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[0:01] Marc Tumminelli: Hello, it's Marc Tumminelli, and this is actually not the Little Me podcast.

[0:06] Marc Tumminelli: If you're a listener of Little Me, then you have come to expect my joyous romps through the careers of people who've done some pretty incredible things as kids, and a ridiculous amount of content regarding the stage and film versions of Annie.

[0:14] Marc Tumminelli: Today is very different.

[0:22] Marc Tumminelli: My dear friend Blake Ross has an incredible podcast, also on the Broadway Podcast Network, called Burnt, where she breaks down the Broadway disaster of the musical Rebecca.

[0:28] Marc Tumminelli: It is one of the craziest Broadway stories I have ever heard, and I was so riveted by it.

[0:36] Marc Tumminelli: So definitely check out Burnt here on the Broadway Podcast Network.

[0:41] Marc Tumminelli: Since the Rebecca episodes, Blake has made, released new episodes, doing these like fun Broadway deep dive stories, going into stories like Patti LuPone yelling at the photographers during Gypsy, or Jeremy Piven quitting Speed the Plow because of mercury poisoning, etc.

[0:57] Marc Tumminelli: But then Blake asked me if I wanted to join her for an episode of Burnt, and I said yes in one second, because my other addiction, other than Broadway, is true crime.

[1:06] Marc Tumminelli: When I was nine, Unsolved Mysteries popped on NBC, and it was my gateway drug.

[1:11] Marc Tumminelli: That coupled with that Amy Fisher lived like a few miles from my house, it was just all too much for me to handle, and I was very hooked on true crime everything.

[1:19] Marc Tumminelli: So this week, instead of me talking about kid performers, Blake and I are going to cover a pretty horrific murder that involves a community theater star who murdered two people and still made it to the theater to perform in the community theater production of Nine.

[1:35] Marc Tumminelli: It is wild.

[1:37] Marc Tumminelli: So here's your trigger warning.

[1:39] Marc Tumminelli: If true crime is not for you, just stop here.

[1:42] Marc Tumminelli: I'll be back next week with Stacey Brass Russell, who is going to recount her story of making her Broadway debut mid-show in the OG production of Annie, and you'll love her.

[1:51] Marc Tumminelli: And I have some unbelievable Little Me guests coming up that fit into our normal show's mission.

[1:56] Marc Tumminelli: Thank you for indulging me on my true crime podcast dreams this week, and enjoy this episode, or just stop now and maybe listen to another Little Me episode you may have missed, or any of the lovely episodes of any Broadway Podcast Network podcast.

[2:12] Marc Tumminelli: So now, here's my episode of Burnt with the lovely Blake Ross.

[2:22] Blake Ross: Hello, and welcome to Burnt, a true crime podcast all about the crazy-ass shit that happens on a stage.

[2:32] Blake Ross: I'm your host, Blake Ross, and I'm here today with one of my favorite people.

[2:37] Blake Ross: That is no hyperbole. Laughs a minute. I'm obsessed with this person.

[2:41] Blake Ross: He's the owner of Broadway Workshop. He's also the host of the delightful podcast, Little Me.

[2:48] Blake Ross: That's my dear, dear friend. Oh, God, I love him just so much. It's Marc Tumminelli.

[2:53] Marc Tumminelli: Hi, Blake.

[2:54] Marc Tumminelli: Yay. Hi, Blake. I can't believe I'm on Burnt. It feels like a really special moment.

[3:00] Marc Tumminelli: It feels like you messed up and you have to confess your deepest, darkest secrets to somebody.

[3:05] Blake Ross: No, I walk the straight and narrow, but I do love a crime moment.

[3:11] Blake Ross: I know.

[3:12] Blake Ross: Yeah, go ahead.

[3:14] Blake Ross: Marc and I are very similar people. One might say we are the same people.

[3:20] Blake Ross: We both love Broadway. Check. We're both obsessed with true crime. Check.

[3:25] Blake Ross: We both love podcasts. Check. And we love the housewives.

[3:31] Marc Tumminelli: And we love the housewives.

[3:33] Blake Ross: This is a special crossover episode because I'm also airing this on the Little Me podcast, which makes no sense for any reason because I talk to former child stars.

[3:41] Blake Ross: But today we're going to talk about something really pretty wacky.

[3:45] Blake Ross: Today, look, this is not delightful. This is a real dark story.

[3:49] Blake Ross: This is through the looking glass. This is the opposite of delightful.

[3:52] Marc Tumminelli: Opposite.

[3:53] Blake Ross: So if you came to Burnt more for the funny, like, ha, Patti LuPone took a New York Magazine photographer and threw her out of the theater. Ha, ha, what a scandal. This is not for you.

[4:05] Blake Ross: But I wanted to do this. This is my fault.

[4:07] Marc Tumminelli: Yes.

[4:08] Blake Ross: Because Marc and I were having dinner and I said, you know what we have to do.

[4:12] Marc Tumminelli: Well, no.

[4:13] Blake Ross: That's actually not what happened.

[4:15] Blake Ross: So what happened was we were talking about Burnt and all the crazy scandals that we talked about.

[4:19] Blake Ross: The Patti LuPone of it all. The Jeremy Piven stupid stuff. Shia LaBeouf. Rebecca, of course.

[4:26] Blake Ross: And I said, Marc, has there ever been a murder in the theater?

[4:30] Marc Tumminelli: And that's when you said.

[4:32] Marc Tumminelli: Yes, I've had. You know this story.

[4:34] Blake Ross: So this is my honestly one of my not I can only say favorite true crime stories because it's so disgusting to say that.

[4:42] Blake Ross: But the most fascinating one of the most fascinating to me is the man you're about to talk about.

[4:48] Marc Tumminelli: OK, so let's jump into it again.

[4:51] Marc Tumminelli: Disclaimer, this is a real true crime story.

[4:53] Marc Tumminelli: It involves the stage. It's really crazy, but it's not fun.

[4:59] Marc Tumminelli: It's a real true crime story. It's crazy.

[5:01] Blake Ross: It's a crazy story.

