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free money free money is out there just go get it by starting your podcast today our players this week are michelle cole big sister markeisha cole big sister maurice cole dad martre cole victim elena gay denise's youngest daughter latoya gay the accomplice and denise gay
Denise Gay, now she was a woman that was very hard to pinpoint. She was moving around from state to state, from Pennsylvania to Delaware to South Carolina to New York. Now, we do know that she was born on September 30th, 1968, and Denise was no stranger to the law. She had a very long rap sheet.
Um, writing bad checks, computer fraud, forgery, scams, schemes, seduce, and scheme. All of that. That was her. I guess you like pick your crime of choice. Right. Like a video game. You know what you're good at.
Right. And I mean, she was good enough. Right. Can't win them all, you know. Well, if you were good, you wouldn't have charges. But she left all of that behind her and she got a new job in Richmond, Virginia at Smithfield Foods. Denise was working there for a while and she met a man and he was fine. And she just found out that.
that his wife just died. His name was Maurice Coles. Maurice just lost his wife, Karina. Karina actually died because of some complications due to a hip surgery. He was devastated. His whole family was devastated. His sons, his daughters, they were saddened by this great loss. And Denise thought that she could help him get over that because what's the best way to get over somebody, everyone?
That's right, to get under somebody else. And Denise was trying to get Maurice to get underneath her, if you know what I'm saying. Things moved very quickly after Maurice's wife, Karina, died. Within a month of her passing, Denise has moved in with her nine-year-old daughter, Elena.
and her 19-year-old daughter Latoya. She wasn't living there. Latoya was living somewhere else, so she was coming back and forth to see her mom or them. And who also lived there was Marte Coles. Now, Marte was Maurice's youngest son. He was born on October 22, 1997, in Highland Springs, Virginia. And the Coles, they really were a big, happy family before Karina's passing.
It was Marte, and he was the youngest. There were also three brothers, three sisters, and they were described as like a really fun bunch to be around. Maurice was described as having a zest for life. He liked to draw. He was really great at drawing. He drew like anime and characters and things like that. He was one of those like into gamers type of kids. And he also had a girlfriend. His girlfriend's name was Ashlyn. Him and his little white girl, they loved each other. I mean, they were deep, deep in love.
Martre would always tell her that he had these dreams of becoming an animator. He specifically wanted to design, illustrate for games. And in 2014, when Martre was 16 years old and Karina passed away unexpectedly, his life shattered.
Like he felt he was a mama's boy. He fell into a deep, deep depression. And not only that, after her passing, the relationship with his dad was really on the fritz. And the relationship was really strained because Martre and his dad, they were two totally different people. You know what I'm saying? Martre is the sensitive, artistic guy.
nerdy kid type and Maurice is a very like strict blue collar worker hard hat wearing dad as if the death of a mother wasn't enough to send a teenager into a tailspin his father is quickly moving in with his new girlfriend Denise and her kids so you know that might that might do a little damage and did you see that he was on the couch
He was sleeping on the... He actually let the girls have the room, so he was back on the couch. So he didn't even got a space big enough to house these extra people. You know what I'm saying? At first, Denise was a comforting presence in the grieving household. She was always nice to Martre, and he didn't resent her. He actually got along with her. She supported his art unlike his father, and she was like, you know, you should definitely pursue professional training. Like, you're actually good at this. And Maurice admitted he knew nothing about higher education and art.
He was like, that's when Denise volunteered to help. Martre, his sisters, Michelle and Marquisha, they would call him Trey. Marquisha was talking about him, and she was like, Martre adored her. He trusted her a lot. He was like, you know, Denise is cool. She'll take me here. She'll take me there.
She wants me to go to school. She said she's going to pay for me to go to school and help me sign up for school, which, honestly, we should have known was a red flag. This girl has moved in with you in less than a month. Is she going to pay for something? I have no place to go. Is she going to pay for something? Okay. Okay.
But... You ain't going to pay for shit. Right. Markeisha and Michelle wasn't buying it. They was not digging Denise. They was like... Michelle said, I knew she was evil from the moment I laid eyes on her. They said she is not this sweet family fixer that Trey may have envisioned. And she ruled the household and she didn't... Like, she was like, nobody can go against me. What I say goes. There's no question about it. It was just very...
You've really come up here and running shit. Like, calm down. Whose house is this really? And to make matters worse, the first thing she does when she comes in the house is take down all the pictures of Karina. Like, girl, my mama died a month ago. Put the pictures back and let them stay. I don't care if my mama been dead five years. It's her house. It's her family. Her pictures stay. Denise's children were not the siblings that Trey was used to.
