Death of Christian Andreacchio
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Forensic Tales discusses topics that some listeners may find disturbing. The contents of this episode may not be suitable for everyone. Listener discretion is advised. In February 2014, a 21-year-old from Meridian, Mississippi, was found dead in the upstairs bathroom of his apartment. He was dead from a single gunshot wound to the right temple.

After a 45-minute investigation, the police chief called off the entire investigation and told all of the officers to go home, that this was a textbook case of suicide. But the victim's family wasn't so sure. The victim's family discovered some troubling evidence. Like, why was the gun found on the left side of his body when he was right-handed?

Or why did the friend that he was with the day of his death go to an ATM and try to withdraw all of his money? Things just didn't seem to add up to a textbook case of suicide, leaving many to question, was the 2014 death of 21-year-old Christian Andreacchio a suicide or a homicide?

This is Forensic Tales, episode number 48, The Death of Christian Andreacchio. ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪

Welcome to Forensic Tales. I'm your host, Courtney Fretwell. Forensic Tales is a weekly true crime podcast that discusses real, bone-chilling true crime stories with a forensic science twist. Some cases have been solved, while other cases remain cold.

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Every contribution to the show, whether it's big or small, helps me to continue to produce the true crime content you love. Please consider supporting the show on Patreon. Another great way you can help support Forensic Tales is by leaving us a rating with a review. Now, let's jump right into this week's episode.

Hey guys, I hope everyone had a safe and nice Thanksgiving holiday. I know for me and my entire family, it was certainly different this year. We decided to not get together given the current situation, which was difficult. And this was the first year that I didn't cook anything. This was our first Thanksgiving where we ate at a restaurant outside, of course, but it's just a weird, weird time.

But I am hopeful that we are moving in the right direction and that we'll be able to celebrate even bigger and better next year. So I hope all of you still had a great and safe holiday weekend. So the case that we're talking about this week on the show has definitely been covered by many other podcasts. There's even been entire shows dedicated to the facts of this case, two of which have had direct involvement with the victim's family.

And it's the story of the 2014 death of then 21-year-old Christian Andreacchio from Meridian, Mississippi. His story and his case is extremely unique. And it's something that I absolutely wanted to cover on the show.

Because his death remains a mystery. Even over six years after Christian's death, I'm still left scratching my head on whether his death was a suicide or whether it was a homicide. I'm left wondering, what really happened to Christian Andreacchio? If you ask the Andreacchio family, his death is clear-cut, a homicide. If you speak with the Meridian Police Department, they've ruled it a suicide.

This is a case with a ton of forensic evidence, and depending on which expert is studying or interpreting that forensic evidence, you may come up with a very different conclusion on how Christian died. So let's get into the facts of the case together, and then you can decide what you think really happened. Christian Andreacchio was 21 years old back in early 2014.

He was born and raised in the town of Meridian, Mississippi. Meridian was a place with a long-standing history in manufacturing, and it was also the birthplace of Jimmy Rogers, who most people would regard as the father of country. And from a very young age, Christian told his parents that he wanted to have a career on the water. And when he turned 18 years old, he found a job working on a tugboat.

Even at 18 years old, he knew which direction he wanted to go in life. Something that most people don't figure out until many years later. Or for some people, they never figure it out. But Christian was different. He wasn't one of those people. And he didn't just want a career on the water. He had much bigger dreams. He wanted to become the youngest captain at the Magnolia Marina where he worked.

And by all accounts, in 2014, he was well on his way to making his dream a reality. In the first three years that Christian worked at the Marine, he had already been promoted twice, and all of his co-workers really enjoyed working with him. Now, taking a step back and looking at Christian's life, he was a happy guy. He was a fun guy. He was the kind of person you'd want to be around.

And at 21 years old, he was also making some really good money on the tugboat. Even though the job had a slight downside, he was required to go on these 30-day hitches on the boat, but he loved it and he loved making good money doing it. It didn't really seem to bother him. In 2014, he had created a great life for himself, especially for only being 21 years old.

