The Killing Of Dan Markel Part 1 - 665

Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of Generation Y ad-free right now. Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app. How are you doing tonight, Aaron? I'm good, Justin. How are you feeling today? I'm doing all right. We're going to be covering a big case tonight. One that I've heard the rumblings about, and I've seen it on a lot of the true crime channels, but never really knew all the details about this case. And this is one of those cases where you can go down so many rabbit holes. And it might sound pretty basic on its surface, but oh my gosh, I went down too many rabbit holes about this family and everyone involved. and it just really occupied a lot of my time for the last week. Yeah, and for me, it really is something I wanted to cover because the question is, how did this happen? Why did this happen? And I think that comes up because of who ends up in hot water over it. Sometimes it's not the person you expect is being held accountable. Or you wonder if this is everything. Before we get into that, Aaron, we have some announcements. I always try to plug this other show I'm doing. It's called WTAF Was My Childhood. It's a fun, more lighthearted show about growing up as Gen X or an elder millennial and how things were during your childhood and how much things have changed since then. It should be everywhere. You can find a podcast. So WTAF Was My Childhood. has a little bear smoking a cigarette as the logo. And I wish I had started with this, Justin, but we have some people who probably tell us that they skipped through this part of the show because they're like, oh, they're just plugging stuff. I want to get to the content. We try to make this as quick as possible. So we understand your motivations, but we do tell you for a good reason in case you want to know about it, which you might. Also, we're going to be at CrimeCon again, 2026. This is in Las Vegas, Nevada. Once again, we will be there May 29th through the 31st. And if you don't know anything about CrimeCon, well, you'll see some of your favorite content creators there. But you'll also get to meet with law enforcement. You'll meet with victims' families. You'll meet with advocates. You'll meet with people who do forensic testing, such as Othram. So I would highly encourage you, if you haven't been, I think it's an incredible experience. And if only to do it once. I think you should look into it. We would love to see you there. If you are going, please use our code GENY, G-E-N-W-H-Y, to save on your tickets. So go to CrimeCon.com and find your ticket and then use our code GENY. Well, with that, Aaron, what are we going to be talking about tonight? Tonight, we're talking about the killing of Dan Markle. On July 18th, 2014, FSU professor and lawyer Dan Markle was shot while sitting in his car at home. The investigation revealed a messy divorce, family animosity, and a murder for hire plot. And this is something that I don't know if anybody could have foreseen how this was going to go. That's what I'll tell you from the get-go. So Dan Eric Markle was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on October 9th, 1972 to Ruth and Phil Markle. He had one sister named Shelley. The kids were raised in a conservative Jewish household. Dan's friends and family described him as a mischievous child who grew to be a very friendly, smart, and driven adult. He attended Harvard University for his undergraduate degree, then traveled to England and attended Cambridge University. He went to Israel for a year and then attended and graduated from law school. So very motivated, highly educated. He was a top law scholar and published multiple articles on topics like the death penalty, of which he was obviously against. In 2005, he started a blog called Prozblog, where he wrote about topics in law and helped newer lawyers find support and connect with their peers. Dan was a devout Jew and looked to the traditional Jewish ways for guidance in his life. And that's essentially how he ends up meeting his soon-to-be wife, right Aaron? In 2003, Dan met Wendy Adelson on a Jewish dating site, J-Date. Within a year, they were engaged and then they got married February 26, 2006. Wendy was the youngest of three kids born to Donna and Harvey Adelson. Donna was a stay-at-home mom for some time and even appeared on Wheel of Fortune in 1989. Every time I hear that, I think, man, I wish I could appear on one of those game shows. But yeah, I'm sure there's a lot of pressure, even though it's pretty cool to be on there and you could win some money. Eventually, she worked at Harvey's Dental Practice, which was the Adelson Institute for Aesthetic and Implant Dentistry and helped keep the books updated. Robert, the oldest brother, attended medical school while Charles or Charlie, as we call him, followed in his father's footsteps and became a dentist. Now, Wendy grew up in Coral Springs, Florida