Nine-year-old Elena was often violent and would turn, like, in a second. One time she stabbed Martre in the shoulders, and it wasn't even because she was trying to stab him in the shoulders. She was trying to stab him in the chest, and he kind of dodged it a bit, and it just landed him in the shoulder. But just stabbing him with a pair of scissors. She also poured bleach in his room and threw knives at him. Now... Bleach. First of all, you're not going to be throwing bleach at me. You're not going to be throwing bleach in my house, because...
All the shit you fuck up, who knows if there's carpet or a rug, the bedspread, the clothes that I'm wearing. I very much like the clothes that I wear. Why is this girl so mean at nine years old? At nine years old, what has she seen? Now, if you're wondering, well, why didn't Maurice interfere? It's because Denise interfered first and she'd be like, listen, Trey,
You know, Elena, she's a kid. She doesn't know any better. We don't want to stress your daddy out. Let's just keep this between me and you. Can you forgive her, please? And he's like, all right, Denise, I'll fuck with you. I won't tell my dad. But it was a lot to be dealing with at the house, like always having to watch her back around Elena creeping down the halls and shit. So Michelle always made sure that Trey knew he was welcome at her place. And he also would stay with his girlfriend, Ashlyn, sometimes. He...
Let his sisters know that he had thoughts of suicide since his mom died. And he even was put on antidepressants because he would have these spells of detachment and like just go into these real dark places. Now,
We talked before, Denise was very supportive of his art and she encouraged him to pursue professional training. So one night they sat down and they looked at different schools and one caught Trey's eye. It was Full Sail University. This was a for-profit college in Florida and it had an A1 art and design program. As the years go on, Marisa's feelings for Denise start to fade. Like, I think it's
not doing what it was supposed to anymore and filling that void of his wife. And it's 2017, three years later, and he's grown tired of Denise, honestly. And it's so hard to try and move on and forget about your wife and just move past that stage because every day he's looking at Martre who looks just like her. As if looking like her wasn't bad enough, it's like he embodied her. He was the closest to her. He was the baby of the family. Like, he was...
they were best friends. So it was just very hard to try and move on, forget when this reminder was in your face every day. So Denise was really starting to not like Martre being around there. Like I want it to be me and my man with my kids in my new house. And Martre, you know, he's still feeling overwhelmed. I mean, he's
grief-stricken still he's 19 years old he's kind of suffocating in the environment that he's in and he can't talk to his dad about it and of course his sisters are always there they've always made it clear that he could spend the night over there do whatever he needs to do over there but it's kind of hard because you don't live with your sisters you just there when you can crash right
He also had another escape from home with Ashlyn. You know, that was his boo. He loved his art. That was his way of escaping from everything else that was going on around him. And, you know, his sister's always had his back. But his artistic talents proved to really rescue him because... He got an email from Full Sail University...
inviting him to go to the school to go to orientation. It's like, come on down to Florida, come to your orientation. Congratulations. We can't wait to meet you. We can't wait to see your portfolio. We can't wait to see your art. When you come down to orientation, we want you to do a special art project for us. We want you to make a mask of your face.
to bring down to full cell when you arrive for your new life in college? Well, I don't know if it was like a college tour in, like,
introducing him to the program. So it wasn't necessarily like starting his new life. He was never coming back. But, you know, he's about to go. He's 19. He's going to tour his college. He's super excited about this. And they want they gave him an art assignment. So he's like, you know, ready to show what he's got right now. He tells everybody about this. And of course, Denise is excited for him. And she's like, OK, a mask of your face like that's not so exciting. How are you going to do it? Oh, you should make it with paper mache. And
I can help you with your project. And Marjory is like, yeah, you can help me with our project because I'm about to go to full sale. Like, this is gonna be great. Right. And they're like, OK, let's plant. Let's go ahead and do it the morning before you leave. So do what you got to do. Come over to the house, make your mask and then hit the bus headed to Florida. This is so exciting. So on March 12th, he says goodbye to his girlfriend, Ashlyn, and his sister, Michelle, says,
He was spending the night at Michelle's house, and something told Michelle, like, just let him sleep in. But he had told Michelle the night before, he had said, make sure you wake me up. I don't want to forget doing this art project. I don't want to forget. He was like, I don't want to forget doing this art project. I do not want to miss my bus. Tomorrow is a big day for me. Make sure that you wake me up. And something in the pit of her stomach said, don't wake him up. And she was like, pfft.
Do what the boy want. This is the start of his brand new life. So she wakes him up and she heads to work, drops him off at her dad's house. Well, Denise's house, whoever's house you want to call it.
drops him off over there and heads to work. Now, when she was on her way to drop him off, he was a little sad that morning and he was like, I'm really sad. I really miss her. I just really want to be with her. And of course, Michelle comforts him and sends him on his way. It's my trade, Denise and Latoya all at the house helping Trey get his mask together. They're paper macheing it on and they're like, you know, we'll do a paper mache of your face.
