374: Infatuated With WHO?! Love & Sex Obsessed Cousin Does The Unthinkable

The search for suspected killer resumes this morning at Ohio.

“That is a vast wide open area up in the air.”

We're told he ran off into the mountains after crashing his truck during a police chase. Cruise are already out there preparing and getting ready to go head back into those woods. I'm holding up, I gotta be strong. What we have here is the horrible, horrible tragedy. I don't know why he would do something on this.

He'd babysit my kids while we go out. You know, go grocery store shop and everything else. I just don't know why he'd do things like this. Hey Drew Creme Besties, welcome back to an all new episode of Surrealist League. With me, you're true Creme Bestie, Annie Elise.

And I hope you guys are having a good start to your week so far. I don't know if you're listening to this on Monday, when it releases or maybe later in the week.

“But whenever you're listening, I hope you're having a good start to your week.”

So far, I don't know if you're listening to this on Monday, when it releases or maybe later in the week. But whenever you're listening, I hope you're having a great day. I hope you had a great weekend. I hope everything is going well for you in your life. And yeah, I just hope things are good and happy.

Probably because I'm about to come shit all over it if I'm being honest. So I'm like trying to get you in like a good mood. Good vibes because I'm about to dump all over it. And I know that I probably say this a lot, but trust me when I say today's case is on a whole different level. It's one of those stories that it really makes it feel less like real life.

And more like it is some fictional dark twisted Stephen King novel. Truly, it's hard to believe that this is even real.

“I mean, we are talking layers of family secrets, very disturbing relationships,”

multiple murders, missing children, and even more horrifying details that you will literally never see coming.

It takes place in Lawrence County, Ohio. Not exactly a place where tourism is like booming or people are dreaming to visit, but it's as southern in Ohio as you can get right there on the border of both Kentucky and West Virginia, right in the heart of Appalachia. And most of the people in the area really have spent their whole lives there.

It's where their families are from, where they have lived for decades. It's where people grow up, start their families, and just remain. That's where they stay. Now, Todd and Stacey Holston were your happy, all-American family. They were a younger couple, both still in their 20s, but in Appalachia,

it's pretty common to get married and have kids while you're still young. The two of them had two boys.

There was eight-year-old Devon, who was a second grader at Rock Hill Elementary School,

and two-year-old Braxton. Now, Todd was a blue-collar worker, and he was often gone for long periods of time during the day at various work sites. And I wasn't able to find in my research or not, whether Stacey worked, or if she just stayed at home and watched the boys before they would go to school, manage the house, things like that.

But either way, they both did whatever needed to be done to run the house, and kind of balance the shared responsibilities, and it really did seem to work for them. The family lived in a mobile home in the Pedro area, right along state Route 93, a very long and windy road that is pretty far from any big cities, and it's just surrounded by trees and farmland.

So it was far enough into the country to feel more secluded, but it was close enough that the drive into town for groceries, or gas, or any sort of necessities really wasn't that bad. Now, the home had a very big front yard. Also, this nice wooden porch where Todd and Stacey could just sit,

watching the boys play outside, it was beautiful. And what's even better was that a bunch of Stacey's family members all had homes nearby. So there was this sense of not only home and comfort, but community there as well. But as we know, even the most picture-perfect families can have secrets behind closed doors. And in 2017, Stacey was keeping a big one.

It was something that she certainly was not proud of, and it had been weighing pretty heavily on her for quite some time. It was a chapter of her life that she knew that she needed to close, she needed to put it in the past, but it wasn't going to be easy.

She was having an affair.

And at first, it started like many affairs start.

She was leaning on this person emotionally. She was kind of having them become her confident things like that, but then they started to become a sexual aspect to it as well. And then from there, things really crossed the line between flirting, a little bit of an emotional affair to full-blown intimacy sex the whole nine yards.

And she knew that she didn't want her husband Todd to find out, or anybody else for that matter. And she knew that it was time for her to end things and move on with her life. The stakes were made, yes, but it wasn't too late for her to make things right. However, she also knew that this was probably going to be very messy.