and graduated from high school in 1997. She went on to get her undergraduate degree and then she too earned her master's degree from Cambridge and then graduated from law school. Like her mother, she competed on a televised game show, The Weakest Link. Wendy's friends and family describe her as a fun, smart person with a great sense of humor. Wendy and her family were extremely close and her parents were involved in their children's lives, even as adults. Obviously, they had this family practice together here. But Robert, he would fall out of favor with this tight-knit family when he dated a woman who wasn't Jewish. So despite his mother's wishes, he married her and only spoke to the family once every week or so. Some sources say he was estranged, but in later testimony, he recalled speaking with his family several times a month. Donna involved herself in Wendy's dating life as well, but she was happy when Wendy met Dan, the successful Jewish lawyer. Donna helped plan the wedding and agreed that the meal would be kosher. Dan wanted a traditional wedding and every aspect needed to be kosher for the rabbis, But I just want to really harp on Wendy's family. They work together. They are involved in each other's lives all the way into adulthood. They don't really keep much from each other. On February 26, 2006, Dan and Wendy wed in Pokeraton, Florida, but it didn't quite go according to plan. The catering was not kosher and the rabbis left after the ceremony. Dan was upset by this, but Donna couldn't understand why. Despite the rocky beginning, Dan and Wendy proceeded into a happy marriage and moved into the upscale neighborhood of Benton Hills in Tallahassee, Florida. Dan and Wendy worked as law professors at Florida State University. To all appearances, they were a happy and successful couple. In 2009, Wendy gave birth to their first son, Benjamin, and the following year, she delivered their second son, Lincoln. After the children were born, their relationships started to change. Wendy missed being close to her family, who were about seven hours away in southern Florida. Dan attempted to land a job in Miami, but it didn't work out, and they remained in Tallahassee. In the next two years, it's said that Wendy grew increasingly unhappy with the marriage and started to pull away. According to Wendy's friend Tova Walsh, Wendy tried to talk to Dan about the marriage, but he was dismissive. Tova claimed in a 2020 interview that she was present a few times when Dan said unkind things to Wendy and she found him to be controlling. Wendy felt like Dan no longer viewed her as an equal and she wrote a fictional novel which clearly reflected parts of her life and frustrations with her marriage. Dan's seeming lack of attentiveness extended to Wendy's work. He never even read her novel. So Dan was frequently traveling for work, speaking on panels and presenting to other scholars and lawyers. In September of 2012, Dan was at a conference in New York when Wendy called to tell him she was leaving him. He immediately booked a flight home. But when he returned, Wendy and the kids were gone. Much of the furniture was missing. And on a mattress left on the floor, Dan found divorce papers. According to his friends and family, he was devastated by this. And I've seen some articles about this and documentaries about this. Most of them report that the house was cleared out, was left bare. I wasn't in the house. I didn't see photos, but it's described as she took everything and left him a mattress. Not sure if that's exactly true, but that's the way this is reported. And if that's the case, I mean, even just leaving and taking a lot of stuff with the children seems very hostile and vindictive. Yeah, and this contentious divorce played out in filed motions and court hearings. Dan accused Wendy of hiding assets and taking hundreds of thousands of dollars, along with a family ring that belonged to his aunt from the Holocaust. Now, Wendy claimed Dan was emotionally abusive and told her colleagues that she struggled with mental illness. In an interview with 2020, a friend described the divorce like a tennis match, back and forth with accusations and motions. Wendy attempted to relocate to the Adelson family home in Coral Springs, Florida, with Benjamin and Lincoln. She filed a motion for relocation, but Dan objected. On June 20th, 2013, a judge denied Wendy's petition to relocate. A month later, July 31st, 2013, their divorce was finalized. You can imagine she wants to move these children seven hours away. Dan saying, I can't travel seven hours to see my own children. So that's why he fights this in court. And the judge agrees because typically it's, hey, you can move out, you guys can separate, but you're required to keep access to the children by both parents. Yeah it devastating to have your kids that far away Wendy is very upset by this decision and her mother Donna was enraged They exchanged emails