And then that that will be a mask of yourself. So they're putting it over him and they are covering both his nostrils and his lips. And he's kind of squirming, squirming like, no, I think you should leave some air holes. And they're like, no, no, no, it'll be OK. It's OK. Just calm down. So they've got the paper mache all over his face. And then they begin to smother him.
And he's like, stop, get off of me. What's happening? Get off of me. And they begin to smother him more. Latoya is holding his legs down while Denise is sitting on top of his chest, pushing down as hard as she can. Once Trey stops moving, they tie him up with his hands behind his back and they get one of those storage bins and they stuff his body into it, folded back in, knees to chest,
ankles to butt, stuff him in this bin. They close it. They put it in the back of the car, and they drive five miles away from the house and drop the body in this wooded area on the side of the road. All the while, Ashlyn has been waiting for Bae to text her back, like, "'Okay, I understand you had to do your mass this morning, "'but you should have called me when you got to the bus stop, "'when the bus left.'"
When you arrived, I haven't heard from you all day. What's up? So she's like texting him. Hey, what's going on? Why aren't you texting me back? What's going on? So she's starting to get real concerned. She's like, you know what? Let me call Markeisha and Michelle. See if they've heard from Trey. Neither sister has seen Trey.
I heard from Trey since Michelle dropped him off at the house. And they're like, you know what? This ain't normal. This ain't right. I talked to bro all day long. Michelle said the way that our bond is, everybody keep in touch. So they start to look for him and they start checking out the little spots he hangs out around around town. And they do not find him. They even go to the house and it's empty.
They see Denise and Latoya coming out the back, and they're like, yo, where Trey at? And it was like, I don't know. He left. Like, girl, what you mean you don't know? Because at the very least, you should have said, I dropped him off at the bus station. Michelle and Markeisha, they're like...
Okay, now I'm starting to think the worst because this nigga was just talking this morning about how he wish he could, you know, he just missed mommy so much and, you know, he's been struggling with depression. Maybe he's taking his life and I would hate to think that's something I would hate to think my brother's in trouble and needs help and I can't be there for him, you know? I would just think if I was in like, oh my gosh, I missed the sign. Like, yeah, you know, like, oh fuck, what did I...
She said she couldn't eat. She couldn't... I'm sorry, I'm jumping ahead. But she said she couldn't do nothing. But then, like, aside from jumping to that, she's, like, concerned. But then, you know, her suspicions started to turn to Denise. Denise was giving off this demeanor that she didn't usually give. Like...
It was, it was giving guilty. Like, Denise was joking around with Michelle and Markeisha, placing a mask on her face, playing around. Like, I'm sure he's fine. Look at me. I'm on my train. And just, they was like, that's real weird because we don't even like you like that. So we don't play. We don't joke. Why are you trying to kiki and we don't do that? Real suspicious. And I'm asking where my brother at. And I'm asking where my brother at. I've,
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Ashlyn is like, you know, still on the case. Private eye here, you know? So she's like, I'm going to start retracing his step. First thing I need to do is inspect this email. Now they shared an email account at 19. That's crazy. Girl, please. Let me tell you something. You shared an email account? I probably should have. I did not, but that was a good idea because I used to send emails to
Especially, you know, if my phone was taken, sending emails all the time. I remember. So... Get an email, don't have my phone. This email, everybody, when I got my phone taken. Well, they was on it, doggone it. And this was the email that was used in communication with Full Sail University.
And so she was like, let me get to looking at this email and see if anything sticks out to me. And she noticed that the person inviting him out is CrenshawSheila03 at gmail.com. And she says, wait a minute. If somebody from a university system is emailing you, they will be using that university system email. It don't end in no edu, no email.
at fullcell.edu or something like that. Like, we all know what school email addresses look like. And that one is...
Mm-hmm. So she shares the news with the sisters. The sisters call up Full Sail, and they're like, hey, we got this email of you inviting my brother to come out and join this art program and come tour the school. And it was like, nope, we don't have that going on this week or anything like that. They're like...
are you sure? They're like, yeah, I think we know what goes on around here. It was like, okay, well, the email came from a Sheila Crenshaw. Do you know who that is? We sure don't. Sheila Crenshaw's never worked here before. Okay, it's time to file a police report because this shit getting crazy.