Which, let's just be real. Any situation like that is, in very rarely we'll get out of an affair unscathed. They're also just with this one way too many secrets involved.

“And I think that anytime somebody gets their feelings hurt after an affair,”

or in the process of an affair ending, they can get mean and they can get very vindictive. However, Stacey's situation was a little bit different. You see, this affair wasn't with someone in the community who maybe would pass by every now and then, or local pastor who you only see on Sundays or someone who you rarely bump into, which don't get me wrong.

That would be bad enough. However, it would make the dissolvement of an affair much easier in my opinion, because you're not worried about running into them frequently. You're not worried about them feeling a tie to you in any way. It's easier to part ways with somebody where there's a few degrees of separation.

But in Stacey's case, Stacey had been secretly seeing a man named O'Rone Lawson. And he had grown up in Lawrence County his entire life, just like Stacey, so they had that in common. He also lived very, very close to where Todd and Stacey's house was, so that logistically made sneaking around way more easier for them.

“But unfortunately, and here's where things get a little bit twisted and a little bit, you know, uncomfortable.”

There's more to the story between the two of them. Because O'Rone was very close with Stacey and Stacey's family. Not because he was a family friend, not because of the affair, but because he was also Stacey's cousin. Yes, you heard that right.

O'Rone and Stacey were first cousins.

Which look? I don't even know how something like that happens. I could maybe see in a twisted fictional novel type story, or something like that, where you meet someone, you're drawn to them, you're attracted to them, and then oh my god, after you guys have sex,

you're like, holy shit, we're related because you do a genealogy testing, or you find things out months later, and you're like, oh my god, this is so gross, what just happened, they knew they were first cousins. And decided to bond very close closer than most cousins do emotionally. Remember, then he became her confidant, then it crossed over into sexual territory.

And it's not only messy, but it's also... Eugh, Ick, Ick, and all of the ancestral piece of it aside, let's talk about the fact that there will be no easy way to end this affair. It's your family, you're going to see them, you're going to see them at Thanksgiving,

“on holidays, all the time, so how on earth are you supposed to get out of this unscathed, right?”

Now it's not clear how the affair actually started, but based on my research, there wasn't one specific moment where they decided to start sneaking around, or when the relationship officially began. It seems as though it was more of a slow burn. Remember, they had known each other their entire lives.

They had also spent a lot of time together, and they had been spending even more time together after Todd and Stacey moved into their house in 2017, because it was in that same area, that same community, and was within walking distance of a bunch of Stacey's other relatives.

So, like I said, Stacey knew that what she was doing was wrong, but what's interesting is that a wrong felt the exact opposite. He wasn't ashamed of this affair like Stacey was. In fact, he even confided in his mom, Stacey's aunt. He told her all about their sexual and intimate relationship,

and he told her that he was absolutely infatuated with Stacey.

He had never met anybody like her.

He claimed that Stacey was the love of his life. So I mean, they were in pretty deep, or at least on a wrong side of things. It was early October 2017, and he could tell that something was off with Stacey.

Usually he would walk over to her and Todd's house. He would spend time with her and with her kids. But lately, there had been this definite shift in her energy toward him. And then, on October 6th, Stacey finally broke things off with him.

Whatever they were doing, whatever their relationship was, it had to stop.

that they could both agree on, right? Things needed to end.

“Not only is this affair bad, but war family.”

We can't be like, you know, bumping and grinding when we're related. That's weird. And I mean, with most affairs,

there's always kind of that lingering question of

what if we just decide to be together for real? What if we leave our spouses? What if we run off into the sunset together? The married person could get a divorce. And if we run over, maybe even have more kids just

have a fairytale ending. But this obviously was not an option for Stacey and around even if they wanted it to be. They were first cousins. They can't get married.

They can't go off. They're not going to have children together. Well, let's hope they're not going to. But it's literally illegal in the state of Ohio to marry your first cousin.

As it is in many other states, for good reason. Although I will say, in my research, I did come across the fact that there are states where it is legal.