He paid for his own apartment that he shared with his brother. He drove around Meridian in a fairly nice BMW. He owned jet skis. And because of his job at the marina, he was starting to create a really successful life for himself. A kind of life that his parents, Ray and Todd Andreacchio, were super proud of.

And which is why what happened on February 26, 2014, just so shocking, not only to the family, but for many people throughout Meridian. In February 2014, Christian had a new girlfriend in his life, 17-year-old Whitley Goodman. Before dating Whitley, Christian had had a long-term girlfriend for many years, a girl that his parents thought that he might marry someday.

So at first, the Andriachios were a little skeptical about Whitley. She was young. She didn't really have a great reputation. She also had a troubled home life. At one point early in their relationship, Whitley moved in with Christian's parents, Ray and Todd. His parents knew that their son really cared about this girl. So they wanted to do what they could to help her out.

But Whitley couldn't stay at the Andreacchio house for very long. After about a month, Todd, Christian's dad, was the one to tell Whitley, look, you're starting to cause trouble. We gave you a place to stay, but I think it's time for you to go. So after being kicked out of Ray and Todd's house, Whitley, by all accounts, moved into Christian's apartment that he shared with his brother.

don't think it was like a formal thing. It was like she pretty much had nowhere else to go and just started crashing at his place night after night. So during this time, Christian would be away for these 30-day stretches on the tugboat. So he would be away from the apartment for several weeks at a time. And Whitley, who was staying at the apartment, not only made herself at home, but

but she would also borrow and drive around in Christian's BMW, something that he really wasn't a fan of. On one of these stints on the tugboat, Christian was injured.

Now, it wasn't an extremely serious injury, but it prompted him to look into some sort of life insurance. Now, keep in mind, Christian is just 21 years old. I am in my early 30s. And to be completely honest, I have not researched life insurance policies for myself. But after the accident, Whitley, his girlfriend, expressed her concerns that what if something happened to him while out on the water?

Specifically, she worried what would happen if she got pregnant with Christian's child and he got injured. What would they do? Now, pause. Just to be clear, Whitley was never pregnant with Christian's child. This was just some story that she had come up with and was more of a hypothetical than anything else.

You guys know that whenever there's talk about a life insurance policy and it's in a true crime case, that spells trouble. So on February 25th, the day before Christian's death, he was out on the water on the tugboat. On the 25th of February, one of Christian's co-workers on the boat, a woman by the name of Cheryl Stanley, died.

remembered that one of Christian's friends, Dylan Swearengin, kept calling him and saying, Hey man, your girlfriend Whitley's been driving around town. She's using your car and she's been driving around with some dope dealers. Like, man, you need to get home. Now, this wasn't the first time that this has happened.

Christian had already told his girlfriend Whitley many times before that she wasn't allowed to drive his car when he wasn't home. And they had already fought about who Whitley was hanging out with and who she was spending her time with. Christian, by all accounts, didn't like the guys that she was hanging out with. So Christian's on the tugboat. He gets all of these phone calls from Dylan and he decides that enough is enough.

His relationship with Whitley had already started to fall apart. And now after finding out that she's at home using his car, riding around with some not so great guys, he's had enough. He asked for permission to leave the boat early and he was going to go home, kick quickly out of the apartment, get his car back and break up with her. Christian got permission from his supervisors to leave the boat that night.

And his friend, Dylan Swearingen, was there to pick him up on the morning of February 26th. Now, the boat that he was working at was in Louisiana, specifically at St. Rose. So his friend Dylan drove from Meridian, Mississippi, out to St. Rose, Louisiana, to pick him up.

And then the two of them drove back to Meridian together. And once they arrived back at Christian's apartment, that is when the Andreacchio's family life was turned completely upside down. Dylan and Christian got to the apartment around 1130 in the morning on February 26. About six hours later, Ray and Todd Andreacchio received the phone call that is every parent's worst nightmare.

They learned that their son, 21-year-old Christian, was dead from a single gunshot wound to the right side of his head in an apparent suicide. As soon as Ray and Todd hung up the phone, they had a feeling in their gut that something was wrong.