But the police are like, we can't do much. He's 19 years old. He's an adult. He can leave on his own accord. So, like, an adult can't run away. They just leave, you know? We don't really have anything to go off of here. Now, Ashlyn, Markeisha, and Michelle are getting more and more worried as the days go on. Maurice, Trey's daddy, however, is seeming very unbothered. He's like, listen, Trey's an adult. He probably went on a personal trip.
I mean, at the end of the day, he was supposed to go to full cell, right? He's probably doing whatever the fuck he's supposed to do. He probably did not want to be bothered. Made his own way down there.
He technically a man, you know what I'm saying? Right. Probably some, let that man be a man. We don't have to know everything that's going on with him. It was soon March 21st, Karina's birthday, and Maurice is finally starting to show some concern about where Trey could be because he would never miss his mother's birthday. He says if he'd have ran off with a cult, he still wouldn't have missed his mama's birthday. Ten days later, on March 31st, the police receive a 911 call from Maurice Cole's house.
Now, when they get there, it's Latoya, Denise, and Alana at the house. And Latoya and Denise are like, oh, don't worry, it's a false alarm. Alana was over here playing on the phone, pulling the alarm, making false calls or whatever. But don't worry, she's in a whole lot of trouble. We're going to straighten her out. Alana...
looks at one of the officers and she says can I talk to you for a second and the officer recognizes her because she's got caught up in situations over the years of trying to run away and he says you're not gonna run are you and she says no I just want to talk to you
And he's like, what's up? So he's got this body cam on, right? So everything she's saying is being recorded. She was like, so I saw my mom kill my stepbrother. And he's like, what do you mean? What?
So Alana, who's now 12, she's like, yeah. So I was it was Sunday and I was hanging outside of the bedroom one morning and she's like, I hear some weird noises. So I go to the hallway and I look through the crack of Trey's door and I see Trey lying on the floor. He's kicking and he's struggling. And my sister Latoya sat on his legs to hold him down while my mama sat on his chest and pushed down and.
I think there was something white on his face, but he was yelling, get off me, get off me. And then my mama had looked up and she seen me watching and she yelled for me to go in my room back to bed. And she yelled for me to go back to my room. Nothing was happening. So I went back to my room.
But then I started hearing like noises in the attic, like some stuff is moving. So I come out and take another little peek. And that's when I see my sister Latoya dragging this gray plastic tub across the floor. And it looked like it was real heavy, like the way she was dragging it. It was something in there. And she was like, then I see my mama help Latoya get the bin into the car and they drive off.
And the officer's like, this is quite a story you tell a little girl. And she was like, yeah, that's what happened. He was like, is this a true story? Is this a story you made up? And she was like, it's a true story. And he was like, OK, do you know it's against the law to lie to a police officer? She was like, yeah, I'm not lying. I swear to God, I saw my mom would kill my stepbrother. So the police officers, they really didn't do anything about Elena's statement.
Not much at all. At this time, the police officers that were on the scene didn't know much, didn't know anything about the missing person case that was open about Martre. And they were like, ah, you know, this little girl be bad. You know what I'm saying? They just put a label on her. Right. And meanwhile, the search for Martre had gone on for weeks with no luck. His sisters were dead.
trying so hard to find him. They have been looking and looking and no luck. Now, there was a man that was walking through the park. His name was Larry Anderson. He was, he said he was out. He was smoking a cigarette and he saw this tub underneath this like
tree a little bit of brush not really hidden he saw a shoe on the ground he was like oh well he was like oh well somebody must have left a whole thing of clothes let me see if i can find something in there maybe i can recycle something maybe i can sell you know whatever he opens up the tub and he finds martre coles's body immediately he's like oh my god i just found a kid like this is a he a grown-ass man he's like i just found a kid you know what i'm saying like
Martre is pretty skinny. He immediately calls the police. They rush to the scene and it's very confusing because Martre's body, even though it's folded up, there's no real signs of trauma. Like he wasn't shot. There wasn't any blunt force trauma, no swelling. It didn't look like there was, they couldn't immediately tell if it was suffocation because there was nothing on his neck, right? It really looked like
Who is this person and how did he die? He had no ID on him. He didn't have any tattoos. He was just an unidentified young John Doe.
It wasn't until they took his description, they put it into the database to see if there was anybody missing. And oh yes, there was a missing persons report that was filed not too long ago that they really hadn't done anything about. Then they're like, oh my goodness, Martre Coles. They go to the DMV and pull up Trey's license picture and they're like, this is definitely the body that we just found. Now the medical examiner took the body and found
ruled Martre's death to be asphyxiation, but they didn't know if it was because he was in the plastic tub or if it was something else because, like we said, there weren't any signs of trauma on the body. But when they did the toxicology report, they found sleepy pills, Trezodone, and they also found GHB in his system. And they were like, hmm.