That's a little unsettling, personally, in my opinion, which, again, don't even get me started. If they decided to get married and then have kids together, it's just a lot of bad. So anyway, you would think that if they both know

that there's no real future, that they would know that this affair is going to end at some point. It has to. But that's not how things went.

Both of them were not in agreement about the separation. Around did not take things well at all. I mean, he had just been telling his mom that Stacy was the love of his life,

that he had never met anybody like her,

that he would absolutely head over heels and love with her. So even though things were, yeah, really weird and quite literally incestuous, he was kind of going through this weird form of heartbreak

when Stacy decided to end things with him. Now, Stacy, on the other hand, she felt a lot better after their breakup, or, I mean, whatever you really want to call it. But granted, it wasn't like your typical affair,

where you will cut off complete contact. You'll never have to see the person again and you can just go your separate ways. I'm sure it was awkward when she would still have to see aaron around.

But she also knew that this was the right thing to do. She still loved Todd. She wanted to move on. She wanted to make her life work with her husband. So all to say, Stacy was feeling

a lot more positive about the future. Everything finally felt like it was going to be okay. Or at least, that's what she thought. What she didn't realize was that something much darker

was waiting around the corner. And before long, that darkness would completely swallow her and her entire family. On the morning of Wednesday,

October 11th, Todd woke up very early for work to head to a work site at around 4.30 a.m. This wasn't really out of the normal. He worked long days.

Sometimes he would have to show up at these sites extremely early. And that was really kind of an average morning for them. Sometimes his work sites could be as far as an hour and a half away.

Definitely were some frequent early mornings. So whenever that would happen, that would leave Stacy there to get both kids up ready for school, get Devon off to school.

And everything about that morning was completely normal. It followed the usual routine.

“Really, the only thing that was a little”

out of routine was that instead of writing the bus home from school that day, Devon was going to go to his grandparents house after school, which required him to take a different bus than he normally would.

Now because it was a small school and a very small rural area, Stacy just needed to write a note for Devon's teacher, telling them about the change in the schedule. That's all she needed to do

for him to take a different bus throughout home. It was just a very close-knit town, small communication, things like that, nothing like overly formal.

So Stacy fed the kids, wrote Devon his note, and got him on the school bus all before 7 a.m. Now by 6.43 a.m.,

Todd had made it to his work site in Kentucky, which was about an hour and a half from home. But when he got there, right away, he noticed something kind of odd.

You see, Todd and Stacy were creatures of habit, through and through. They followed a pretty similar routine every single day. So if something about the routine was ever off, it was pretty obvious.

And in this case, usually, and especially when Todd was working so far away, Stacy would text him at some point in the morning, asking if he made it to work safely. Mainly because the area was full of country backgrounds

and even the most experienced driver could end up in some sort of driving trouble, like if a deer suddenly crossed the road or something like that. And besides, it kind of just made Stacy feel better

knowing that Todd was safe and where he needed to be, so that she could just go along with her day.

“I think a lot of us do that with our partners, right?”

Like, hey, did you make it okay? Hey, how was school drop off? Just checking it, right? And for Stacy, again, this wasn't something that she just did on occasion,

or whenever she could make time for it.

She always, always texted him.

But by the time that Todd got to the work site that morning and pulled his phone out after clocking in, he realized that Stacy had never texted him. Now, first, he just thought that it was strange and he went about his day being like,

"Oh, this is weird, but okay, I'm not gonna like make a huge deal about it." He wasn't aware of any plans that Stacy had that day that may have made it difficult for her to check in, but regardless, he tried to just brush it off.

But then, as the day started to drag on

that's when things started to creep,

it's a bad thoughts started to creep into his mind. And what was even weirder to Todd in all of this is that she wasn't responding to any of his texts or calls. And that was really weird. Now, once Devon was at school,

it was just Stacy and Braxton at the house. And while two-year-olds are definitely very demanding of your time

“and you have to pay very close attention to them,”

they also are at that age whether becoming a little bit more independent. They're walking, they can stay distracted, they'll be playing for a little bit, so it's not like Stacy couldn't have just

sat Braxton down really quick to play by himself, while she either called Todd back or responded really quickly to one of his text messages. So, understandably, Todd began to worry. He just couldn't shake this gut feeling

that something was very wrong.

