Episode 5: “Black and White Cookies”
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Inside that envelope my source had given me was a lot of paperwork and several CDs full of digital files. One of those files was marked Blackstone Jail Recordings. I opened that one first. Hello? Hello.

Happy pre-4th of July. Thank you. Happy birthday. Thank you. I got your card. I laughed out loud. Most of these recordings were taped during the pandemic when in-person visits were no longer allowed, but the county jail set up a video conference system, so you can see Jill Blackstone's face light up with a big smile every time a friend would come visit.

Tell me about yourself. What do you do all day? I'm fine. I have wonderful books to read, and that is a lifesaver. I got my first disciplinary action. I was so mad. What did you do, girl? On Monday, so Monday morning, I left the phone numbers out for a friend to call, and they said I'm not allowed to pass phone numbers.

Jill rarely talked about her case, but she did reveal once that she felt out of place in jail.

I don't see myself as this person in the uniform. I think myself as me. I listened to every conversation to see if Jill ever talked about Wendy. She did, just a few times. Wendy's birthday was yesterday. Yeah. So my parents had a toast to her. Oh, that's nice. Yeah, they always do. And my niece made a cake, and they always do something. What about you? Anything with work?

Nothing. The only other time Wendy's name came up was when Jill apparently had a falling out with her other sister, Lisa. Jill doesn't say Wendy's name in this conversation. Instead, she refers to her as the other one. And then I had an argument with my sister because she's just so nuts and bolts about money. She just exhausts me sometimes. And then whenever that happens, I instinctively want to call the other one and say, you can't believe what she did.

And then it makes me miss her all over again. It's just a bad cycle. Just really put a cloud over me. But it is what it is. I mean, I have no idea what I'll do when I get out of here, you know. But I hope that's my biggest problem. All right, I love you. Feel better. I love you, too. Get rest. I will. And I'll see you next weekend. All right, I love you. Okay, love you, too. Okay.

The next CD I pulled out was marked Photos, and a part of me wished I hadn't opened this one, because the pictures of Wendy and the dogs in the garage were devastating. One of the photos is a close-up of Wendy and Izzy. It is a searing image of a dog, loyal to the end, laying back-to-back with Wendy.

I moved on to the other evidence inside that envelope and was quickly overwhelmed by the amount of information. Those CDs contained thousands of digital files, transcripts, interviews. I realized I needed help figuring out the order of it all. So I tried calling the two people who knew the most about this case, lead detective Johnine Jones and her partner Steve Castro. For years, they couldn't discuss their investigation. But things have changed, and now for the first time, they're willing to talk.

This is Episode 5 of the Blackstone Sisters. I'm Barbara Schroeder. I had never had a case involving any animal abuse or a crime of any animal abuse. So to me, that was, it was shocking to see. Detective Jones and Castro are both retired from the LAPD now, and the case is over, so they're free to talk about it. But the main reason they agreed to do this interview is because they want to be a voice for their victim, Wendy Blackstone.

Plus, they wanted to respond to the comment Jill Blackstone's attorney Danny Davis made about how the case against Jill should never have even been filed and that Detective Jones had become obsessed with the case because of the dogs.

For Davis to make that statement, it's actually laughable that Davis says something like this. Such a tragedy that he can say this case should never have been filed. Castro said that their work on this case was always and only about getting justice for Wendy Blackstone. Detective Jones was resilient. No stone unturned.

I mean, went above and beyond. I mean, and so for Davis to make that statement, he's nuts. Sometimes when you hear, "Man, what gives defense attorneys a bad name?" Dan Davis, sorry.

The officers have agreed to take us behind the scenes of their investigation, and they're also finally answering the question I've been chasing the answer to all these years. The one about what triggered Jill Blackstone's second arrest, and why did it take three years? The answer? The officers had to keep going back to the district attorney's office, three times in all, with new evidence each time, to finally convince a prosecutor to file charges.

Here's the information they had the first time around. Talk about the clues that you felt were most critical to your investigation. Several, actually, in my opinion, because I've been to several scenes and a lot of them are suicides. And one thing that you look for, besides the weapon being there and all this other stuff, is did they leave a note? You know, a lot of times that's telling. When we get to this scene...