That's really weird. Now, one of the overnight sergeants, they hear about Martre being found and he thinks back to a couple of days ago when this little girl said that she saw her mama kill her stepbrother. He was like, could it be?
Is it related? Elena's story returned to the spotlight and all eyes were on Denise and Latoya. Investigators run a background check and that's when they found out that Denise was a scammer, was a trap star. And they decided that, OK, yes, she's suspicious, but also we can't rule dad out. And they also made a move by deciding not to tell anybody in the family that they had found the body yet.
And it was very interesting because it really seemed that Maurice wasn't disturbed by his disappearance. So the investigators, they decided that they were going to re-interview Martre's sisters. They were asking them all the same questions that the standard ones. When's the last time you saw him? This, this and third. And remember, at this point, Martre's sisters do not know that his body has been found.
And at the end of the meeting, they say, hey, do you mind if I get a DNA sample? And they gave the DNA sample. And my trace is, you know, that, you know, when something happening, the pity of stomach, you just know his sister was like, when they asked me for that DNA sample, I did not ask them if they found the body. But I knew that I was never going to see my brother again.
Now, on April 3rd, investigators obtained a search warrant for the house. And when they got there, Latoya was the only person that was there. I guess she was in town. When they told her what they were doing, she was like, oh, OK, and left. On a hunt, the officer followed her vehicle to the spot where Martre's body was found. She didn't really like go to the spot, but she was like on a cliff that overlaid where he laid and left.
She kind of looked. She saw that there wasn't any, like, police tape. There wasn't police lights. It wasn't a crime scene. So she was like, OK, nothing crazy is going on over here. So maybe this search has to do with something else. After the search warrant, police were like, OK, what do we know? We know that people always return to the scene of the crime and we need to find evidence.
out and the way that this body was placed and way that was left it was very haphazardly definitely feels like somebody is going to come back to at least finish getting rid of this evidence it almost was too easy to find right so they decide that they're going to set up a outdoor camera the kind that like hunters use to search for game people put it on there outside it's camouflage you can tie it on a tree they decide they're going to set it up and they set up just a
in the right angle that you'd be able to see the road and the path going straight to where his body was left. So Denise, she texts her daughter. She's like, yeah, I got to go move the body. I got to go do whatever I got to do. I got to get rid of the rest of the evidence. And Latoya is like, oh, mom, I wish I was there. I'm in the Carolinas. Are you sure you're going to be able to do it without me, without my help? She's like, no, baby, I got it.
So she drives Maurice's SUV right to the spot where the road meets the trail to go down to where she put Martre's body. She's wearing a hood. She's got a shovel. Getting ready to bury him, right? She walks to the place, realizes the tub isn't there, looks around for a little bit, walks away and leaves. Texts her daughter and says, it's not here. Ha ha ha.
It's not here. Now, the police are like really excited that they found somebody on the camera because they had that camera for about five days and they thought maybe this was just like a dumb mission that they were trying to pull off. Right. In the background, they also started pinging Denise's phone. Boom. It shows that on March 12th, which is the last time that Martre was seen, her phone pings right at that spot.
And on April 7th, the night that they found something on that camera, lo and behold, she pings at that same spot. They also learned that Denise has access to the drugs found in Martre's system. Well, at least the sleepy drugs. GHB, isn't that a street drug? Mm-hmm. I just know we used to call it Georgia Homeboy when we learned about it in middle school as a bad drug. Mm-hmm, that's what it was called. Mm-hmm.
I, and I just knew that Georgia Homeboy was a bad drug and it's a date rape drug. Mm-hmm. You got to watch out for them. Now, the police at the time, they don't know who this person is. They have a hood on. They can't really make out who it is. Of course, they don't have those text messages that I told you about before, but they do recognize the SUV. It's Maurice's SUV. And so, remember that search warrant? Well...
They were trying to figure out where those emails came from, because it is very strange that Full Sail would email him from a Gmail account. Well, you know, detectives and technology nerds doing what they do best, saving the world one solved crime at a time. They said, hmm, the email is being sent to and from the same home.
More specifically, his congratulations email came from Denise's laptop. Okay, y'all, so I want to read y'all his acceptance letter. Hello, Martre. My name is Sheila Crenshaw. I have been asked to help you on your journey here at Full Sail. You will enjoy the programs here. I am looking forward to seeing you on Tuesday at 10 a.m. Someone will meet you at your hotel on Tuesday morning to welcome you here. The Homewood isn't...