[5:02] Marc Tumminelli: So let me just get the setting out there.

[5:04] Marc Tumminelli: It's May 2010.

[5:06] Marc Tumminelli: We're in Costa Mesa, California, which is the heart of the O.C.

[5:10] Marc Tumminelli: Gorgeous. Beautiful.

[5:12] Marc Tumminelli: The home of Vicki Gunvalson, the home of Tamra Judge.

[5:15] Marc Tumminelli: For all those Real Housewives people out there.

[5:18] Marc Tumminelli: It's a beautiful coastline.

[5:20] Marc Tumminelli: A 9-1-1 call comes in from a distraught man.

[5:23] Blake Ross: OK, what's going on, sir?

[5:25] Marc Tumminelli: There's a body in my son's apartment.

[5:27] Blake Ross: There's a what?

[5:28] Marc Tumminelli: A body. A dead body.

[5:30] Blake Ross: A dead body?

[5:32] Marc Tumminelli: His name is Steve Hare.

[5:34] Marc Tumminelli: He's saying there's a dead body in my son's apartment.

[5:37] Marc Tumminelli: Can't get more blatant than that.

[5:39] Marc Tumminelli: The police arrive at the apartment of his son, a man named Sam Hare.

[5:46] Marc Tumminelli: So Sam Hare was a military, a member of the military, fought in Afghanistan.

[5:52] Marc Tumminelli: He is hot as hell, a very good looking man.

[5:56] Blake Ross: Yeah.

[5:57] Marc Tumminelli: Can I say that?

[5:59] Blake Ross: Yeah.

[6:02] Marc Tumminelli: What he did in Afghanistan is mind-blowing.

[6:07] Marc Tumminelli: So during combat, they have to keep generators running in enemy territory.

[6:13] Marc Tumminelli: And he would run out to keep the generators going while they were being attacked.

[6:17] Marc Tumminelli: I mean, this is like a true army hero, Sam Hare, who could get it.

[6:20] Blake Ross: But that's the story about Sam Hare.

[6:25] Marc Tumminelli: Yes, that was whose apartment this 9-1-1 call is coming in from.

[6:32] Marc Tumminelli: Sam Hare, Afghan war veteran, they find in his apartment a body.

[6:35] Marc Tumminelli: The body is of 23-year-old Julie Kibiyushi.

[6:39] Marc Tumminelli: She's lying in Sam's bedroom.

[6:39] Marc Tumminelli: She has some writing all over her T-shirt.

[6:42] Marc Tumminelli: She's been shot in the back of the head.

[6:42] Marc Tumminelli: And her pants are ripped in what appears to be some sort of sexual assault.

[6:48] Marc Tumminelli: So they ascertain from this that, and Sam is nowhere to be found, that somehow Sam is involved in this, of course.

[6:55] Marc Tumminelli: It's his apartment, right?

[7:01] Marc Tumminelli: In the apartment, they find Julie's cell phone, which had all of these texts back and forth between her and the owner of the apartment, Sam Hare.

[7:11] Marc Tumminelli: He said, "Can you come over at midnight tonight alone? Going out for a walk. Very upset. Need to talk. Please don't tell anyone. Please. I need to talk to someone."

[7:25] Marc Tumminelli: This is like a succession of texts.

[7:28] Marc Tumminelli: And they're friends.

[7:30] Marc Tumminelli: Julie and Sam are not really dating, not necessarily boyfriend or girlfriend, but they are very close friends.

[7:35] Marc Tumminelli: They met at West Coast Community College.

[7:39] Marc Tumminelli: She tutored him.

[7:41] Marc Tumminelli: She was this very, very smart dancer who was at community college.

[7:47] Marc Tumminelli: They met. Really good buddies.

[7:49] Marc Tumminelli: But they did not have a sexual relationship.

[7:52] Marc Tumminelli: I think she even said in these text messages, because he was like, "No sex, please. Just come over to talk."

[7:57] Marc Tumminelli: And she was like, "Ew, no. You're like my brother."

[7:59] Marc Tumminelli: They used to hang out at Sam's apartment all the time.

[8:02] Blake Ross: Right.

[8:05] Blake Ross: Right.

[8:06] Marc Tumminelli: So it would not have been a weird thing for her to go over there.

[8:06] Marc Tumminelli: So the police ascertain from the fact that he was a war veteran and had had some aspects of PTSD, his father had said, some night issues, sleeping at night, things like that.

[8:21] Marc Tumminelli: His car is missing. His passport is missing.

[8:24] Marc Tumminelli: And now he has a body in his apartment.

[8:26] Marc Tumminelli: The police ascertain, well, let's go on a crazy manhunt for Sam Hare because he obviously killed this girl.

[8:32] Marc Tumminelli: And there's one other thing about Sam Hare that isn't covered in every documentary, which is that he had been questioned about a murder many years before this.

[8:42] Blake Ross: Did you know this, Blake?

[8:44] Marc Tumminelli: Well, no. Not only has he been questioned, he was on trial.

[8:47] Marc Tumminelli: But he was acquitted.

[8:51] Marc Tumminelli: They thought that maybe he lured someone to a location for a gang murder.

[8:56] Marc Tumminelli: But it turns out that that was not, in fact, the case where there was certainly not enough evidence.

[9:00] Marc Tumminelli: So the police now think he's a war vet.

[9:03] Marc Tumminelli: He has been on trial for murder before.

[9:06] Marc Tumminelli: He is missing. His passport is missing.

[9:08] Marc Tumminelli: His friend that he lured to the apartment is dead.

[9:12] Marc Tumminelli: He obviously is the guy.

[9:14] Marc Tumminelli: So they put out crazy APBs for Sam, go on the manhunt looking for him.

[9:20] Marc Tumminelli: While Sam is doing this, while, excuse me, while the police are out looking for him, Steve, the person who, Steve Hare, his father, who put in this 911 call also goes out looking for Sam.

[9:29] Marc Tumminelli: Because what else do you do?

[9:36] Marc Tumminelli: And his dad's like all over this investigation.

[9:40] Marc Tumminelli: And he also doesn't buy that.