about the situation and Donna provided ideas to Wendy to manipulate Dan into agreeing to the relocation. Donna suggested that Wendy threatened to raise the children in a Catholic home and get them baptized. She further directed Wendy to offer Dan $1 million to be paid by Wendy, her parents and her brother Charles. The children were Dan's world and he absolutely refused to put 500 miles between them because no matter what, he just wanted access to his children. And what a weird and mean retaliatory thing that her mother would try to say, you know, like, oh, bring them up Catholic and, you know, get them baptized. Like this is just spiteful. well and it's also insulting because they're trying to buy him out from having access to his own children and to me if you're a parent out there just think about that you have someone who's your ex and they're offering you big money a million dollars so you don't have to worry about seeing your kids that doesn't work it wouldn't work for me so even though the divorce was finalized the legal battles kept going on benjamin and lincoln visited donna and on their return dan discovered that Donna had said hateful things about him to his boys. Court records report that she told the children that Dan was stupid. They told Dan that she hates you because he was taking her sunshines away from her. Donna's spiteful comments to the children angered Dan and he filed a motion to require supervised visitation for Donna. You can see how that would set off some more guns a-blazing in this whole battle. You know, again, just because there's an end to the divorce doesn't mean the battles are over. I mean, sometimes that's the beginning of a war. The court set a hearing for May 15, 2014, but the lawyers for both parties withdrew because of unspecified conflicts. And new lawyers were obtained for both sides, but Dan was murdered before a new hearing date could be set. So let's talk about Dan's murder, Justin. It was July 18, 2014, around 8.50 a.m. Dan had dropped Benjamin and Lincoln off at daycare in Tallahassee, just a few miles from his home. He then drove to Premier Health and Fitness Center, where he often worked out. Surveillance video from the gym confirmed Dan arrived at around 9.12 a.m. On his drive home, he spoke with Ruth for a few moments before another call at 10.45 a.m. Dan talked with a teacher at the non-denominational charter school. He wanted the boys to be raised as traditional Jews, educated in the faith and kosher, but Wendy applied for Benjamin to attend kindergarten at the school without telling Dan. The call was arranged for Dan to ask questions and discuss the education provided at the school. As Dan approached his house, he noticed someone in the driveway whom he didn't recognize. Dan stated, there's someone next to me. And then the teacher heard a grunt, muffled voices, and two gunshots followed by labored breathing. He attempted to talk to Dan, but he didn't respond. The teacher quickly dialed 911 knowing something wrong has happened to Dan. At about 11 a.m., a neighbor, James Geiger, on Trescot Drive, where Dan lived, heard gunshots. Now this neighbor looked out the window and he saw a small light colored car that looked or appeared to be a Toyota Prius backing quickly out of Dan's driveway. So he went over to Dan's car, which was parked but still on in the garage. And he called 911 at 1102 a.m. and reported that Dan was unresponsive but appeared to still be alive and moving. Inside the vehicle, Dan was sitting slumped in the driver's seat, bleeding from what appeared to be a gunshot wound to the head. 19 minutes passed before emergency responders arrived, and he was then rushed to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. There is some talk and debate about whether the 911 dispatcher understood the severity of this, and they claim that's why it took 19 minutes for responders to arrive. That didn't even make a blip on my radar, Aaron. I just assumed that's the normal response time, but I could be wrong. No, I know like when I've had an emergency at my house some years ago, they responded very quickly. I think it just depends on a variety of factors. But I do believe that emergency responders move as quickly as they can. I think they take this very seriously. This is what they do. And according to Ruth Markle's account of the events in her book, The Unveiling, A Mother's Reflection on Murder, Grief, and Trial Life, Dan was shot twice through the driver's side car window. One of those bullets pierced his forehead, the other his left cheek. Dan's glasses were shattered and the wounds caused severe hemorrhaging. Now, one bullet was lodged in his brain and the doctors reported there was zero chance of survival. Dan died at around 2 a.m. the next morning, July 19th, 2014. So Justin, with all of this, the police are going to be quick at starting an investigation. Yeah, we have a fairly nice neighborhood. We have a call Dan was on