And there's a whole bunch of grammar. Those little baby sentences, that is not how an acceptance letter looks. I also have another one, and there's a typo in it. She says, Oh,
If you can, can you email me, you email me your essay. He didn't catch it. Think they let professional people at the school send that out? Well, he thought he had a personal person. They also found on her laptop that she also searched a lot of things. That search history will get you every time. She had searched, quote, something that works like chloroform. And, quote...
how to suffocate someone with duct tape. And she also searched how lime helps decomposition and smell. This episode is brought to you by Target's Black Beyond Measure platform. And an incredible new program on that platform is Illuminating Intersectionality, hosted by Fran of Hey Fran Hey and the Friend Zone podcast.
Chef Jade of all Jades, and Dr. Takiyah Robinson of the Getting Grown podcast. Now this series features dynamic discussions about identity, power, and intersectionality as a tool for honoring the beautiful complexity that is black womanhood. Conversations cover topics such as race, class, and socioeconomic status, education, food and food access, cultural expression, and more. They're covering it all. We're getting deep on here, okay?
In addition, brilliant black women-owned companies like Mintate Cosmetics, Essie Spice, and Partake Food are highlighted. I'm telling y'all, that's my favorite part. Yeah, it is really nice to hear everybody's different journeys to where they are now. And some people are like, yeah, like Essie from Essie Spice, she was like, yeah, my whole family is full of entrepreneurs, but when I wanted to start this, everybody was like, oh. Yeah. And what else are you doing? Oh, and...
Do you have another job lined up? Like, it's so crazy to... Because I definitely got that same energy with this podcast. Oh, my gosh. So many people gave it to us. And we were like, no, like, this is a thing. Like, we really made a business. So make sure that you all check out Illuminating Intersectionality on the Loudspeaker Network's YouTube page.
All three parts of this series are out now and people were able to join the conversation live via Twitter chat. They were tweeting with Fran, Dr. Takiyah, Chef Jade. Also, Target founders were being featured like KJ Miller of Minted Cosmetics, Essie Bartell of Essie Spice, and Denise Woodards of Partake Food.
And some of our favorite black women's social media personalities were all in the conversation. I mean, like Crystal West was tweeting, Sylvia O'Bell, Scottie Beam, Jasmine Lawson, all of them were just like having this really great dialogue, posing good questions, like digging deeper alongside this great dialogue that was happening with Fran, Kia and Jade.
So make sure that you watch the series and you follow the hashtag IIBBM. What's the hashtag, friend? IIBBM. And hashtag Black Beyond Measure to share your perspectives. On April 10th of 2017, police questioned Denise and of course she denied everything. So the investigators like, we know what happened and we know that you know.
That we found him. You know that. And Denise says, what happened? And the investigator is like, well, that's what we want you to tell us. And Denise says, but you said you know what happened. She says, we do. And Denise said, well, then what happened? The investigator says, you killed him in your house. The last time you saw him, he was in a storage bin. Yeah, it is. She made a face like, she's in a bin like me? Yeah. And she said, yeah.
It is. It's not evil. She said, you killed Marte and you stuffed him in that tub. And Denise is not budging. But deny all she want. Denise and Latoya were arrested and charged with felony murder and conspiracy to commit murder. Marquise and Michelle believed that Denise killed Marte to kind of kill the memory of their mom. They don't believe that their father was involved. They said, I know for a fact he wouldn't let anything happen to any one of his kids. Marte was buried on April 22nd.
His sister Michelle said, "We will cherish him. He will be missed and we will always remember him. We will never forget him. He's in a better place now. He's with my mom." Now they started their trial in December 2017. Denise and Latoya's defense attorney Samuel Simpson
His whole strategy was to poke holes in Elena's story. That was the star witness. That's the only person who said anything about the murder. So Simpson's like, listen, Elena changed her story about the mask while she was on the stand.
First she saw his feet moving, then they were kicking up, then she didn't see his feet moving. Things are changing. This story's shifty. It's of a 12-year-old. How much are we going to trust it? How much of it? First of all, like, dang, his feet, somebody was still sitting on him, both stories, right? Mm-hmm. But, you know, like, his feet went up or down, and the next one I say his feet went left was shaking. Like, it all happened. But, you know, when we be watching these trials back,
They be asking the most, ugh, that's why that nigga make that face at that guy last time. Like, it's the most simple, basic questions, but they was like, let's be clear. Let's really map it out. We really want to draw the picture. Don't leave out any details. Don't mess up any details. So they have Elena on the stand and she's like, yeah, I've lied on my trade to the police before. I say he molested me. He didn't molest me.