[9:42] Marc Tumminelli: Despite all of this crazy evidence that seems like his son had done this, he doesn't buy that his son's a murderer.

[9:47] Marc Tumminelli: So he starts tracking his son's bank account, his credit card activity to try and find Sam.

[9:53] Marc Tumminelli: He finds out that his ATM card is being used in Long Beach, California, which is about 20 miles north of Costa Mesa.

[10:01] Marc Tumminelli: So he gets in his car and he drives to Long Beach.

[10:04] Marc Tumminelli: And he starts scouring ATM vestibules, hotels, restaurants, just looking for Sam because he thinks something is obviously very, very wrong here.

[10:14] Marc Tumminelli: While he is in Long Beach looking for Sam, he gets an alert on his phone because him and Sam shared a bank account, that that shared bank account was just used in a pizza place for a pizza delivery.

[10:26] Marc Tumminelli: So Steve drives over to the pizza place and sits at the pizza place for an hour trying and waiting for Sam to either come in or trying to find Sam at this pizza place.

[10:39] Marc Tumminelli: At the same time, the police are also doing a simultaneous investigation to try and find Sam.

[10:45] Marc Tumminelli: They also are tracking all of this credit card activity.

[10:50] Marc Tumminelli: They also go to the pizza place.

[10:52] Marc Tumminelli: So this is Echo's Pizza if you're going to do something bad, maybe don't order then a pizza so that the police can find you.

[11:03] Marc Tumminelli: But, oh wait, back it up for one second.

[11:05] Marc Tumminelli: So before they get to the pizza parlor, they go to the bank.

[11:09] Marc Tumminelli: That was so Long Island of you, the pizza parlor.

[11:14] Blake Ross: Oh, by the way.

[11:15] Marc Tumminelli: Well, Burnt listeners know I'm from Long Island and love my Long Island accent.

[11:19] Marc Tumminelli: But Marc Tumminelli, no matter how many coaching sessions he does, can also not get out of his Long Island-ness, okay?

[11:26] Marc Tumminelli: Well, parlor is a really, parlor is a really hard word to say.

[11:31] Marc Tumminelli: Pizza parlor.

[11:32] Blake Ross: Pizza parlor.

[11:33] Marc Tumminelli: Anyway, before you go to the pizza parlor, they go to the ATM vestibule, okay?

[11:38] Marc Tumminelli: They go to this Chase Bank where they pull up the security footage.

[11:43] Marc Tumminelli: Thinking they're going to find Sam taking out money on the run after killing his friend.

[11:48] Marc Tumminelli: They do not.

[11:50] Marc Tumminelli: They see a boy.

[11:52] Marc Tumminelli: A 17-year-old boy named Wesley.

[11:55] Marc Tumminelli: A 17-year-old boy.

[11:56] Marc Tumminelli: They didn't know it was Wesley at the time, but they see a 17-year-old boy.

[11:58] Marc Tumminelli: So they're like, something here does not add up.

[12:01] Marc Tumminelli: Something here is amiss.

[12:03] Marc Tumminelli: So then they get the alert that the card is then being used at a pizza parlor.

[12:08] Marc Tumminelli: They go to the pizza parlor.

[12:10] Marc Tumminelli: The pizza parlor gives them the address of the pizza they were going to, where they delivered the pizza.

[12:18] Marc Tumminelli: The police then SWAT team, helicopters, guns, bombs.

[12:23] Marc Tumminelli: Because they think Sam is in this house held up where the pizza is going, right?

[12:27] Marc Tumminelli: So they kind of storm in.

[12:30] Marc Tumminelli: They storm this house, and who answers the phone?

[12:33] Marc Tumminelli: I mean, who answers the door but this 17-year-old boy?

[12:37] Marc Tumminelli: Wesley Freilich.

[12:39] Marc Tumminelli: I love this kid.

[12:41] Marc Tumminelli: He's like a stoner, pimply-faced, typical teenager.

[12:51] Marc Tumminelli: Like a Bart Simpson, skateboarding in every B-roll shot, in every Dateline or 2020 that I've watched about this.

[12:58] Marc Tumminelli: He's straight out of Central Casting.

[13:01] Marc Tumminelli: I'm obsessed with him.

[13:02] Marc Tumminelli: Sitting in front of officers of the law, handcuffed.

[13:06] Marc Tumminelli: I'm obviously, literally, I'm sorry I can't say this out of G-rated, but my balls are inside of me.

[13:10] Marc Tumminelli: I was shitting myself, and I was nervous as all hell.

[13:16] Marc Tumminelli: So they open this door, and there's this wide-eyed teenage kid who's like, "What?"

[13:22] Marc Tumminelli: They storm in.

[13:23] Marc Tumminelli: They handcuffed him.

[13:24] Marc Tumminelli: So they're like, Wesley, how did you get this credit card?

[13:28] Marc Tumminelli: He's like, I got it from my friend and sometime mentor, a man named Daniel Wozniak.

[13:34] Marc Tumminelli: Now, let me jump in here really quick.

[13:36] Marc Tumminelli: Daniel Wozniak, they know each other from doing community.

[13:41] Blake Ross: Okay. And Wesley calls Dan a cool cat that he would like to groove with. He's a cool kind of cat that I would like to groove with. And I don't know what that means. He was just like, he was his community theater mentor. Dan Wozniak was the mentor for this kid Wesley in community theater, which if that's not the saddest sentence that I've ever uttered, to be someone's community theater mentor. So if that's what's happening, I think it's time to move on. I mean, I'm sitting in a closet recording a podcast. That's also a pretty sad sentence, but community theater mentor, that's... He was a cool cat that he just wanted to groove with. It's a cool cat. What does that mean?

[14:27] Marc Tumminelli: He's a cool kind of cat that I would like to groove with.