Now, fast forward to around 6.30, 6.45 p.m. that day.

Now, by this time, Todd was clocked out for the day. He was on his way home from work, but like I said, it was pretty far away this works. I about an hour and a half, so he had a pretty lengthy drive ahead of him.

And that entire drive home he continued calling and texting Stacy, but she still wasn't answering. Now, by this point, he just could not calm his nerves any longer.

Whether Stacy was sick or hurt or maybe one of the kids were sick or hurt,

“he knew that something was seriously wrong here.”

So, he pulled up his contacts, and he called Stacy's mom Tammy, and some things wrong, who better to call than Stacy's mom? Right?

She surely would know if there's had been an emergency throughout the day,

or maybe she could see Stacy

and walk over to the house. I mean, who knows? That would be a great person, or a point person I should say to check in with. Plus, as I just said,

Tammy only lived about a quarter mile down the road. So, she would easily be able to jump in the car or even walk over there and be at the house in no time. And that's exactly what Tammy did. But within just a few minutes,

Tammy called Todd back, and she did not have good news. She claimed that the front door was locked, so she hadn't been able to get inside. And I'm not sure if the door being locked

was out of the ordinary, but the fact that nobody had answered the door when she knocked, that definitely was weird. The two-year-old should have been at home.

Stacy should have been at home, so why was nobody answering the door? Even if Stacy had her hands full, or was tending to the two-year-old, maybe bath time, maybe dinner,

maybe laundry, whatever it is, she would have heard something or said something. So when her mom Tammy was greeted with nothing but silence, it was immediately concerning.

Now at that point, Tammy was asking Todd, like, "Hey, well, what should I do from here? What do you want me to do?" And like I said, at this point, Todd was worried sick.

And Tammy was also starting to become just completely frantic and worried. So, Todd told Tammy, you know what?

“You need to just literally break into the house if needed.”

I need you to get inside. We need to see if Stacy's okay. Break a window, kick in the door, do whatever. Just get inside and get eyes on what is going on. He even said, "I don't care what you have to do.

I will fix anything. I will replace anything. Just get inside." Now, Tammy did eventually gain access to the house. But from what I could tell,

the sources didn't specify exactly what she did to gain entry. The front and back doors were both locked after Tammy went in. So, maybe she got in through a window through a different means I'm not really sure, but the main thing is the point being she got inside.

And then something really weird happened. She still had Todd on the line. Ready to update him as she got inside. When all of a sudden, Todd heard Tammy scream. Scream, so loud it was the loudest noise he had ever heard her make.

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Now as you can imagine, Todd's mind was running a million miles an hour.

He was still on his way home from this work side. All he knew at this point was something was going on inside his house. What had that noise been, why was she screaming, had Tammy dropped the phone in shock after seeing something like what is happening here. So that's when he called Tammy's husband, Stacey's stepdad Donald.

Todd quickly explained everything that was going on to Donald. He said that he was on his way home and that now both Stacey and Tammy weren't responding. So if Todd couldn't be there to see what was going on himself, he felt like Donald was definitely the next best option.

“So Donald did the same thing that Tammy had done.”

He got in the car, headed down the road to Stacey and Todd's house, to hopefully solve whatever the problem was. But then 10 minutes passed. Then 20 and Donald still hadn't called Todd back. It's safe to say that Donald understood how panic to Todd had been.

So there was no logical explanation as to why he wouldn't have called him back immediately to update him or even just to calm his nerves if this was all some sort of weird misunderstanding or false alarm. Even if something was wrong with either of the kids or Stacey, that would have left two other adults with phones

who could have easily called and explained everything. So something just was not adding up here. Luckily though, by this point, Todd finally made it home. And from the way that nobody was answering, he already knew that something awful had to have happened.