And when they started to find out more and more about the hours leading up to Christian's death, they were convinced that something was wrong. Before the Meridian Police Department called the Andreacchios to inform them of Christian's apparent suicide, the crime scene investigation lasted just under an hour. It was about 45 minutes. The first responding officers arrived at the apartment at 5.05 p.m.,

By 5.43 p.m., they were pretty much done with the investigation. And by 6.30 p.m., a Meridian police officer was already on their way to break the news about their son Christian. That is, of course, a little cause for alarm. It's really difficult to do a proper investigation in only 45 minutes. But before we spend too much time on that aspect, let's

Let's talk a little bit about what was on the initial police report. So the first people that the police interviewed were Dylan Swearengin and Whitley Goodman, the two other people who were with Christian that day. Whitley told police that when Christian got back to the apartment with Dylan around 1130 a.m., they started arguing. She said that during the argument, Christian became really upset and

And sometime while fighting, he pulled out a gun, held it up to the side of his head and asked Whitley if she loved him. Had followed up and asked Whitley if at any time during her relationship with Christian, if he had ever mentioned wanting to hurt himself or to kill himself at any point. And she had said, quote, no, I don't think so.

After the argument between Whitley and Christian started to cool off, Dylan told Whitley and Christian that he was going to leave the apartment and that he was going to go pick up some food. According to Dylan, Christian had given him his debit card in order to pay for the food. Sometime after Dylan left to go pick up the food, Whitley stated to police that she went to go take a nap on the couch.

Her first story was that she was asleep at the time of when Christian would have shot himself in the upstairs bathroom. She said she didn't hear the gunshot and that she didn't even wake up. Now, I think it's important to provide some framework to this. Christian's apartment was around 1,000 square feet. It wasn't the biggest of apartments.

So Whitley's story is that she was asleep on the couch downstairs at the time and she didn't hear the gunshot. According to her, she didn't wake up until Dylan returned back to the apartment and woke her up sometime around four o'clock in the afternoon.

Whitley will later on say that she had taken a Xanax before she went to go take a nap, and that's probably why she didn't wake up to the sound of a gunshot. When Whitley was first questioned by police the night of Christian's murder, they asked her where Christian's cell phone was.

Investigators inside the apartment had searched the place up and down, right and left, and couldn't locate his cell phone. We know that during the course of the investigation, that a person's cell phone can be the biggest window into somebody's life.

And in Christian's case, the cell phone could shed some light on maybe who was the last person he spoke to. It could provide some insight into his frame of mind the day that he died. So police asked Whitley if she knew where his cell phone was. And for a while, she claimed that she had no idea where the phone was.

It wasn't until police told Whitley that she wasn't going to be released until she told him where it was. She then pulled Christian's cell phone out of her purse and handed it over to detectives. Now, no matter what, for Whitley to have Christian's cell phone after he reportedly committed suicide will lead to more questions than it will answers here.

And it's even more unusual that she denied having it for so long in the first place. Dylan Swearengin, who was also inside Christian's apartment, was also questioned by police. About an hour after Dylan and Christian arrived back at the apartment, so around 12.30 p.m., Dylan is captured on a bank security camera attempting to drain Christian's bank account.

Dylan was at the ATM trying to withdraw all of his friend's money. He's trying to get the money just two to three hours before 911 was called after the gunshot. Now, I say Dylan attempted to withdraw all of Christian's money, but he wasn't actually able to get any money.

He was at the ATM, but he didn't have the right PIN number. So he wasn't able to get anything from Christian's account. So obviously, police are going to ask Dylan, why is he seen on camera attempting to withdraw all of Christian's money, who by all accounts at 1230 p.m. is very much alive?

Dylan's story to the Meridian police is that his friend Christian told him that he wanted him to have all of his money. Dylan said Christian told him to take his money while they were together in the car from Louisiana, where Christian's tugboat was, and Mississippi, where the apartment is. Dylan told police that Christian had been depressed for a very long time.

So he wasn't surprised when his friend told him that he wanted him to basically have all of his money. And apparently, he didn't ask too many questions. He just made his way right to the ATM.

Now, after the trip to the ATM, Dylan also stopped by a local Best Buy where he went into the store in order to get Whitley's cell phone fixed because apparently the cell phone had been damaged sometime during the argument with Christian in the apartment. Dylan returned back to Christian's apartment around four o'clock in the afternoon.