[14:30] Blake Ross: So Daniel got this kid to basically get money out of the HM saying that he was helping his friend, Sam, get money to pay a bail bondsman. This is getting very confusing, but we're going to streamline this for you and get it back to the theater, which is where we're going right now. So he gives this kid Wesley, as you said, these credit cards, says, take $400 out of the ATM because we got to pay back this bail bondsman. Crazy. Then they're like, hmm, interesting. Daniel Wozniak. The police have heard this name before. They've spoken to Daniel Wozniak because Daniel Wozniak, they spoke to all the people that lived in the same complex that Sam Heer lived in. Daniel Wozniak was Sam Heer's downstairs neighbor.

[15:16] Marc Tumminelli: Stairs neighbor.

[15:17] Blake Ross: Yeah. So they had spoken to Wozniak before. And when they spoke to Wozniak, he said, yes, I happen to have seen Sam the same yesterday, which was the day that they believe that Julie was murdered. I have seen him. He was at my apartment. He left with a man in a black hat. That's all they told him. So now a day later, they're standing with this Wesley kid saying this cool cat, Daniel Wozniak-

[15:44] Marc Tumminelli: That he wants to prove with.

[15:45] Blake Ross: That he wants to prove with. Gave him this credit card. And so they quickly rule out Wesley, of course. And now they're looking for Dan Wozniak. What Wozniak, as you said, was a local community theater actor. He was engaged to his co-star, another actress named Rachel Buffett. And they find out quickly that Dan and Rachel have some money issues. They haven't paid their rent. They have a wedding coming up and a honeymoon, and they have to pay for it, and they have no money.

[16:17] Marc Tumminelli: Might I add here that the wedding invitation to Rachel and Dan's wedding is on the counter at Sam's apartment where Julie was found dead. That's how close this wedding was happening in the next week or two at this point.

[16:37] Blake Ross: Yes. So now all alerts on Dan Wozniak, he might know something. So the police call Dan Wozniak, and they say, look, you got to come down to the police station. We need to talk to you again. He said, nah, I'm going to my, I have my bachelor party tonight. I'm going to go to my bachelor party. We could talk another time, police. So the police are like, I don't think so. They drive around looking for Dan Wozniak, find him in a sushi restaurant with his buddies, having his bachelor party, cuff him and say, you're coming down. You're talking to us, which is a pretty crazy way to exit your bachelor party.

[17:19] Marc Tumminelli: Now, throughout all the documentaries, we get to see so many headshots of Dan. Just lots of headshots.

[17:27] Blake Ross: And I want to say this, for a community theater actor who has no money, who lives in California, he has gorgeous headshots. They are chef's kiss headshots. Like one after another of these gorgeous pictures of this man. And of course, he's a community theater star because he's a boy and he's alive. And so they put him as the lead in everything. He's got quite a-

[18:00] Marc Tumminelli: He does have a repertoire.

[18:01] Blake Ross: Repertoire. And he has starred as Harold Hill in The Music Man. And are we getting to nine yet or we have to hold for a minute?

[18:10] Marc Tumminelli: Well, we got to hold. Just places, places. Okay, we just got to hold. We're still at the place where they-

[18:16] Blake Ross: They got him from the sushi buffet.

[18:17] Marc Tumminelli: Yes, they got him from the sushi buffet. They go to the sushi buffet. He's partying with his buddies. It was last night of freedom, literally now at this point. They cuff him. And as they drag him out of the restaurant, he says, I'll tell you everything. I can't protect him anymore.

[18:37] Blake Ross: I think maybe this guy has, he should have been like a soap opera writer.

[18:44] Marc Tumminelli: Well, he's certainly a pretty bad actor.

[18:48] Blake Ross: He's not a good actor. But there's also all these moments where they're talking to people who did community theater with him. And this woman's like, we did arsenic together. And I'm like, I love that she's abbreviating arsenic and Old Lace because she's in the know. Dan was in the know. They are stars.

[19:07] Marc Tumminelli: Of this very small community theater.

[19:09] Blake Ross: But he wasn't, we'll get into, and we'll play some of his performance as Guido in Nine, which is part of the story.

[19:17] Marc Tumminelli: Which is going to keep coming back. Guys, buckle up. You'll never see Nine the same way again.

[19:23] Blake Ross: Never. So they haul this Daniel Wozniak into the Costa Mesa police department. He tells them that he and Sam were working on a credit card scam together, where they withdraw money from Sam's account and then report it to the bank as missing. He says, they're doing this scam. But on the night that the police believe Julie's murdered, couldn't have been me. I was on stage playing Guido in Nine. Couldn't have been me.

[20:04] Marc Tumminelli: I'm starring, I love that the reason why he could not have murdered anyone is because he was starring in the community theater production of Nine, which is hard to watch. Because Nine is a really hard show to pull off.

[20:20] Blake Ross: Yeah, I mean, Rory Epstein didn't mess around while he was making that show. These women in the community theater production in old prom dresses, it's a scene.

[20:31] Marc Tumminelli: It's a choice.

[20:32] Blake Ross: And he is just acting with his little belly, because he's a big guy. He's a big, I would call him a daddy bear. He's a bigger guy.

[20:40] Marc Tumminelli: He would classify as one, yes.

[20:43] Blake Ross: And I want to say that if I was doing a community theater show with him, I would have had a little crush on him.

[20:48] Marc Tumminelli: Maybe, maybe a larger otter or daddy bear.

[20:53] Blake Ross: He's a daddy bear. Anyway, so as Sam is telling them, the police, about this credit card scam story, he says, the morning after I played my triumphant stage production in Nine, Sam comes to my apartment and he confesses to me that he shot somebody in a drug-fueled rage, and you, Dan Wozniak, have to help me get away with it. I said, what did you do? He's like, I got a gun. He asked me for sex. He was pretty f***ed up. He said no, and then he just shot her twice in the head. And Dan's like, I wouldn't help him. But Sam told me, I'll kill you. I'll kill your wife if you don't help me. So Dan is now terrified of Sam and says, okay, I will drop you off at a shopping mall.

[21:42] Marc Tumminelli: Okay. And so the police say, well, wait a minute, wait a minute. You told us a couple of days ago that Sam came to your house and he left with a quote, white guy in a black hat.