But what he walked into was something that he could have never imagined,

not even in his worst nightmares. As soon as he walked through the front door, he saw a rune. Which kind of put him at ease for a moment. It was a familiar face. It was a family member in the midst of all of this chaos.

But before Todd even had time to think about why he was there, or even where everybody else was during all of this, a rune pulled out a knife and attacked him. Now, Todd was not a small guy and in any other circumstances, he would have been able to block a rune's attack for sure.

But everything happened so incredibly fast. And a rune had surprised him. He had the element of surprise. He just seized the moment and attacked him as soon as he walked through the front door. Now you'd also think that multiple stab wounds to the head and neck

would completely incapacitate a person. But not Todd. Which I don't know if it was his adrenaline that was just going so high to where he didn't feel any of this, or if the wounds were more shallow than what I'm imagining and envisioning,

but Todd was able to fight back through this knife attack. Interestingly, he was able to pry the knife out of around hands, and somehow he even got on top of him, pinning him down on the living room couch. And he was in complete shock, kind of being like,

"What are you doing? What's going on? Like, I don't understand." Now, what's odd in all of this? More, I guess I should say, more odd than your wife's cousin, randomly being in your home and stabbing you, is that a rune had this very weird look in his eyes,

almost like a character in a movie coming out of a trance. And I'm sure that it's something that you really have to see in person to really understand, which I don't wish that on anybody, but Todd claimed that there was this clear switch in a rune. Immediately after this switch, he seemed extremely apologetic.

He claimed that there were people who were breaking into homes in the area, and he thought that Todd was a home intruder. Basically saying, "Hey, sorry, I was just trying to protect the house.

“I thought that you were a burglar. That's why I attacked you.”

Even though he had stabbed Todd multiple times at this point, and probably had more than enough time to realize this was Todd,

So then, a rune told Todd that Stacey and the kids

“were in their bedroom hiding, and that everybody was fine.”

Everybody's okay, they're just in the bedroom and they're hiding. So for a split second, Todd felt at ease. Then, the reality started to sink in. And he realized that something still just was not right. A rune had said that Stacey and the kids were in their bedroom,

but he never mentioned Tammy or Donald,

and Todd knew that Tammy and Donald were also supposed to be at the house. So where were they? And why wasn't everybody coming out of the bedroom after hearing Todd's voice and hearing a rune attack him? Not to mention, everything was still way too quiet.

If Todd hadn't known any better, he would have figured that nobody was home at all. Now, given that a rune had just stabbed Todd multiple times accident or not, Todd was pissed and he was also much bigger than a rune. So he literally threw him out of the front door and told him,

"Leave, get off my property, get the hell out of here." But what he didn't realize in that moment was that he just let a monster walk free. When Todd went back inside, he started to notice things that he hadn't noticed before. There was blood all over the floors. It's so much blood, in fact, that it was hard to track where it was even coming from.

And that's when Todd started going room to room just looking for his family.

“Now, remember, it was a mobile home and I don't know the exact layout of it,”

but think of it as like a very long trailer with this long hallway

and then bedrooms scattered on either side. And inside of his little son, Devon's room, was a horrific scene. Stacey was in there lying on her back on a futon bed. A blanket on top of her body.

But it was clear she wasn't just lying down and resting or taking a nap. She wasn't moving. And this blanket on top of her was completely saturated in dark liquid. Her body was also cold, her coloring was off, and it was clear that Stacey was dead.

And it was also clear that she had been dead for quite some time. Now, Todd wouldn't know it until later, but Stacey had been shot twice in the chest and once in the back. The gunshots had hit two vital organs. Her heart and her lungs.

And sadly, she wasn't alone. On the floor in Devon's room was Donald. His body hadn't been covered with a sheet or a blanket or anything else, and he too was surrounded by a pool of blood. He had been shot once in the shoulder and once in the chest.

He was dead too. Stacey's mom Tammy was in the laundry room, but she wasn't hiding like her own head said she had been shot once in the neck and once in the back. And for whatever reason, her body too was covered with a blanket.