There's several notes, but they're not just like a suicide note. They're instructions. So to me, it was right from the get-go, I knew this was different than any other scene because it's actually telling you what to do and what you're going to find and what to do with what you find. And we both looked at each other, and Steve's like, this is no accident. I said, no, you can't premeditate an accident.

When detectives went inside the house, they saw all those post-it notes Jill had put up, and then they went to Wendy's bedroom, where there was more suspicious evidence. Wendy would need two things to get out of that garage that night if she could, and that would have been her glasses and her hearing aids. And they were not there. They were placed in her bedroom. And if Wendy was conscious at any point in time, I think that would be the two things that she would need. And I can't imagine to be in a dark room

room with no one and no noise is probably other than dogs distressing around you. I can't imagine to die like that. It was shocking to see. The dog was right next to Wendy Blackstone's body and it was up by her head and definitely deceased with her. And I think with the hardest, I've never seen so much dog urine and feces around a body like that. So yeah, that was a first.

Another clue that made officers think Jill was lying about Wendy's death being an accident was when she said she pulled the grill into the garage because it got cold out. Yeah, I remember her mentioning that it got cool that evening. And it didn't get cool that evening. We have the temperature that night. It was not cold that night. It was probably around 78 or 80. Actually, 84 degrees that evening between 60 and... And let's be clear. I don't think...

We both never, ever, ever thought this was an accident. Take us back to the moment that you walk into the hospital room. What's your impression of Jo Blackstone? Well, we arrive and we go in and she's in the bed. And my opinion is like Johnny spoke, we spoke to nurses and everything. She's doing okay. And we come in and you know why we're here when we needed to speak to you. And she was completely cooperative and

In fact, it got more chatty as we actually spoke. So it was, it was a very comfortable interview, in my opinion. I've had interviews where they're not very comfortable, to be honest with you. And this one was very comfortable. It was very genuine. But she did have answers that she probably knew these questions were coming and she prepared for that. I asked the detectives about another accusation Jill's attorney had made against them, that they didn't read Jill her rights immediately.

Castro said they did nothing wrong. Police officers have discretion as to when to Mirandize a suspect, and they waited because Jill was talking so much. Were you surprised that she was as talkative as she was? And is that a technique that you use to let people talk? Yeah, well, first off, you do want to be able to build some type of rapport where they feel comfortable speaking to you. Nobody wants to talk to someone they don't like. So that...

You can call it a technique, but it's always the best form of talking to someone and getting information. If Jill Blackstone hadn't talked to you so much, if she would have pulled the lawyer card, would this case have turned out a lot differently? How important was that interview to your case? Oh, I'm going to say very crucial to our case to get the person that is suspected of murdering

The crime to admit to what Jill Blackstone admitted to definitely was a turning point for us. Yes, absolutely. I agree with Johnny. And to be very telling was the fact that Jill tells us, listen, Wendy had no idea this was coming. Absolutely no chance. So basically you're telling us you killed her.

And this was interesting. Even though both Jones and Castro were convinced Jill was lying to them about Wendy's death, there were other things she told them about Wendy that they did believe, like how devoted she had been to her sister. I don't think Jill didn't love her sister, even up until the end. But you can love someone, but you can also kill them. It can end up that way. And I think Jill was at a stage in her life where she just sold her house.

She's not working as much. She has now some money, more money from the proceeds of her house. And she is now looking at what kind of life do I want? Do I want one with my sister still?

or do I want to try and live a life for just me now? And she did make that very clear to us. She wanted that. Yeah, that was a real sad statement in her interview where she said, "I'm 52, I'm alone, I have nobody. Most people my age have a family." And she said, "I have nothing." Another thing that she had mentioned to us was that she thought she went out and looked for a location, an assisted living location for Wendy. Maybe this will solve it, maybe give me some freedom.

And she thought she found a place that she thought was really nice. But it was $3,000 a month. And she had contacted her parents. And the parents said, no, we're not going to send you the $3,000 a month. So again, now Jill's probably thinking to herself, God, see, it's just me. It's me with Wendy. No one's helping me.