[21:58] Blake Ross: Dan Wozniak says, just kidding. That was a lie. Sam was my wife. I made up this mystery person just hoping that they'd take the blame off of me. So I made up this guy, a white guy in a black baseball cap. He doesn't exist. That's a lie. I apologize for that.

[22:18] Marc Tumminelli: Yes. What you all need to know is that the acting that this man is giving in the interrogation is so bad. It's like someone who doesn't know improv. It's like if you asked my mom to do improv, like it doesn't make any sense.

[22:35] Blake Ross: How dare you besmirch Denise's good name?

[22:35] Marc Tumminelli: No, Denise Nielsen's not going to do improv. She's a prop comic. But I'm just saying the guy is like, all right, all right. You got me. I made up the guy with the black hat. What do you want me to do about it? It's like-

[22:52] Blake Ross: What do you want me to say, officer?

[22:55] Marc Tumminelli: He's like, I'll do whatever as long as I can get to my wedding, okay? And they're like, you are a terrible actor. One detective after another is like, this guy is the worst actor we've ever seen. We interrogate people all the live long day, and we've never seen acting this bad from a guy who's a professional actor who thinks he's going to pull the wool over everyone's eyes. He's like, I'm Guido.

[23:23] Blake Ross: Also, I think we need to mention that his soon to be wife, Rachel, is also starring as Carla in this same production of Nine. We'll get to her. We're going to get to Rachel Buffett in a minute.

[23:33] Marc Tumminelli: Yes. But is it Buffay or is it Buffett?

[23:38] Blake Ross: It's Buffett, but when people have- Which I thought was interesting, because Dan Wozniak and Rachel Buffett, they have both names. It's like Steve Wozniak and Warren Buffett. Did that not go into- They have some interesting names. So they're in the interrogation, and he keeps changing his story. It's like huge differences, and then they're like, just kidding. I lied about that, but this I'm telling you the truth about. And it goes on and on forever.

[24:00] Marc Tumminelli: Do you want to jump to the swab?

[24:05] Blake Ross: So finally, the police are like, okay, no more messing around. We need to get a DNA swab to eliminate you as a suspect. So Dan consents to this DNA swab. Because he's a dipshit. He doesn't understand how DNA works. So they take his DNA, and then five seconds later, they're like, we're not going to find your DNA on Julie, are we? He's like, no, no, no, no. Definitely not on Julie, but I was in Sam's apartment. So you might find it in Sam's apartment. So again, the story-

[24:36] Marc Tumminelli: He's like, I used the bathroom. I think I went out to the patio. It's just he is...

[24:42] Blake Ross: Now it's a totally different version of the story.

[24:43] Marc Tumminelli: Totally different story. So they're like, okay, so then you were in the apartment. So finally, they bring in another cop, and they're like, now we're going to do the good cop, bad cop routine. And the bad cop's like, you're under arrest for accessory to murder. You got to tell us everything that you know. And he says the line that everyone is thinking, but it's like the worst thing you can say to an actor. He said, you're not that good of an actor, Dan.

[25:14] Blake Ross: Dan, you got the answers. You can help us.

[25:17] Marc Tumminelli: I don't know what else you want me to say.

[25:23] Blake Ross: I don't know. Tell us the truth.

[25:27] Marc Tumminelli: You're not that good of an actor.

[25:32] Blake Ross: I mean, he's really not that good of an actor.

[25:32] Marc Tumminelli: He's really not.

[25:32] Blake Ross: So finally, they bring in the fiance. This is where we get to Rachel Buffett, buffet, however you want to say her name. They bring her in, his co-star of Nine, and they're like, tell Rachel what the real story is. And he sticks to this whole story about Sam and him and this credit card scheme and him helping Sam clean up the murder that Sam did. And she's very cold. She's kind of just asking him these rote questions, but she's not like, wait, what? You helped a friend with a murder? Like, what in the hell? She kind of is just like, okay, and then you did what? And then she was very... So now the antennas are coming up about Rachel too, but first they got to get this out of this big bear daddy.

[26:29] Marc Tumminelli: So they send Rachel away and they're like, Dan, we found your DNA on Julie's body.

[26:36] Blake Ross: Now, anybody who has ever watched one episode of Dateline, your grandmother knows that DNA does not come back that quickly.

[26:45] Marc Tumminelli: No. If you're on the Reels channel or Oxygen quite frequently as I am, you know that you're not just going to swab a person's thing and then be like, DNA doesn't work like that. But Dan is a community theater actor. He doesn't have time to watch Dateline.

[27:03] Blake Ross: He's very busy getting a book for arsenic to be able to watch a good Dateline like I like to. He doesn't know. I'm just saying, if you and I-

[27:15] Marc Tumminelli: So they do not have the DNA. They're like, then why is your DNA on Julie? So then...

[27:22] Blake Ross: He's like, and we're gonna play this clip right now.

[27:52] Marc Tumminelli: Stop. How did your DNA get on it? I was standing over the body. I saw two bullet wounds to her head. You can't even keep your lies straight. He says, because I was right over the body. I saw two bullets in her head. Sam said he shot her twice. I saw the writing on her shirt. So he then changes the story again and says he actually did see Julie's body when he was in Sam's apartment. So now the police are like, this guy has something to do with this. They start really grilling him. The police say, we have your DNA on this girl's body. He admits to now being over the body. I saw her. They're like, that's not the way DNA works. You just fall off your body and get onto a murder victim. That's not how any of this works.

Dan is like completely clams up and goes back to his cell after hours of interrogation. While he is back in his cell, he calls the fiancé that he had just spoken to a couple hours earlier, Rachel Buffett. They have a conversation. And even though she's like, dude, they're recording us, he starts- Well, the big thing that it gets revealed in that conversation is she goes, your brother just told me he has a bag full of evidence that you gave him, and I'm gonna tell the police about it. And he's like, don't do that. Wait, not only did he give his brother a bag full of evidence, he said here, his brother's name is Tim. He said, Tim, take this bag of evidence and get rid of it. This is how smart this family is.