while he was shot. And we have neighbors who witnessed something going on here. So when they start this investigation, of course, they're going to call the family and they're going to call Wendy. And Wendy arrived at the police station later that day. officers told her that one of the gunshot wounds was fatal at around 2 50 p.m. Wendy was interviewed and police took her fingerprints swabbed her for DNA and looked at her phone she was at the station for hours she reported to officers that Dan was emotionally abusive and the relationship ended on rocky terms Wendy stated that Dan caused a lot of grief but asserted she would never harm him When questioned if Dan owed anyone money, Wendy responded, yeah, me, which this answer was very unexpected because it gave Wendy a motive and could implicate her, but this is how she is. However, she did tell authorities that Jeffrey LaCasse, her ex-boyfriend and social work professional at FSU, could be a good suspect because he didn't like Dan because Dan hurt me. So an ex-boyfriend possibly did this? Well, Wendy further revealed information about her brother during the interview. She told police Charles joked that a hitman was too expensive, so he bought her a TV as a divorce present instead. Though her family disliked Dan, she did not believe they were capable of hurting him. Wendy called Donna in the interview room with an investigator present and broke the news to her. Now, after that call ended, Wendy stated, Well, my parents sounded really surprised, so that's at least a relief. Just trying to think of who would be angry enough to do something to him. My parents would be angry, but they're not capable of this. But, you know, police, they're conducting interviews. And family and friends repeatedly said that the Adelsons hated Dan. And some even said that the Adelsons were mean. Jeffrey Lacasse explained that the family despised Dan, and Wendy told him about the hitman joke by Charles. However, he maintains that Wendy told him it wasn't a joke. That's kind of scary. About a week before Dan's murder, Jeffrey and Wendy broke up, and Jeff was a person of interest for the authorities. He wasn't surprised and told police he said multiple times that he wanted to kick Dan's ass, and his disdain for Dan was well known. However, he stated he would never actually hurt or kill him. He further claimed he was out of town in Atlanta, and police confirmed his alibi. Jeffrey was convinced that Adelsons were involved with Dan's death, and he asked police more than once to investigate the family, specifically Charles, the brother. Yeah, so detectives, they quickly ruled out burglary or robbery as the motive because, well, Dan's wallet and valuables remained untouched, and there were no signs of forced entry into the home. The targeted nature of the shooting carried out as Dan sat in his car with his children safely at daycare suggested a planned attack. I mean, there's nothing stolen. They didn't enter the home. This was wait for him to get there, shoot him twice in the head and leave. That's it. They were there for mere seconds and they're driving a Toyota Prius possibly. This car is not very loud. It's pretty silent actually. It seems like every aspect of this attack, this shooting, was pretty well planned out. Now, the community obviously was shocked by Dan's death. Hundreds gathered at Shomre Torah Synagogue on Sunday, July 20th to remember and honor Dan Markell. Dan's parents flew in from Canada the next day after he was killed and attended the local funeral in Florida. Now, they were touched by the outpouring of love and respect others had for their son. Phil Markell recalled to 2020 that he learned new things about his son through other stories and memories of him. Now at the service, Donna and Harvey Adelson approached investigators and offered to cooperate. They said they would arrange a formal interview before leaving town. But the following day, when police called Wendy to follow up, the call was abruptly cut off. Minutes later, an attorney representing Wendy phoned investigators to say that she, her parents, and her children had already left for South Florida, it would not be speaking further with law enforcement. So, hey, we'll talk to you tomorrow, and then, sorry, Charlie, we're out of here. Yeah, a funeral was held four days later in Toronto, Canada, on July 24, 2014, which the Adelson family did not attend. The Markels made arrangements to have Dan's body transported to Canada, and in their tradition, they held an unveiling of the headstone on April 26, 2015. Now, in her book, Ruth wrote that it was the hardest day she faced after the murder. And, you know, this family's sadness only deepened when Wendy left with the kids and her parents for South Florida the day after the funeral. Ruth and Dan traveled to Florida several times after Dan's death to visit Benjamin and Lincoln, and Ruth recalled that the visits with the grandkids were