The officers wanted to ask Jill's parents about the financial situation, but the Blackstone family had stopped cooperating. This is not an easy case. The parents from the get-go, I think any parent would probably want to believe when you have two children that are

One's arrested, one's, you know, dead. They wanted to believe it was an accident. I don't know what they know, even to this day, because they would not discuss anything with us other than that first day we talked to them. And that, they had stated, no, this is...

terrible accident we would have taken Wendy then we don't believe that you know any of this could happen other than being an accident this family I'm sure is will never be over this and I there in no way did we want to ever hurt them but we have to also do our job and when it came to that my victim comes before

the family, and that's Wendy. There was a third sister. I think she gets lost in all of this. We found, of course, in any family there's dynamics and who gets along and who doesn't. At times they get along and at times they don't. But yes, Lisa, the younger sister, there was a different relationship between her and Jill that there was between her and Wendy. Because Lisa had the eye disease as well, the RP that Wendy had. Yes.

So you think that they would have been very close. But that her and Lisa just did not click, did not, were not on the same page with sisterly love and things with the family.

Detective Jones shared a story that's never been made public before about Jill Blackstone's first arrest, which happened the day after detectives interviewed Jill. She was about to be discharged from the hospital, so Jones asked one of the officers who'd been on her suicide watch to detain her and transport her to jail.

The officers called me and stated that she wanted to speak to me. And I was at North Hollywood Station. I said, all right, have them come in, bring her in. And when they came in, they had said she wanted you to have this. And it was a copy of her medical records. And I said, all right. And I thought that was it. But they said she wants to talk to you. So I

Placed her in an interview room and had another detective with me, and I asked her what she needed, and she said, well, I want to know who arrested me. And I said, I did. And she said, you did? I said, yes. And she goes, well, I thought you liked me. I go, this has got nothing to do with liking you, basically. It's about the arrest. And yes, I am the detective that arrested you, and it will be my case. She goes, oh.

With Jill behind bars, the detectives took all their evidence, including that revealing interview they'd done with her, to the district attorney's office. They presented their case, but the prosecutors declined to file charges, and Jill was released.

Why wasn't she charged and arraigned the first time around? They thought it was important, and it is important, to get the results of the autopsy. Let's make sure what the cause of death is. When we filed the case with the district attorney, you only have a 48-hour period to turn around and file a case for charges. We understand, working with murder investigations and even death investigations, sometimes it's...

Everything's not going to get there yet. And the district attorney, they didn't kick the case because it wasn't, there wasn't evidence. They just needed more evidence.

The officers were told to keep investigating, and they had to find the answer to a specific question. The district attorney wanted to make sure that nothing was going to come up to show that Wendy Blackstone ever wanted to die with her sister. You needed to find out if Wendy actually wanted to die or not. After the first arrest, what were you guys focusing on finding and getting? The first thing we wanted to know was, did Wendy Blackstone ever know or ever realize

permit or give Jill authorization to do this to her? Were we going to find something? It was a case that was going to take time.

Because Wendy's parents and her other sister Lisa weren't talking with detectives anymore, the officers turned to Wendy's friends for help. How many trips did you take to New Jersey? Did you go back east? Three. She just was out there really trying to get as much information as possible. Not because I'm going to go get her, no. To get all the evidence needed. But she just went above and beyond.

We grew up on the same block. This is Mary Beth, a lifelong friend of Wendy's. We ended up becoming best friends, you know, in elementary school. Lots of sleepovers at each other's houses, you know, spent a lot of time with her family. She spent a lot of time with mine. When it came to the fact of Wendy committing suicide? Absolutely not.

Really, last thing that I would have said. And I'm sure that everyone who's ever had a friend or someone commit suicide says that. But there was no indication whatsoever. In fact, she seemed very happy, very upbeat. Next, Jones talked with Fran, another dear friend of Wendy's. My memories of Wendy was that Wendy was always happy. When you found out that she had died, it was a shock. It was a shock.