So Tim says, okay, I'm going to get rid of the bag of evidence by throwing it over the fence in my parents' house. Because if I throw it over the fence in my parents' house and it lands on the other side of the fence, it's gone. I've gotten rid of it. I've gotten rid of it. So the brother tells Rachel, I have this bag of evidence. And so Dan's like, if you go to the police with that, I'm done for. I didn't murder anybody. My mom's working on canceling all the wedding plans now. And I just talked to Tim and I need to make a phone call to the detective now. Why? Tim says he has evidence with him or he knew where it was or something. Then I'm doomed. And everything sounds like Norma Desmond at the end.

Like this guy, his line readings in his life are so disingenuous. Rachel, you're never going to see me again for the rest of your life. But that sounds, that's too good. That's too good way. Rachel. Babe, listen to me. I'm going to go do something right now. And you're not going to see me for the rest of your life. You're never going to see me again for the rest of your life. It's almost like the emphasis is on the wrong words. Like when I work with a six-year-old. Like, well, that's not the most important word in this sentence, is it? So Rachel, to her credit, he starts unrolling this confession. And he's like, basically, you can ascertain what it is. I have to tell the truth of what I did.

I think you know what it is. It's bad. Imagine the worst. And that's what I did. Trust me, please. I have to tell the truth on what I did. And I think you know what it is. And it's bad. Imagine the worst. And that's what I did. You're never going to see me again. So they're talking through and basically he admits it to her. And she says, I'm going to tell the cops. And she does, to her credit. She tells the cops, they find this bag of evidence. And in it is pay dirt. It's Sam's bank information. It's his- His bloody clothes. It's the bloody clothes, shell casings. It's like, if you wanted to basically bag up, Dan Wozniak killed this man and put it in a bag, gave it to his brother. And the brother got, quote, rid of it by throwing it over a fence.

So he's like, I love you, baby, to his girlfriend. I got, I'm going to go confess to murder. So- So after 14 hours, he is back in the interrogation room and he admits everything. And also the most dramatic line readings of all time. The line was, I'm crazy. And I killed Sam. And I killed Julie. You said you wanted to talk to me. What's going on? I'm crazy. And I did it. You did what? I killed Julie and I killed Sam. Okay. All right. All right. It's all about the money. Sam is decapitated. He's at the military base. He's at the theater. He's at the theater. He confesses to the murder. He also confesses to decapitating Sam, dismembering him. And parts of it are in the theater and parts of it he scattered in a nearby park.

And the detective asks him, what was going on in your mind as you were dismembering your friends? And he says, I was smiling and laughing. And then he starts this maniacal laugh. And your motive behind killing Sam was? Money and insanity. Money and insanity. Okay. I'm sure as his performance as like a crazy serial killer or whatever he thought was like his line reading at that point, but it's so creepy. It's so weird. Weird. He starts telling the police the story and he basically, after killing Sam, well, let's start from the beginning of the story. He lures Sam into a theater at a military base. He says, I have to move some stuff. This is the Liberty Theater? Yes. At a military base. They go up to an attic to move some things.

As Sam is bending down to help pick up something that Dan- They're in the prop shop. Yes. He shoots Sam. Sam doesn't die right away and asks him for help and he shoots him again to make sure he's dead. It's horrible. Then after killing Sam, he goes to another theater. He's a man of several theaters and goes on for the triumphant role of Guido in Nine with the girlfriend. After killing somebody, he then washes up and goes to the theater to go- Perform as Guido in the community theater production of Nine. Now, I couldn't do a show if I didn't sleep for 14 hours the night before. I cannot imagine in a million years a world where what kind of level of psychopath you have to be to be able to sing a Maury Estin score after murdering your upstairs neighbor.

They have footage of it. It's like nothing fazed him. It's crazy. The show does look very janky. Mark, besides the janky performance, it's not a Broadway stage performance, but it's pretty okay. Besides that, during intermission, he hatches this plan. How am I going to get away with this murder? Okay, I have Sam's cell phone. He hatches this plan during intermission to text Julie, Sam's friend, to lure her to Sam's apartment after the show so that he can then use Julie's murder as a cover-up for Sam's murder. He sends these texts during intermission, sending these texts to Julie sets the stage to help him get out of the murder that he just committed. Now, why did he murder Sam in the first place?

For the $62,000 in the account, Sam had saved all his military money, and Dan could not pay for his wedding. He was broke as a joke. He had no job. He was about to get evicted, and he had a wedding, and he had to pay for honeymoon. His get-out-of-jail-free card was that I can kill this guy I kind of know, steal the money from his account, make it look like he took it and ran away, and pay for my honeymoon, which is truly disgusting. Not only does he kill his friend for the money, then he stages this and kills another person and stages that to try and cover up the crime. So the next day after triumphant performance in Guido, killing his friend, triumphant performance in Guido, then that evening he kills Julie.

He then goes back to the military-based theater attic. He dismembers his friend's body, and then he goes on to perform another show and goes to the cast party afterwards. Total insanity crazy. Goes to the cast party, and there are all these photos of him having a good time, drinking in his Across the Universe t-shirt, which is like, where do you get that from? But it is so wild to imagine what his day was, and then just performing in Nine, going to a cast party, dismembering somebody, killing someone, and then performing again. It's crazy. It's wild. It is really wild. So let's get to the fiancée, Rachel Buffett, Buffay, if you will. Rachel was also an actress, and she was also a Disneyland princess.

You know what? What did she play at Disneyland? I don't. Do you know? She looks like a Rapunzel to me. I would say this is pre-Rapunzel, maybe, wasn't it? I mean, pre-Tangled. So I think she was probably Aurora or Cinderella. Your basic Cinderella. She was pretty basic. She looks kind of like she'd be more like a princess at Adventureland. Sure. Or like a Six Flags great adventure, October scare fest. Yes, that's exactly right. But Rachel, the one-time Disneyland princess, also co-star of the great performance of Community Theater and Nine, the police start suspecting, wait, something's up with her, because they get a call from a man named Chris Williams, also a performer of the area. He's a jazz musician.