He said Whitley was asleep on the couch. He went upstairs to see if he could find Christian. And that's when he said he found him in the upstairs bathroom, slumped over the bathtub. And that's when he said he called 911. Before Dylan and Whitley were released from questioning the night of Christian's death, they were both given GSR tests, gunshot residue tests. GSR tests are very routine in cases like this.

A GSR test can determine whether or not someone had recently shot a firearm. But when you shoot a gun, it leaves behind residue on your hands and on your clothing for quite some time. When Dylan and Whitley were given gunshot residue tests, both of their tests came back positive for the presence of gunshot residue.

Now, before Whitley was even administered the test, she admitted to police that they would find residue on her hands. Her story was that she had fired a gun the night before with some of her friends, including a guy by the name of Matt Miller. So it wasn't a surprise when her GSR test was positive because she had already come out to offer an explanation.

Keep in mind, Whitley's story is that she was with Matt Miller the night before firing guns, who just so happens to be the guy Christian heard she was driving around with in his car. And that's why her test was positive. This would suggest that she hadn't showered. She hadn't really washed her hands all that well.

Because it's not that difficult to wash away gunshot residue, especially if you really want to. So it is a little odd, to say the least, that her GSR test would be positive from supposedly firing a gun the day before. Dylan, on the other hand, was never questioned by police about why he also had gunshot residue on his hands.

So unfortunately, this is a really big missing piece to this entire puzzle that we may never know. The only thing we do know is that the only two other people inside of Christian's apartment the day he shot himself also had gunshot residue on their hands.

Okay, we know Whitley and Dillon both tested positive for gunshot residue on both of their hands. What about Christian? What was on his hands? Well, he also had gunshot residue. But unlike Whitley and Dillon, the GSR was only on his palms, which suggests that Christian at some point would have handled the gun as well.

The Meridian Police Department ruled Christian's death a suicide within 45 minutes. When investigators got to the bathroom, they saw Christian kneeling on the bathroom floor with his upper body slumped over the bathtub. Blood had began to pool in the bathtub and started going down the drain. On the day of Christian's death, the coroner assigned to the case signed the death certificate and listed the cause of death as a gunshot wound to the head.

The coroner didn't indicate whether Christian's death was a suicide, homicide, or accident. Instead, the coroner listed the death as undetermined. The following day, February 27th, Christian's body was sent to the medical examiner's office for an autopsy to be performed. And a couple weeks later, on March 28th, the medical examiner's office issued a report indicating the final autopsy findings.

which was a cause of death of a gunshot wound to the head, and the manner of death was suicide. That's a little confusing, I know. The coroner said manner of death, undetermined, and the medical examiner said suicide. Keep in mind, the death certificate is issued based on a coroner's findings, not on a medical examiner's. The Andreacchios didn't believe that Christian would have killed himself.

So the family hired an attorney, a woman by the name of Cynthia Speechens. And they also hired a private investigator, Max Mays. Cynthia took the case in the beginning, believing that she would have to tell Ray and Todd Andreacchio that, yeah, as tragic as it is, their son did in fact take his own life. But as Cynthia Spittens got deeper and deeper into the case,

She described Christian's death as, quote, a physically impossible suicide, end quote. At their attorney's advice, the family then hired a private pathologist, Dr. Jonathan Arden, to look at Christian's case. The first pathologist ruled that Christian's death was a suicide. So they wanted an independent pathologist to see what they could uncover.

Dr. Jonathan Arden is a world-renowned medical examiner. He's worked on cases like the DC Sniper case, a story we've covered here on Forensic Tales, and he's also worked on the Anthrax case, which we all know was a super high-profile story. So the Andreacchios were extremely fortunate to have someone like Dr. Arden take a second look at the case.

And when he looked at it, the first thing he noted was the positioning of the gun and the positioning of Christian's body. The gun had been wedged near the upper left thigh on the outside of the bathtub. The entrance of the bullet had been on the right side of Christian's head, specifically his right temple.