She also says, OK, I guess some parts of my story have changed. They got on the stand and they said, are you sad that your stepbrother died? And she says, no. But her therapist testifies that never. She might have lied about previous incidents, but she never lied about the story of the murder. Now, the prosecution, they said Denise Smith.
was growing hatred for martrey because his mere presence was destroying the relationship that she had with maurice and this is why she made a plan to get him out of the picture now the defense is like all you have is circumstantial evidence
And that's not good enough to put somebody away from murder. Like, it could have very well been Elena. You don't know nothing. We got to do beyond a reasonable doubt, right? It goes to the jury and Denise and Latoya were convicted of conspiracy to commit murder.
But the jury was deadlocked on a charge of felony murder. This was kind of due to the fact that Maurice was unable to cooperate. He didn't want to turn his back on Denise. He's like, listen, we all suffered a loss here, but Denise loved my son. And I don't believe that she was responsible for his death. I don't believe that I would have let somebody in my house who would have then turned around and killed my son. That I can't believe.
So I'm not going to pit this story against her. I'm not going to help y'all turn her into a monster. Don't ask me for shit. So they set a retrial for the following year. And this time they would be tried separately, Latoya and Denise. By the time April 2018 rolls around,
Maurice is all of a sudden willing to help. And why is that? Because he found a cell phone of Denise in which he found text messages to her daughter Latoya talking about...
we got to move the body. It's Google searches on how to dispose of the body. What does Lyme do to dead bodies? And he's like, oh shit, like it's hitting him. She really did this shit. So in the second trial, he takes a stand against Denise. He describes the day of the murder and the days following. He acknowledges that something was off between Denise and his daughters, but since she was so nice to him, he didn't think anything was out of the ordinary.
He said he was shocked about the news. Like, you know, he just lost a wife. And the first thing he did was invite a woman in who killed his son. Like, I'm sure that was a hard pill to swallow. But the prosecution continues to lay out a mountain of evidence against Denise. They have the cell phone, the computer records, the camera evidence, and they present all of this to the jury.
Denise's defense again was to argue that Elena killed Martre and that she and Maurice covered it up. And the prosecution called this attempt shameful, which I mean, it kind of is. You blamed it on your 12 year old daughter. Yikes.
This time around, the jury finds Denise guilty of first-degree murder in addition to the conspiracy to commit murder conviction, and she was sentenced to life in prison along with a $100,000 fine, which how the fuck is she supposed to get that? But that's a different story. In May of 2018, LaToya Gay was convicted and sentenced to 20 years for first-degree murder and 10 years on the conspiracy charge. She will be eligible for release in 2043. ♪
All right, y'all, it's time for... I'm not black. I'm OK. I ain't do it, but if I did, this is how I would have got away with it. I ain't do it, but if I did, if you're ever forging a document, you need an example to base it off of. Find the clues. I saw several things wrong with her email. Not just that she didn't use a university email address, but also... There wasn't a letterhead. There wasn't a letterhead. The shit was emailed on a Saturday.
Like, a 5 o'clock on a Saturday. Like, let's get real. Let's be realistic. I ain't do it, but if I did, why not help the child go to real college and he'll be out your hair? And he would really be out the house. He would really be gone. He'd be out your hair. I was in a whole nother state, too. He could have actually applied and maybe actually got in and then he would have actually been out of the house without you having to actually kill him. Crazy.
There is this like deep part of my mind that like little Miss Elena has seen a lot in life. And I wonder where she is now because I what I do hope is that she's in a lot of therapy because she wasn't so nice to that boy either. And it's learned behavior. She OK, because Miss Little Thing wasn't peaches and cream. Mom clearly taught her.
The ways of the world. Here we go. We're in that cycle. And now Elena's what? In the system? Is she? She ain't got no immediate family. I ain't do it, but if I did. I'm definitely. Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry. I was just saying I have my eye on you, little Elena. You have seen some things and done some things.
And ran away from some things. I don't know. Let me not say too much about no kid. I'm going to keep my eye on you, Elena. And you are in my thoughts and prayers. I ain't do it, but if I did, do not return to the scene of the crime. It's a big no-no. If they showed up at your place with a search warrant,
You're clearly already a suspect, especially since this is three weeks after the murder, not like right after it happened. You're being watched. Assume you're being watched. I ain't do it. But if I did, it seems like, well, you did plan the day that you were going and how you were going to murder him. So it feels like you should have been prepared to properly dispose of the body so that you did not have to return to any crime scene because it would have been taken care of then there after.
