3 Investigative Takeaways from an Amazing True Crime Podcast

Thanks to a recommendation from Hal Humphreys at PI Education, I got a chance to listen to the Bone Valley podcast a few weeks ago while I was driving through Arizona.

It’s nine episodes (nine-plus hours) of pure entertainment that fit perfectly into my weeklong saunter from Phoenix to Sedona to the Grand Canyon and back to Phoenix. Although the atmospheric river dumping on the West Coast put a bit of a damper on things, it was still a great trip.

As for the podcast, the only time I get to listen to one is on these long trips. My commute to work is less than a mile, and sitting around my house listening to a podcast just doesn’t suit me. And working while listening never seems to work for my brain.

The podcast is hosted by Gilbert King, a Pulitzer-winning author, who was tipped off by a Florida sitting judge about Leo Schofield, a man convicted of murdering his wife in 1987. Schofield, who was 21 years old at the time of the murder, has been serving a life sentence even though another man has confessed to the murder. It’s a chilling story about a murder and a miscarriage of justice.

It’s probably the best true crime podcast I have ever listened to.

I know a lot of my colleagues in the business might have some more interesting takes on the criminal defense angle here, but as someone who doesn’t focus on that kind of work, here are a few of my takeaways from the Bone Valley podcast.

Good investigations take time and resources

King and his assistant spent nearly four years on the research and inquiries needed to wrap up their investigation. Think about the number of man hours and amount of resources and money needed to get to the bottom of this. For argument’s sake, let’s just say that King and his assistant each spent 1,500 hours a year on this for four years (12,000 hours total). Even if you don’t include any of their expenses, at a modest hourly rate, you are talking about over $1 million to get to the bottom of one case.

I understand that someone’s life is at stake here, and turning over a criminal conviction is no walk in the park, but it’s a healthy reminder that investigations take time and resources. Investigations are messy and don’t often neatly wrap up in one hour, despite what Jessica Fletcher and Frank Columbo would have us believe.

People don’t like to be wrong

This may seem pretty obvious, but nobody likes to be wrong. And admitting to being wrong is even more complicated. There seems to be a lack of admitting to anything wrong in police work regarding wrongful conviction cases. You often find police officers who go to their graves believing they were right about their work, despite any new evidence, science or confession that may contradict them.

I empathize with the officers. Nobody likes admitting to being wrong.

But getting it right — and not just “being” right — should always be the goal here.

Despite the effect it might have on one’s ego.

There are good facts and bad facts

In criminal defense, there is a saying that there are good facts and bad facts. For example, if you were accused of murdering someone, the fact that your cell phone location was in the same area as the body is a bad fact, but someone else’s DNA (and not yours) being at the scene is a good fact.

King does an excellent job of presenting all of the good and bad facts in defense of Leo—the bad facts being that he was abusive to his wife, a bizarre premonition had by Leo’s father and some interesting eyewitness testimony.

The good facts included the unknown fingerprints, the lack of a murder weapon and a timeline that didn’t add up.  

You’ve got to deal with all of the facts, good and bad.

Ignoring the facts doesn’t change them.

So, those are a few of my takeaways. What did you think of Bone Valley?