uncomfortable because the Adelsons didn't let her have a moment alone with them. They were always monitoring her interactions with the boys. That's what Dan wanted was supervised visits and now his parents, the grandparents here, are being forced to travel and being forced into supervised visits with these children and I'm 100% sure that they don't want Dan's family saying anything, making any allegations or questioning anything that would make these children doubt what happened. Yeah, I would further say they also don't want any possibility that they could leave with them Yeah So it September 2015 Ruth received an email from Wendy that stated she had changed Benjamin and Lincoln last names to Adelson due to safety concerns The news came just a day before Ruth and Phil were set to visit the boys. Wendy went a step further and removed Benjamin's middle name, Amikai, which was a tribute to Ruth's mother's name. Names and their meetings were deeply important to Dan, who decided to honor his grandmother by passing her name down, which meant my people's lives. Now it said Wendy never explained why she removed Benjamin's middle name, but Ruth was hurt by this. It seems as if they were slowly being removed from their grandson's lives and all history of the Markels was being erased from the children. Well, to add to the family strain, Wendy seemed very interested in Dan's life insurance policy and financial assets. She received over $2,400 per month for each son from Social Security, but requested money from the boys' trust funds for rent and food. She also received money from the university for Dan's pension and investments. Now, some of Dan's friends started a GoFundMe, and the donations were paid into a trust for his sons, Benjamin and Lincoln. According to Ruth, Wendy wanted the funds paid directly to her. Each interaction and visit added to the growing animosity between the families. Okay. We got to pause here, Aaron. She changes the children's last names back to hers, even changes or removes a middle name. And she wants all of the donations and GoFundMe to go directly to her and not to the children. When she left Dan, she cleared out the house, leaving only divorce papers. And she told everyone in her life that Dan was an abusive person, a terrible person, yet I'm trying to find evidence of his abuse. In all of my readings, I could not find it. Just people said he was a terrible person, but all of these people are associated with Wendy. And to do all of these things and to have all of your family members kind of in on your spiteful and vindictive behavior. I know a lot of families who have been broken up by abusive relationships. And even so, I've never seen essentially an entire, you know, what appears to be an entire family go full on into this sort of behavior against an ex. This is the first time I've ever witnessed behavior like this, where they all hate this man so much. And for what, it's kind of unclear besides the fact that Wendy doesn't like him and a custody battle is raging and we all know how those go. Well, I will say that I have seen something like this before, not to the point where names are being changed like this, but I do know when I've seen this before, it always corresponds with child custody case. That seems to be a recurring theme. And yeah, it's hard to imagine that you get this many people who are just like, yep, rename the kids. Yep, move here. Yep, erase those other people from our lives. you know, we're going to put up as many roadblocks as we can so they can't interact with their own grandkids, etc. This is a group effort, it feels like. And all of the hostility seems to be coming from one of the families. That's what I want to point out is the Markels, I'm not seeing a lot of hostility from them. I don't know how Dan was. I wasn't there. But at least one family is trying to work with the other, whereas Wendy's family, not so much. So let's get into the evidence because in order to break this case, the investigators need evidence. So they continued to gather intel and diligently followed up on the car description provided by Dan's neighbor. Security cameras at Premier Gym confirmed that Dan arrived shortly after dropping off his sons and a meticulous search of the parking lot cameras identified a light green or silver Prius that didn't stay parked for long, instead was shifting spots and when investigators later described as counter-surveillance behavior. For nearly 90 minutes, while Dan was inside exercising, the Prius was moving around in the parking lot. I wonder if they were planning to hit there and then decided, we'll follow him home instead, you know, just looking for an opportunity. So multiple witnesses, along with surveillance cameras around Tallahassee, placed the Prius trailing Dan's car that morning and leaving the crime scene immediately after the shooting. Video footage from a city bus captured the vehicle as it passed by, and another camera