Is there anything that you think could have led you to believe that she would die? Did she talk about anything about health-wise or any depression? Was she ever angry, mad? I'd spoken to Wendy, I think it was on Thursday. And we said we would touch base over the weekend. That was the last time.

Any kind of correspondence that Wendy and I had. And I got a call Sunday morning from my sister. She told me that Wendy was dead. And I pretty much lost it. Did you know anything about her relationship with her, Sister Jill? She always said to me that I'm grateful. That's a word she always used.

to me that my sister gave me this opportunity to live out in California. And when Detective Jones returned to Los Angeles, she and Castro interviewed one of the sisters' next-door neighbors, June, who'd been very close with both Jill and Wendy. Was she okay, Jill? Was there anything going on in her life that was... I think Jill was a little overwhelmed. June told the officers it wasn't Wendy who'd been depressed lately. It was Jill because of recent developments in her life.

The officers knew about Jill's lupus and financial concerns, but they didn't know about the troubles Jill had with her dog rescue, Thumping Tails. June said that Jill had been the target of an animal cruelty investigation. It was a huge, just attacks on her from a lot of people in the rescue community. It was like cyberbullying.

And it was unrelenting. Several people had accused Jill of keeping too many dogs at her house, up to 13 at a time, which led to fights, which led to injuries. Also, according to the complaint, Jill had a reputation for unnecessarily euthanizing dogs. She had a kind of breakdown in the middle of all of that. No animal cruelty charges were ever filed against Jill. The case was dismissed for lack of evidence.

But Jill's accusers put her name on several do-not-adopt lists, and she ended up closing her rescue. And then more recently, in the months before Wendy died, June said Jill seemed extra stressed about needing to move out of her house. Apparently, the new owner, a developer, was letting Jill rent back the house month by month, and he had recently informed her it was time to move out.

Jill tried talking to her parents about living with them for a while, but June said the conversation did not go well because Jill's parents had some strong feelings about her dogs. And her parents said, of course, they could all come, but not the dogs. Oh. And for Jill, that was like her parents saying,

to their other daughter, "Well, you can come and live with us, but not the four kids." - Oh, they meant that much to her? - That much. - Do you think this was more of a suicide attempt or is this, did she intentionally kill her sister? I mean, we're trying to sort all this out. - Yeah, I care about Jill. I think she's been battling a lot of health issues and a lot of mental health issues.

that aren't her fault. She's a caring person. She's a smart person. It's hard to reconcile. Hi, this is Detective Jones. May I help you? Yes. This is Joe, Wendy's email friend, who she met in a retinitis pigmentosa chat group. I knew Wendy. We never met in person. We emailed and we emailed for over 17 years, pretty much every week. I have

I believe almost all the emails we've ever exchanged. Wow, that would be a lot of emails over 17 years. 2,000, over 2,000. So over 2,000. Did she ever talk about her sister at all? Yeah. Yeah, her sister was a TV producer. She adored her sister.

A couple of years ago, she planned out her 50th birthday party. They had a big celebration. Joe told the detective that in the weeks before Wendy died, she didn't sound troubled at all. She was never depressed around me. I mean, people with retinitis pigmentosa can get very depressed about it and think their life is over. And that was kind of why we kept talking, because I don't feel that way, and she didn't feel that way.

She never expressed any form of real depression or suicidal thoughts or anything. She was always pretty upbeat, actually. In fact, recently she's been a bit more upbeat. I appreciate you giving me a call back on this. No problem. I would do anything for Wendy.

Jones took all of the emails that Wendy and Joe had written to each other into evidence, and she read each one. It took a long time. It took a long time. What did you learn about Wendy from those emails that you didn't know before? You don't usually get to know a victim. You have to hear it from family. But to be able to read everything that was going through Wendy's mind with her friends and the advice that

that she would give to her friends. Everything was sound, and just the intelligence of Wendy Blackstone came out in the way she would write because this was her way of communication. It was like talking to her, honestly, because of the way she would talk to her friends. She was educated. She had a degree. She had a relationship when she was in college. She absolutely adored her dog. She loved Bruce Springsteen.

