so skewed
whether it was the men
or an ex-boyfriend
or a random stranger
whoever it was.
The investigation was
just not done in a proper way.
For sure.
Yeah.
We have DNA.
We have evidence.
And it feels like
we have nothing.
Yeah.
All right, you guys.
That was our episode
this week.
And we will see you
next time with another one.
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Murder With My Husband