As this news starts spreading that Dan Wozniak killed these people, Chris Williams goes to the police and he says, the morning that Julie was murdered, I was in Dan's house with Dan, his fiancée, Rachel, and Sam was there too. Now the police are like, wait, what? Both Dan and Sam never mentioned, I mean, sorry, both Dan and Rachel never mentioned this. So they talked to Chris Williams and Chris Williams says, I also loaned money to Dan and Rachel. And because I wanted the money back, like it was a loan, it was not just giving them money. Because I wanted the money back, I told them, although this wasn't true, this guy seems a little shady too, but whatever. He's like, I told them that this money is not mine.

It's from a guy with connections. So make sure you give me the money back in a prompt manner, because something bad might happen to you if you don't give me the money right away. So Chris goes to their apartment and says, I kind of need my money back. And while he's there with Dan and Rachel, Dan says, okay, I'm going to go get your money for you. You stay here. So Chris is suspecting that he's going to be there for a couple of minutes. Dan's maybe just going to take some money out of the bank. He ends up sitting there for three hours with Rachel Buffett. He says, while he's there with Rachel, she's very agitated. She's looking for jobs at topless bars. Like clearly this couple has some deep, deep money issues.

Three hours go by. I don't know why this Chris Williams decided to stay there, but three hours go by. He's still there. Dan comes back. He's a wreck. He's acting really nervous. He's almost hyperventilating. He takes 400 bucks. He throws it down on the table and say, here's your money.

[41:05] Blake Ross: Rachel gets questioned by police a day prior; she doesn't tell them anything about Chris. In fact, she also told the same lie about Sam coming to their apartment and leaving with that white guy, the black hat lie. So they're like, Rachel's also lying. So something's up with her too. So they bring Rachel back in. And there's also a very eerie recording of her statement to police. This girl, like, I don't, again, also don't know if she's acting or what, but she's like, very matter of fact, very calm while she's relaying all these things. And they're like, why, Rachel, why did you lie to us about the man in the black hat? She said she was afraid of Chris's mafia connections. She didn't want to say anything.

She was afraid that if she said something about Chris, that, you know, the mafia would be after her or something like that. Crazy. But she insists that even though I lied to you, I know nothing about the crime. They give her a voice analyzer test, which those things are not admissible in court. And I don't know why anyone ever submits to them, but they come back and they're like, your voice analyzer slash lie detector test came back as deceptive. There's something you're not telling us. So they arrest her for being an accessory after the fact. She's now lied to police twice, one about the man with the hat and two about Chris Williams. While she's getting ready for her trial, she goes on a crazy media tour, including a stop at Dr. Phil with Sam Harer's father, Steve, which is a wild scene to watch.

He's like, can you please stop talking about my son? Can you please? He like just begs her to stop doing press. But because of how much these people are hurting and they think that I had anything to do with that, it's bringing up a lot of pain for me. And I guess that's why I don't want to wait for it to go through court. I'm so happy that it will so they can see that I had nothing to do with it. But I want some sort of healing or at least for them to just know that I didn't have anything to do with their pain before that. Do you believe she belongs in prison? Yes. Yes, I do. And if she truly feels for the family, I would appreciate her stopping trying to get other. I'd appreciate if she doesn't give any more interviews until the courts.

[43:44] Marc Tumminelli: Yeah, of course. But he is just like the sweetest man who, you know, is dealing with the most unthinkable thing of having not only his son murdered, but, you know, for all of that time that they thought that his son was a murderer. It's like it's so wildly unfair to this man that she is going everywhere to talk about. Horrible, horrible. But she goes on this media tour. She goes on Dr. Phil. She goes on Dateline. She starts proclaiming her innocence and she starts building this story of blaming Dan, that he is this psychopath, which clearly he is. Besides the fact that he's a horrible actor, he's obviously a psychopath. His trial, his defense attorneys are blaming her, saying she is the mastermind behind all of this, that she kept pressuring Dan about the money of it all and that she knew about the murders.

And not only that she knew about the murders, that she helped lure Julie to the apartment because her and Julie were friends. Rachel and Julie were friends. So they're painting this picture that Rachel is not the Disney princess that she proclaims that she is. The prosecution during Dan's trial, it's very, it's the most clear cut. Besides his confession, he's literally this guy is not a dumb dumb. He's literally Googling how to kill someone quickly and how to hide a body. His brother testified against him in court like it was a treasy trial. And within an hour, they come back that he's guilty. It's very clear that this guy is a crazy sociopath. The prosecution shows him having Google searches on how to kill someone quickly, how to hide a body.

I mean, folks, I don't advocate for killing anybody, of course, but if you're going to, please do not Google how to do it first. There's ways to track this. You know what? If you're going to kill someone, Google it, write it down on a piece of paper really hard so that even if you rip the page, it's on the next page. Do all the things so we can find you.

[45:50] Blake Ross: Yeah, I guess that's the right tactic. Don't tell people to be good murderers.

[45:56] Marc Tumminelli: I guess, I understand. And actually, criminals are generally pretty stupid.

[46:01] Blake Ross: Probably, yeah. And don't give it to your brother, who then is going to take the backpack and just throw it over the—

[46:08] Marc Tumminelli: And then also don't do Nine. Also, who does Nine?

[46:12] Blake Ross: Yeah. I mean, do an all-male Sweeney Todd at least.

[46:17] Marc Tumminelli: Oh yeah, because that's going to happen at a community theater. Blake, have you been to a community theater audition ever? Because I'm going to tell you that there are three guys there and none of them have any talent. So very, very quickly, Dan Wozniak gets convicted of murder. Within an hour.

[46:30] Blake Ross: Yeah. It only took an hour for the jury to come back to convict him of murder, which is one of the shortest times a jury was out in American history on a murder trial. Sentenced to death. Two years later, Rachel Buffett goes on trial, charged with lying to the police. The question of the trial is, did she help Wozniak get away with murder or did she really help police by helping to get his confession? The big thing that's reiterated is the fact that she lied so many times. What we find out during the trial, this is the really, like, makes me really creepy, creeps out part, is that we find out that Rachel, when Chris Williams, the jazz singer, comes to their apartment asking for the money and Dan goes out with Sam to then do what Dan does, Chris gets $400 from Dan after he does all this stuff.