Dr. Arden's argument is that once Christian was shot, he would have lost all muscular function or the ability to move his body at all. So if Christian, who is right-handed, shot himself on the right side of the head, why was the gun found on the opposite side of his body?

Dr. Arden argued that the gun should have been found much closer to Christian's right hand, not down by his left thigh. The gun that was used was a .45 caliber semi-automatic firearm. Now, full disclosure, I know next to nothing about firearms. I don't own one. I've only shot a gun once in my life. I am no firearm expert, okay?

But with a semi-automatic gun, to fire it, you pull the gun's trigger, the bullet comes out, the gun reloads, and is ready to shoot again. When the gun was discovered next to Christian's body on the outside of the bathtub, the gun's hammer was forward or decocked. If Christian had fired the gun, you'd expect the hammer to be back or cocked, but it wasn't.

The gun was decocked with a live bullet still in the chamber, which would have been impossible for Christian to do. He can't shoot himself in the head, fall over the bathtub and die, then go back and cock the weapon. It's impossible. So the conclusion that Dr. Arden came to was that someone else must have touched the gun and decocked it because Christian couldn't have done that theoretically.

This leads to the speculation that the crime scene was staged or somehow manipulated. Whether that was the police, whether that was Dylan or Whitley, someone would have touched that gun after Christian was dead. At least that's what's indicated in Dr. Arden's report. Next is the bullet.

So the bullet that killed Christian appeared to have hit a wall near an electrical outlet right above the bathroom sink. It appears that way because the bullet itself, besides blood, also had material on it that's consistent with drywall material. And there's also a crime scene photo that shows a hole in the wall consistent with the size of a bullet.

Christian's body suggested that he would have been kneeling over the bathtub when he shot himself. But there was no evidence that the bullet hit any part of the inside of the bathtub, which if he's kneeling over the tub, you'd expect the bullet to strike somewhere on the tub. But the ballistics tell a different story. At least that's the argument that Dr. Arden, the pathologist for the Andreacchio family, will tell.

Dr. Arden believes that if Christian shot himself over the tub and it didn't actually hit the bathtub, the bullet would have had to travel and basically ricochet across the entire bathroom, but it didn't. There's only one hole near the bathroom sink, suggesting that Christian was in a different position from when he was shot compared to the position that he was in when first responders arrived.

If you believe this medical examiner's assessment, Christian can't move or change his body position after being shot on his own. It's physically impossible. So this establishes some serious and some major questions about how and where Christian was shot. The independent pathologist, Dr. Arden, also pointed to two other major issues regarding the timeline of events as told by Whitley and Dillon.

One is the issue of rigor mortis. So rigor mortis in the simplest of terms is the stiffening of our bodies post-mortem. The longer we're dead, the more rigor mortis we'd expect to observe in the body. Based on Dylan and Whitley's very own statements to police, Christian had just shot himself. But the pathologist observed a rather advanced stage of rigor mortis on his body.

an amount that suggested he had been dead for much longer. We're talking an amount of rigor mortis that is consistent with him being dead for several hours before Dylan called 911. And the second issue that Dr. Arden raised is the issue of lividity. Post-mortem lividity is simply the pooling of blood from gravity.

You die on your stomach, we'd expect the blood to pool on your stomach, not on your back, because that would defy the laws of gravity. The independent pathologist noted that Christian had significant lividity, specifically to the back part of the right leg. His body was found kneeling against the outside of the bathtub with his knees bent. His calves were facing directly upwards.

So if the blood pooled to the back part of his legs, his calves, it doesn't make sense that the calves were facing the ceiling. It's completely against gravity, at least according to what was reported on the autopsy report. So taking all of this forensic pathology evidence into account,

Dr. Arden ruled Christian's death a homicide, and he's even signed his name to that. To him, it was clearly a staged crime scene. Christian couldn't have decocked the gun after his death. The gun was on the left side of his body. Christian was right-handed, and he was shot to the right temple. And the bullet angle didn't add up with him leaning over the tub.

And that's just the forensic evidence. That's not necessarily considering what Dylan and Whitley did after that afternoon. But even with all this information, the Meridian Police Department refused to reopen Christian's case. The police chief, who at the time was Chief Lee, was present inside of Christian's apartment.