Saying that Wendy Blackstone loved Bruce Springsteen might have been an understatement, because as I was going through her emails to Joe, she mentions Bruce over 100 times. Wendy was a super fan, had been to dozens of his concerts with Jill or friends during her lifetime. I went to my first of the five Bruce Springsteen concerts I'm going to in July. It was a perfect night, just perfect. Here's an actor reading from Wendy's emails.

It's amazing the way he runs across the stage at full force, jumps onto the piano, hangs upside down from the mic stand. And then, when Patty and Bruce sing to each other on the slow songs, there's definitely true love in their eyes. We should all experience that in life someday the way they do. Bruce really and truly is something special to me. Next up, Shea Stadium. Tickets go on sale tomorrow morning.

Jones said she was surprised by all she was learning about Wendy's life because Jill had made her sound kind of helpless and dependent on Jill for everything. But Wendy did a lot on her own, like gardening. Right now, my pumpkin patch is my biggest thrill. I have one actual pumpkin growing. It was tennis ball size on Saturday, and now it's larger than a cantaloupe. Wendy also helped Jill a lot with her dog rescue, Thumping Tails.

We had a huge adoption fair this past Saturday. We were at it from 8 a.m. until 3 p.m. We had 15 adorable six- to eight-week-old puppies from a few different letters. We think probably four will definitely wind up being adopted, so that's considered a very good day. Jill had also said that Wendy was dependent on her for transportation, but Wendy was able to get around on her own. In fact, when Jill started working at the Dr. Drew show, Wendy would go visit her.

My access ride was right on time at 3:25 to take me to Jill's work. No traffic. And 15 to 20 minutes later, I was at the CNN building. Once I was up in Jill's office, she was in the middle of approving scripts. Then, about 10 minutes later, someone stuck their head in and said, "Is now okay?" And Jill told me to come out to the main area.

The officers also discovered Jill had not been transparent about Wendy's financial situation. She was not totally dependent on Jill for money.

In fact, Wendy got a monthly disability payment of around $600. She'd actually saved enough to once loan Jill money when she had to declare bankruptcy several years earlier. A lone friend said that Wendy never asked Jill to repay. But what gave the officers the most insight into the life of Wendy Blackstone were lists that she liked to make and essays she would write. This was her list of favorite pastimes.

listening to audiobooks, playing the iPad game Trainyard Express. Her favorite TV show was Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Wendy was a big fan of true crime shows like Dateline and the hit podcast Serial. And then there was the essay that affected the officers deeply because Wendy told the story of how she learned she would never see or hear well again.

I have never seen the stars in the night sky. I have never driven a car, and I can't read the back of the cereal box as I eat my breakfast. I was born with a degenerative eye disease called retinitis pigmentosa. The form of RP that I have is called Usher's syndrome, which not only slowly steals my vision, but my hearing as well.

My childhood was pretty normal. After school activities, riding my bike with friends. Some things were harder than others such as going to the movies or having sleepovers, but I somehow did it without telling anyone I can't see in the dark. I always felt embarrassed by it which is why I never said anything. Although I always knew I was different than other kids, I wasn't diagnosed until I was 12 years old. That's when my own family found out I can't see in the dark because I had spent my whole life hiding it. I grew up never discussing my vision with anyone.

It was like the pink elephant in the room. We all knew about it but never mentioned it. To be honest, I wish my RP had not been a taboo topic. Even in my family, we didn't discuss, we didn't sit around and say, "What's out there we didn't know about?" It felt like something that had to be kept secret. That's wrong. I shouldn't have been made to feel that way. When I was in college, I was still able to read textbooks, magazines. I was even able to see the stock tables in the newspaper. I used my magnifying glass.

But my peripheral vision had deteriorated to almost nothing. When I looked straight ahead, I only saw what was straight ahead. If there was a chair below my line of sight, I would walk right into that chair. If there was a curb I didn't see, I'd trip over it. If someone was handing me something, I didn't know how to take it from them. I wondered, how would I find a way to break my silence and share my secret?