He feels so badly that Rachel and Dan... Dan is clearly very upset. They're clearly having a lot of money problems. Chris feels really badly and gives them a 20 and says, have dinner tonight. Like, clearly you're having a lot of money problems. He gives them a 20 and says, here, buy yourself some dinner tonight. Drives away. Moments later, he gets a call back from Rachel and she says, come back. You forgot your $20. And he said, no, I left that for you to get some dinner tonight. And she's like, no, no, no. I think you should come back to get your $20 and really starts trying to convince him to come back to get his $20. He doesn't go back, of course, and goes on to tell police about all of this, but he believes that Rachel was trying to lure him back to their apartment so that they could also get rid of Chris Williams.

So because he was obviously a big part of this and saw Sam and saw Dan and saw Rachel that day. So he believes that they were trying to kill him too. That's what the police told me. They said, if you would have gone back that day, they wanted to kill you.

[48:52] Marc Tumminelli: So I don't know if she's so innocent in all this, but of course, but she wasn't because she was found guilty. She was found guilty of accessory after the fact. She was sentenced to 32 months in jail. I mean, it's all, it's the only reason why I don't think she knew that Dan killed Sam was because in that jailhouse call, he kind of admits, and it does really sound like she does not know that information because I don't know why he would say it on that call. It all is quite crazy, but she does get found guilty and he is on death row, but then Gavin Newsom recently put a moratorium on the death penalty in California. So I think he moved jails, but he's away for at least life. He's away for life, but they just moved him into a very nice jail. The example is from a Motel 6 to a Regent Hotel. He's staying in a much nicer jail.

[49:50] Blake Ross: Yes. He's staying in a much nicer jail. And of course, the families of Julie and Sam are outraged about it, that he should have the word. I mean, this is a sick, sick individual. He should not have any easy time. But he's denying that. He's still blaming this all on Rachel and denying that he had anything. He did a CNBC lockup show.

[50:10] Marc Tumminelli: I know. I have not watched that yet.

[50:13] Blake Ross: He tried hard. I haven't watched it either, but he does it and he's like, I saw clips from it. He's reading a Bible and he's very much, again, playing the part of a saint. But it was just so crazy. And that is a story of Daniel Wozniak and Rachel Buffett. It's a crazy and wild story. It's really sad and wild. But the fact that Dan Wozniak killed two people, dismembered one, and went on to play Guido in Nine, it just boggles the mind, Marc. It boggles the mind. And I have to just say something really sweet about June, who is Julie's mom, who just sort of broke my heart through every interview. I mean, to see a mom sort of have to talk about her daughter like that is just so heartbreaking. She was murdered purely for a cover-up. This guy thought he was some kind of criminal mastermind and he was such a dipshit, like real big dum-dum.

[51:19] Marc Tumminelli: And also, the first page of the Wikipedia says, Dan Wozniak is a former American community theater actor. And that is the saddest. That is also very sad. The thing you have on your Wikipedia is—

[51:34] Blake Ross: Well, it does say Daniel Wozniak, quote, murderer.

[51:39] Marc Tumminelli: A former American community theater actor. To be a former American community theater actor is all... I guess I'm a former American community theater actor. Blake, were you ever in a community theater show?

[51:49] Blake Ross: I was. I was in a community theater production of Runaways.

[51:53] Marc Tumminelli: Where do people go when they run away?

[51:57] Blake Ross: I just can't imagine you murdering someone and then going to do the matinee.

[52:01] Marc Tumminelli: No, that I couldn't do.

[52:02] Blake Ross: It's truly gross. I hope he rots in jail and that Rachel Buffett ain't much better, but she's not going to have a good time.

[52:13] Marc Tumminelli: Yes. If this story at all intrigued you and you want to do an even deeper dive, there's a great podcast called Sleuth. It does a multi-episode deep dive into this case, deep dive into Dan Wozniak, deep dive into Rachel Buffett. Neither one of them is great people. It also talks to Steve Hare, who's Sam's father, who had a lot to leading the police to the pizza parlor, Pizza Pala, to get all this information. If this at all interests you after hearing Marc and I rattle on about it for an hour, go listen to Sleuth.

[52:47] Blake Ross: What a crazy story. Crazy story. Hey, Marc, if you could solve any unsolvable crime, what would it be?

[52:53] Marc Tumminelli: Probably Al Capone. Where is he really? Geraldo. Where is he really and what happened to him? I would think that's the classic case.

[53:03] Blake Ross: Why? What would you do?

[53:08] Marc Tumminelli: I want to know what happened with JonBenet would have to be my number one. Then my number two, Amy Lynn Bradley. I don't know if anyone knows this story. She disappeared from basically a Royal Caribbean cruise ship. There's all this footage of her. Then she's literally in the morning, she's gone. They don't know if she got thrown off the boat. They don't know. The cruise ship murders are crazy. I'm sorry. I'm obsessed with cruise ship murders.

[53:33] Blake Ross: Maybe you want to just do a whole podcast about cruise ship murders, cruise ship crimes. It'll be called cruise ship crimes. There's some crazy ass shit that happens on a cruise ship.

[53:44] Marc Tumminelli: Yeah, you got to be careful there. JonBenet, I want to know what happened to her, but that's not for this podcast. Blake, you're killing it legitimately. Congratulations on the success of your—

[53:59] Blake Ross: Not really. Congratulations on the success of your incredible theater podcast.

[54:03] Marc Tumminelli: Thank you, Marc, my dear, dear friend. I was riveted with each episode. I can't wait to dive into whatever your next Broadway crime is.

[54:09] Blake Ross: Thank you. Go listen. If you want a little levity, a little palate cleanser after listening to this terrible story, go listen to Little Me. It's a laugh a minute. It's great. You'll learn a lot of things. Thanks for joining us, Marc. I love you.

[54:23] Marc Tumminelli: I love you very much.

[54:25] Blake Ross: Bye, guys. Thanks for listening. Bye.

[54:25] For sources and more information on the Rebecca scandal, visit bpn.fm slash Burt.