He was the one to rule it a suicide, and he was the one who told investigators to pack things up after that 45-minute investigation. And as long as Chief Lee was in charge, they weren't going to spend any more time on Christian's case. The Andreacchios poured a lot of money into their son's case.

They believed, and they had a lot of outside supporters, as well as experts in the field of forensics, that Christian didn't commit suicide and that he was murdered in cold blood. But if you're going to entertain the idea that Christian was murdered, you have to start looking at some potential motives. Who would want him dead and why?

And well, the Andreacchios pointed to the only two other people who were with Christian inside that apartment, Whitley Goodman and Dylan Swearingen. On the day of Christian's murder, there were seven phone calls placed from Christian's cell phone to Matt Miller. Now, we know Matt Miller in this story. He's the guy that Whitley said she shot guns with the night before Christian's death.

And he's also the guy that she was riding around with in Christian's car while he was out on the tugboat. We also know that Christian came home from his job to confront Whitley about hanging out with Matt Miller. So you do have to wonder, why would Christian call Matt Miller seven different times on his cell phone right before he would have shot himself?

And we have to remember that Whitley had Christian's cell phone inside of her purse when she was being questioned by police. Maybe it's possible that Whitley was the one calling Matt Miller from Christian's cell phone, or maybe it was Christian. So Matt Miller, we keep hearing this guy's name. He must be pretty important to this whole story.

Well, he has sat down with reporters and different media who have covered this case over the years. And I think he is a very important piece to this entire puzzle. Matt Miller claims that the night before Christian's murder, his cousin, Jet Miller, wanted to go out and shoot a new gun that he got. Matt matches Whitley's story that she was out there that night with them. But

He makes a very important distinction from her story. According to Matt, Whitley never shot a gun that night. Matt's cousin Jet asked Whitley if she wanted a turn at shooting the gun, but her response was that she was too scared, that she didn't want to shoot the gun. Matt claims Whitley didn't shoot the gun, that the entire time that night, Whitley sat on his lap while he covered her ears.

Why is this such a big deal? Well, I'll go back to the GSR, the gunshot residue test. Whitley's test was positive. She had 100% fired a gun very close at the very most within a day of Christian's death. And her explanation to the Meridian police was that she shot a gun the night before with Matt and Jet Miller.

But according to the one other witness, Matt Miller himself, she didn't fire a gun that night. He's sure of that. And he's claimed that he's told the police about that on more than one occasion.

So that's a major problem. That's a major inconsistency and leaves the door open as to the real reason why Whitley would have had gunshot residue on her hands the night of Christian's murder. When we know she was in that 1,000 square foot apartment when it happened. The other issue is that the other person who was with Matt Miller and Whitley was Jet Miller, his cousin. And Jet says something completely different.

Jet Miller says Whitley absolutely shot guns with him that night. He doesn't have the same story of Matt that she didn't. Jet Miller recalls that she did shoot the gun at least once. There was also a fourth person out there that night, a guy by the name of Zach Tabb. Maybe Tabb could be the one to say whether she did or she didn't shoot a gun. Well, Tabb's statement isn't so clear.

The Meridian Police Department didn't contact him right away, and we don't know what his statement ever was. So one person says Whitley shot the gun. The other says that she didn't. And the third party that could maybe provide some resolution to this, well, we don't have his statement. Matt Miller also provides some insight into Whitley's story in the weeks following Christian's death.

According to Matt, at first, Whitley told him that she did wake up to the sound of a gunshot and she was the one who found Christian dead. One week later, she supposedly told him that she didn't hear it, that Dylan was the one who found Christian in the bathroom, and then Dylan woke her up. In text messages between Matt Miller and Whitley Goodman, he confronts her about this.

He comes out and says, whoa, whoa, whoa, you completely changed your story, not only to me, but you've completely changed it from what you told police when they questioned you. This is a part of the whole thing that has always bothered me. When she says she did wake up and she was the one that found Christian, then later says, no, no, no, Dylan was the one who found him. I was sleeping. Which one is it? Those are very different stories.