The answer was handed to me six weeks into my freshman year, when the person who had become the best friend I ever had one day just blurted out, Why don't you just tell me about your vision instead of hiding from it? Those words changed my life. I told him everything. I had never discussed my vision like that with anyone. While I was still embarrassed, it also felt liberating to share my secret and know that I no longer had to make excuses. My friend told me he would help me tell our other friends who were incredibly supportive.

And I learned that it's so much easier to laugh at myself than to worry about making a fool of myself. It was nice to get that side of a victim I've really never got to do. Found nothing.

of Wendy Blackstone ever wanting to do any harm to herself. I found her to be nothing but wanting life more than ever. Now that detectives had all this information that showed Wendy wasn't suicidal or depressed before her death, they went back to the DA's office for the second time to try and get their case filed. They also brought with them a new and alarming piece of evidence they'd uncovered.

We had received information from someone who knew Wendy very well. She says, "I need to send you an email that Wendy had sent to me approximately a week prior that talks about an incident with Jill."

Wendy's email was about some cookies that she and Jill had shared for dessert the night before. They were at home being her and Jill at their house, and they loved these black and white cookies, which I knew nothing of. I guess it's a big East Coast thing. And they were sharing a black and white cookie, and Jill cut the cookie in half and shared it with Wendy.

with Wendy. Wendy said she bit that half of that cookie. She bit into a bitter part of the cookie and she could tell that there was something in the cookie that obviously didn't belong. And she was trying to explain to Jill, "Hey, there's something in this cookie. I don't know what it is, but it tastes weird."

Last night, Jill and I shared a black and white cookie. As I was eating it, I said, oh, I just bit into something bitter. It was only in my piece she didn't get it. Then in my next bite, the same thing. After I finished, I even remember saying I have to go get some water. I have a terrible bitter taste in my mouth. We even joked that I hoped I wasn't poisoned. This was at around 7.30. Then I went to watch TV in bed. It was maybe 8.10 at the latest at this point. I literally couldn't keep my eyes open.

She woke up in the middle of the night to try to go to the bathroom, and her lamp that she always uses and is on for her and her hearing aids were gone. The light was off, and she couldn't find her hearing aids, and she stumbled to the bathroom, stumbled back to bed. She woke up that morning, and she couldn't get up, and she said she was an early riser. She always gets around 8, but she couldn't even stumble out of bed until about 11 o'clock.

Jill thinks maybe when she went to get the black and white cookie and she put it down on the counter, it accidentally stuck to one of Bruce's tramadol pills, and I bit into that. I said no. Whatever it was was in the cookie. And it wasn't a whole pill. It was like a piece of a pill that had broken up. Of course, at the time I bit into it, I had no idea. But looking back, I'm sure that's what it was. Someone dropped a pill of some sort into the batter and it broke up. Thank God it wasn't poison.

I stayed off the treadmill this morning, that's for sure. And we joked that I better not operate any heavy machinery. And that made her friend, after this has happened to Wendy, send that to us. She just thought, was this a trial run? What is this? I mean, what was she doing? And that is something that we both looked at when we read it. But wow. There was no question that was a trial run. That's how we felt. That's what our attorney felt. Absolutely.

But even with all this new information, the district attorney's office still refused to charge Jill Blackstone. The officers were turned down for a second time. And now they were told they needed to go find evidence that Jill had a motive to kill Wendy and the dogs. Once again, the officers went back to work. And this time, they enlisted an FBI forensics team for help to extract everything from the sisters' electronics. And there was a...

Almost half a year later, when the FBI forensics results came back,

Jones and Castro did uncover disturbing information. Information that revealed why the Blackstone family, Jill's mom and dad and sister Lisa, probably weren't cooperating with the investigation. It turns out a blistering family drama had been unfolding prior to Wendy's death, and everyone had been keeping it a secret. You like to say we were the wrong parents for Wendy.

What you mean is, this isn't the kid you wanted. So you sacrificed me. You dumped your kid on me, and that makes you the wrong parents for me. More about what Jill Blackstone and her family never told detectives coming up next in Episode 6, our final episode of The Blackstone Sisters. Thanks for listening.