showed it turned into Dan's neighborhood. Investigators identified the vehicle as a 2006 to 2009 Toyota Prius with distinctive features, tinted windows, a missing tow hook cover, a black passenger side mirror, and a SunPass transponder sticker near the rearview mirror. Now, by late 2014, detectives traced the SunPass to a Prius owned by a small rental car business in Miami, Florida. In September 2015, investigators contacted the company for records of cars matching that description that were rented out around the time of the murder. detectives discovered that on July 15, 2014, a man named Luis Rivera rented a Prius and returned it on July 21, 2014. The GPS from the car provided a detailed timeline with locations that obviously raised suspicions that Luis was involved. And I'm really glad that the GPS data is still available months later, even a year later, because that I think is key here. Well, on July 15th, 2014, the car was at a residence where Catherine Katie Magmanua, Charles Adelson's girlfriend, lived. The following day, it drove on I-10 about 450 miles north of Miami, Florida. On July 18th, the day Dan Markell was killed, the car was at an intersection five minutes from Benton Hills at 1226 a.m. And this car returned to Miami on July 19th and was returned on July 21st. Cell records confirmed Luis Rivera was in the same location at the same time, but he was not alone. Security footage from an ATM on the evening of July 18th showed a man identified as Sigfredo Garcia in the passenger seat. Now Sigfredo Tuto Garcia and Luis Tato Rivera were childhood friends. Luis Rivera was born in Puerto Rico and moved to Miami when he was two. Court documents stated he was the head of the North Miami Beach branch of the Latin Kings Gang. Garcia was previously arrested 22 times, his first in 1997 at the age of 14. Garcia's previous charges, according to the New York Times, included vehicle theft, aggravated assault with a weapon, criminal mischief, possession of cocaine and marijuana, and strong arm robbery. And obviously, Dan Markell had no connection to Garcia or Rivera, but the mother of Garcia's children, Katie, started dating Charles Adelson in 2013, Charles the brother of Wendy. Katie and Garcia dated on and off for years, and during a break in the relationship, she started seeing Charles. In later testimony, Katie claimed Charles brought up hiring somebody to kill Dan on Halloween in 2013, less than a month into their relationship. When she enlisted Garcia for the job, Charles didn't know he was the father of her children. And Garcia didn't know he was hired for the man she was currently dating. So this is everyone kind of keeping each other at an arm's reach here. And it took several years to piece together all the video surveillance and cell phone data. But the link from Charles, Katie, and Garcia was very incriminating. Around midnight on July 18th, Katie talked to Garcia, then called Charles. Donna spoke to Wendy for less than a minute around 8 a.m. And Dan called Wendy at 9.02 a.m., 12 minutes after he dropped off their sons. The call lasted for less than a minute, and then Charles called Wendy at 9.12 a.m. So it seems to be a lot of phone activity right before the shooting. Yeah. So they're just basically showing how there's a timeline here. The detectives are, they have Dan arriving at Premier Gym at 9.17 a.m., working out until he left at 10.38 a.m. In that time, Wendy called and spoke to Charles for 18 minutes. Charles called Donna for 30 seconds. Charles called Katie for six minutes. Katie called Charles twice, once for over a minute and then nine seconds. and Charles called Katie again. That lasted six minutes. Now, Garcia and Rivera's cell phones pinged on cell towers near Premier Fitness from 9.14 to 9.46 a.m. That was when they were roaming around the parking lot, supposedly. Cell phone activity for Garcia and Rivera halted at 9.58 a.m. and didn't resume until 12.29 p.m. So investigators suspected that they had turned their phones off and back on at those times. But they didn't turn off the GPS on the car. Well, you know, you plan, but you can miss details like that. Katie and the cell towers pinged at Lake City, Florida, about an hour and 40 minutes from Tallahassee, meaning they took off really fast and were trying to get distance between them and Tallahassee. Well, when Garcia and Rivera arrived back in Miami, Katie left her home and her cell phone pinged at a tower near Rivera's home. She attempted to contact Garcia during this time. Cell towers then showed Garcia, Rivera, and Katie in the same area while Katie called Charles. And according to court records, her phone didn't ping on cell towers until the next morning at 9.44 a.m. when she contacted Garcia. Her phone indicated she was in Fort Lauderdale, where Charles lived, and on her way back to Miami. I want to know what their cell phone records and logs look like on a regular day, because it just seems like