And once. I didn't do it, but if I did, why you leaving some phone in his house with evidence to come up with later? Bitch, you thought you got away with that one, didn't you? Mm-hmm. You did. That's all I got. Disgusting. Yeah. He was a man, but he was a child with his whole life ahead of him. Dishonor on you, dishonor on your family. Dishonor on you, dishonor on your cow, dishonor on your whole family.
parole or no parole? No parole. For both of them? I really wonder, is Latoya an older Elena? But it also seemed like they were genuinely scared of mom. That's what I'm saying. Elena is like that because she's seen that and because she's treated like that. And so is Latoya just the older version of her? And it's like, listen, she's over here killing this 19-year-old boy. If I don't help her, what's she going to do to me? Right.
Because, I mean, she knew well enough to—she did that alarm on purpose because y'all have to see the video. You got to pay for it on prom, but y'all have to see the video. She was, like, standing there. She's like, can I talk to y'all? Like, she—very matter of fact, she did not seem scared. She was like—and I feel like they should have known right then and there that she was— That she was telling the truth, right? No, I mean—
You're talking about the police. I'm talking about her mom. Oh, yeah. I was like, I can't believe they let her talk that long. I can't. Right then and there, they weren't like, uh-uh, little girl. You cannot talk to them. Me too. I was like, damn. Because she was talking to him for a minute, telling all the tea. She had to... They made her repeat it a couple of times. Exactly. She said, tell him what you just told me. Well, I said...
And she said it so matter-of-factly, not like she was scared or anything, just like, my mama killed my stepbrother. She said, I saw. And they were like, you know, when they... I know you already said this earlier, but when they were like, you know, lying is wrong, that had me tickled because they said that to me my first time getting pulled over. You know, I didn't get pulled over until I was much older. And I was like, yes. And I was lying to the cops. I was like, yes. I just really don't like you, Maurice. I just want to say that.
I just don't feel like it should have taken you that long to have your own child's back, to have your child's best interest at heart. And Martre definitely was blessed to have the older sisters that he did. They probably really babied him growing up. And that's probably they baby more than he was his mama's baby, but he probably also every picture him and his sisters and his mama, that was a baby. And, um,
They really had some intuition along with his girl. But Maurice, it's crazy. Like not having a dad is one thing, but I can't imagine your dad living in the house and still not knowing shit about you and still not being there.
Because niggas get the excuse all the time of being a provider. And it's the woman's job to watch the home. And this woman just came in and swooped in and picked up where his wife left off. And he was like, you know, I can just focus, make this money, focus. And then I don't have to do nothing else. That's crazy. And as the other young man in the house, I feel like at no point were you checking in with him man to man. Like, you good, son? Yeah.
Right. All these women in here, we got two more, three more basically that done came in. How are you dealing with the change? How are you dealing with your mom? But I guess the dad wasn't even acknowledging how he was dealing with the mom. So trying to have that conversation and be available for your son in that way when he can't even be available for himself in that way. But I almost don't feel like.
And not not excusing the behavior, but I don't think it's that he approached it as I didn't have my kids back. But I think he just really couldn't fathom the fact that he let this go on under like it had to be anything else that I don't think it made sense for him to be that. And it's not like his son is there accusing this woman. It's his daughters who don't live in a house and they never liked her to begin with, you know. Right. Mm hmm.
That's the end of the show. All right, let's do these reviews. All right, this one is from BLB1224. Five stars. I unfortunately got caught up and now have to wait until Fridays. Even started on another true crime podcast, but it ain't the same. I love Taz and Mariah. The seriousness, the commentary is perfect.
Unlike others that made listening cringy and annoying. Enough shade. Keep up the awesome work. I don't know who you shaded, but I appreciate our compliment. I don't. I don't even listen. I only listen to podcasts that deal with this case or not true crime to escape. I can't consume true crime that often. I have to take care of my mentee, my mental health.
So this one says, I love, love, love this podcast. I love this podcast. You don't say. The vibe and information you guys have is incredible. LOL. Keep it up. I'd give you guys a thousand stars. LOL. Thank you so much. If you want to keep up with us, you can. You can email us at sisterswhokillpodcast at gmail.com. gmail.com.
Not EDU because we're not a university. Just Gmail because we're regular folk. And if somebody sends you an email that is just regular folk from...
Edge email? Great. If it's from a university, no. Honestly, from anywhere. If y'all be looking at them emails, if you think it's legit and you're not sure, look at who it came from. And I'm not talking about just read what they put. It says click on the actual email and look at where it came from. Does that shit say it's of a company? Does it look legit? No, it doesn't. Has it been advertised properly? The spams and the scams, they are in the email. I'm telling you.
But you can, but we're on Gmail. SistersWhoKillPodcast at gmail.com. On TikTok, Sisters Who Kill Podcast. On Instagram, Sisters Who Kill Pod. On Twitter, Sisters Who Kill. And join the discussion group if you dare. All right, friend, you got anything else? Talk to us, we talk back.