And that's not something you can just mix up or you can forget. You either discovered him or you didn't. There's no in between. So the Andreacchio family believes that Dylan and Whitley are absolutely involved and had the motive for killing Christian. And the motive was simple. Money.

The family points to Dylan, who was seen on ATM surveillance footage trying to withdraw all of Christian's money that afternoon. They point to Whitley's earlier interest in Christian obtaining life insurance.

And the Andreacchios point to the forensic evidence that the private pathologist, Dr. Arden, discovered about where the gun was found, the inconsistencies in the body's rigor mortis and lividity, the bullet hole in the wall. And over the next couple years, the Andreacchios are convinced that this wasn't a suicide.

Three years after Christian's death, Chief Lee, the Meridian police chief, retired from his position. This was the chief who, after 45 minutes, told everyone to go home that Christian's death was a suicide. So he retired from his position and a new police chief was brought in. And one of the first things this new police chief does is assign a new detective to take a second look at Christian's case.

Because he also had some questions and he had some concerns about the case and how it was handled right from the very beginning. So the new police chief, Chief Benny DeBos, which hopefully I'm saying his name right, believed that things just didn't add up in Christian's case. He didn't agree with why Chief Lee had even shown up to the apartment and

to begin with. It's really, really uncommon for chiefs of police to respond to any crime scene, let alone one that was believed to have been a simple and straightforward case of suicide. So the new police chief believed that the first responding investigators should have been allowed to thoroughly do their job and investigate things.

to consider different possibilities, to speak directly with witnesses. But in his opinion, they weren't allowed to do that. That they were told by their police chief to wrap things up in 45 minutes. Chief DeBoss operates on the philosophy that you treat every single crime scene like it's a homicide until you're proven otherwise.

According to the Andreaccio's family's private detective, this new detective working for the Meridian Police Department secured two arrest warrants after looking into the case a second time. One arrest warrant was for Whitley Goodman and the other for Dylan Swearengin.

The judge who signed the arrest warrants even confirmed this, that there were two real active arrest warrants. So this is where I say Dillon and Whitley are arrested, right? Well, not exactly. The two search warrants to this day have never been executed on either Dillon or on Whitley.

The new chief of police for Meridian requested that the murder charges in the case be reduced to what is called manslaughter with culpable negligence. But despite the warrants and the reduced charges, Whitley and Dillon have never been arrested. The arrest warrants have never been executed.

Now, over the next few years, the Andreacchio family, led by Christian's parents, Ray and Todd, have continued to fight for the arrest warrants on Dylan Swearingen and Whitley Goodman to be executed and for the police to rule their son's death a homicide. But so far, that hasn't happened. And in early 2020, so just earlier this year,

Jet Miller, the guy Whitley was out shooting guns with the night before Christian's death, and Whitley Goodman herself filed a $47 million lawsuit against the Andreacchios.

In the lawsuit, they claim the Andreacchios published false information and that they provided defamatory statements across social media, as well as in two podcasts that have exclusively covered the case. When asked about the lawsuit, Ray and Todd Andreacchio have declined to comment on it.

And the lawsuit, the $47 million lawsuit, is still very much pending. It's an open case and will hopefully be decided sometime in the near future. Until then, Cassie Coleman, the district attorney in Meridian, has said many times that, quote, her office is ready to receive and review any new evidence in the case, end quote.

So it looks like we might be hearing more about Christian Andreacchio's case. I don't think that this is the end. Now, this may be the end of the episode, but it's definitely not the end of the discussion on Christian's case. I really want to hear from you and what you think about this, considering the forensic evidence, the pathology, the statements from Whitley and Dillon,

Do you think Christian's death was a tragic suicide? Or do you think he was murdered? And if he was murdered, was it Dylan or Whitley? Or do you have your own opinion about what really happened? Connect with me and share your thoughts on Instagram at Forensic Tales, on our website ForensicTales.com, or shoot me an email at Courtney at ForensicTales.com.

All right, everyone. Thank you so, so much for joining me this week. As always, stay safe out there. Forensic Tales is a Rockefeller Audio Production. The show is written and produced by me, Courtney Fretwell.

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