they're all calling each other in a frenzy the morning of the shooting, and they're all in really suspicious places. Yeah, and here's the thing. After Dan was murdered, Garcia purchased two cars and a motorcycle. Rivera bought a motorcycle. Katie worked at a dental office, but after Dan was murdered, she received payments from the Adelson Institute for Aesthetics and Implant Dentistry starting in September 2014 via check payment Now these checks were for and the memos stated they were for 10 days of pay But the checks were also in sequential order, even though they were dated weeks apart. In the year before the murder, Katie deposited $15,000 cash into her bank account, and $10,000 of that amount was in the four months before the murder. She continued to deposit large cash amounts over the next year, totaling $44,000. And we've seen enough movies to know that one of the rules is you get a bunch of money, don't start spending a bunch of money. And she's getting paid for work at this dentistry office, although it's never really been shown that she actually worked there. And in the fall of 2015, Katie started driving a Lexus car registered to Harvey Adelson. Charles Adelson previously drove the car and it was legally transferred to Katie on January 23rd of 2016. DMV records stated she paid $1,700 for the car, but there was no bank withdrawals to prove actual payment. The car was valued at $6,000. Additionally, Katie got breast implants and detectives believe the Adelsons paid for the surgery. So $44,000 into her bank account, $1,700 for a $6,000 car that was Charles's car and registered to the Adelson's dental group. And now she's getting breast implants. This is, I guess, couldn't be more clear to me when you follow the money and you follow what's going on here because her lifestyle has changed. Her behaviors and patterns have changed after this shooting. Yeah, and there's a movie that pops up into my head when I read all this, A Simple Plan. This was directed by Sam Raimi, and it starred Bill Paxton, Bridget Fonda, and Billy Bob Thornton. If you haven't seen it, check it out, because there's a whole thing in this film about what happens when you come and do a bunch of money. But anyway, April 19th, 2016, an FBI sting operation is underway, and an undercover FBI agent approached Donna Adelson on a public sidewalk and stated, he was the brother of one of the men who had killed Dan Markell. Now, surveillance captured the encounter on camera, and the FBI agent told Donna, he helped your family with this problem you guys had up north. He's going through some rough times, and I want to make sure you take care of what he's going through the way you're taking care of Katie and Tudo, meaning Garcia. The man asked for $5,000 to take care of his brother. Donna claimed she didn't know what he was referring to, and the FBI agent handed over a folded piece of paper with the press release of Dan's murder on it and a phone number to call. He said it would explain what he meant and walked away. Police called the operation The Bump because they hoped to rattle the Adelsons so they could get more information on them and their involvement. And this is a standard tactic because if you can cause them to panic a little bit, even if they don't do it in front of you, well, now they'll start texting and calling each other. Yeah, you can track their phone records, their phone calls, and their response to all of this. So Donna, she accepted this news article and walked away. Eventually, she called the number and said she didn't know who the man in jail was, and she'd never met him. The FBI agent responded, let's stop messing around, okay? You know who Katie is, and you know that Katie has someone that knows Tato, and they took care of a problem for you. You talk to the right people. You talk to people. You make this 5,000 come to me. That's all I need. Just do it and get it to me. Donna said she'd call him back. The call allowed authorities to listen in on other phone calls, including those to Charles, which she obviously calls him right away, right? Yeah. Donna said, I got some paperwork hand delivered to me. And Charles said, you're being sued? And she replied, no. He said, does it involve me or other people? And she says, well, probably both of us. What's that? Probably the two of us. So you probably have a general idea what I'm talking about. Charles says, you think someone is trying to blackmail you? And Donna said, um, maybe, could be. No, uh, that's crazy. So Charles immediately called Katie, and she assured him it was someone harassing him or trying to get something from him. And Charles said, when they do catch the person, they're going to be asking him lots of questions about who Katie is. All I'm saying is find out who the F it is and tell them to stop playing their games. I don't know who you have to talk to, but it needs to be nipped in the bud. So Charles and Katie, they met in person April 20th, 2016 at the Dolce Vita restaurant and authorities recorded that conversation. Now the video is blurry. The audio is a bit difficult to decipher due to background noise in the restaurant, but authorities transcribed the audio. Nothing within the calls or conversations had a damning confession, but authorities felt they had enough to arrest Garcia, Rivera and Katie at that point. I mean, with the overwhelming cell phone data and information, police arrest Garcia on May 25th, 2016 at a gas station in Hallandale Beach. On June 2, 2016, a probable cause affidavit for Sigfredo Garcia was unsealed. The affidavit named Luis Rivera, Catherine, or Katie Magbanua, and Charles, or Charlie Adelson, and Donna Adelson as co-conspirators in the murder of Dan Markell. The Markell family was shocked and unsure how to digest the news. Ruth emailed Wendy a few days after Garcia's arrest through a victim support advocate. She asked how Wendy and the children were doing, but she never received a reply. A few weeks later on June 28th, 2016, Rivera was extradited from a prison in central Florida where he was incarcerated for unrelated charges back to Tallahassee, of course, to face the charges in Dan Markell's death. Katie's arrest followed on October 1st of 2016. Katie and Garcia claimed their innocence, but Rivera changed his mind and decided to plead guilty to second-degree murder and cooperate with the authorities in exchange for leniency. Rivera was already serving time in jail for a 12-year sentence. On October 4th, 2016, he was sentenced to 19 years to be served in concurrence with his prior sentence for Dan's murder. So he was already there. He was already doing time. And instead of spending life, he was like, okay, I'll work with you guys. And he got 19 years. The prosecution offered Katie Magbinua an immunity deal in hopes she would flip on the Adelsons. You know, it's good that they have one person on their side now. They're hoping to grab another. Her testimony would all but ensure the prosecution had enough evidence to prosecute Charles and Donna Adelson for their involvement in Dan Markell's murder. The state thought Katie wouldn't risk a trial for fear of a guilty verdict, potentially leaving her children without both of their parents. However, she surprised the prosecutors and refused all offers of negotiation and maintained her innocence. Wow. You would think that with the evidence standing before her, she would work with them. But apparently her defense attorney is like, no, we can fight this and we can discredit any evidence against you. There's nothing here because you weren't at the scene of the crime. Other people were. Well, on the day he was sentenced, Rivera provided information to the police about the murder for hire that he later testified to in court multiple times. He confirmed that he rented the Prius and that he and Garcia drove to Tallahassee twice, once in June and once in July. In June, they followed Dan to the daycare and his home. However, Rivera claimed they didn't kill him because Rivera refused to kill him in front of the kids and then they lost track of him. They returned in July with a .38 caliber revolver that was the one used to murder him. Rivera was the driver and when they arrived at Dan's house, Garcia got out, went to the driver's side window and fired the two shots. Then they sped off and started back towards Miami and that's where they threw the gun over a bridge. Now, police searched, but never recovered this gun. Rivera claimed that Katie and Garcia split a $100,000 payment and Rivera received a cut of $35,000. Now, Rivera's account corroborated the extensive evidence discovered during the investigation. So, no matter what Katie thinks, investigators, prosecutors are very confident at this point. And not that it makes it any better, but Rivera has gone on to say, I didn't know Dan had children. I didn't want to take a father away from his children, but he did anyways. So it doesn't really matter what his words are. Yeah. It just goes to show why maybe this got delayed. Maybe his question back in June caused that to go South. But again, they went through with it in July. So whatever it is, it still happened. Now, Justin, now that we've gone through the details on the families and the crime, and now we're going to get into the trials, who will pay for the murder of Dan Markell? And for this, you'll have to listen to our second episode on the killing of Dan Markell. Hey, please rate and review us. If you see anyone asking for podcast recommendations, make a comment. Say, hey, check out Generation Y. They've been around for a while. We really appreciate your support. And I can testify to the fact, Justin, that recently I've seen a number of posts on TikTok where people are doing just that. And it was pretty cool to see us mentioned numerous times in some of these posts. So please keep it up. We really appreciate all your support. Thank you. Thank you.