Which I cannot even begin to imagine the trauma that Todd went through that day. Going door to door of your home where you are supposed to feel safe, protected, comforted, and seeing your entire family annihilated. I mean, I just can't imagine finding your family slaughter in your own home. Now to make matters worse, all of the victims had been shot

with a 20 gauge shotgun. And I'm sure a lot of you are probably very familiar with this, but shotgun wounds are a lot more brutal and gory than if somebody is shot with say, you know, a regular handgun or glock.

They quite literally will shred you and rip you apart. So when I say that there was blood all over the house and all over the surrounding bodies, I mean, it was chaos. But by the time that Todd found the bodies

and recognized what a round had done, a round was long gone. Not only had Todd already kicked him out, but you see he had already been planning his escape route. After he shot and killed Stacey's mom Tammy,

he grabbed her car keys to her truck, moved the truck around to the back of the house so that it would be out of anybody's line of sight when they went by the house, but also so that it would be close enough

when he would flee, he could jump in the truck and take off. And that's exactly what he did. Even though Todd was shocked and confused by everything that had just happened, not to mention the injuries that he had suffered

from being stabbed multiple times by a round, there was still one thing heavily weighing on his mind. He hadn't seen either one of his children in the house. And I'm sure that he was in a state of shock saying the horrific things that he had just seen.

But as a parent, I'll just be the first to tell you, it doesn't really matter what else is going on.

Your kids are always and always will be your top priority.

And the fact that he didn't see either one of them, it was enough to send chills down his spine. So he quickly started searching the rest of the house, and that's when he found two-year-old Braxton. Fortunately, Braxton was okay.

He was just in another room separated from the other bodies. There wasn't even a scratch on him thank God, but he was all alone, this two-year-old little boy.

“And then that left the question of, okay, well, where was Devon?”

Remember, Stacey had arranged for him to be at his grandparents' house after school that afternoon. But by this point, Todd fully expected Devon to be home.

Now, I'm sure that Todd, maybe in the moment, just tried to convince himself that,

“okay, maybe Devon being the older brother,”

hid Braxton in this room away from the others to keep him safe and then he went on his own and hid in another room. Devon was an amazing big brother.

He was always looking out for Braxton.

But Devon was nowhere to be found. So Todd wasn't really sure what else to do. He grabbed Braxton and he jumped in the car and he drove down the road to Tammy and Donald's house for help. Luckily, Tammy's brother was there.

I'm assuming that he lived there as well. And Todd was able to use his cell phone to call 911. And I'm not sure if Todd had lost his phone in the struggle with a run or if maybe he left it behind in a panic or what happened.

But all to say now, he was finally able to call the authorities. He was able to make the 911 call, get help for his family, tell them what was going on and get some medical attention for himself. And Todd was terrified.

I mean, his wife had been murdered. Their parents had been murdered. One of his children was missing.

“The person who was most likely responsible”

was also probably his own family member, his cousin. Someone who he had trusted, somebody who betrayed that trust in more ways than Todd even knew at this point. Someone who quite literally tried to kill him as well. This man was potentially responsible for a triple homicide

and Todd feeling the weight of the fact that he led two of the victims right to him by asking them to go over to the house that night. And Todd's biggest fear in all of this was that a wrong kidnaped Devon in the process. Maybe he was going to try and use Devon

for some kind of leverage, like a hostage, something to get what he wanted in all of this. Maybe he was planning on running off with him or raising him as his own who knows. But when I say that this case was a huge media sensation,

I mean it through and through. It was a very tightly knit area and word got around fast, which to make things worse. This guy who had just brutally murdered three people potentially kidnapped a second grader and went on the run,

he was nowhere to be found. I mean, it would be horrific even if he was reprimanded immediately and taken into custody, but that wasn't the case. A run seemingly vanished. People were panicking and word got around that maybe he was hiding out in the woods.

And this part of Ohio is basically surrounded by woods in all directions, which means he wasn't just hiding out in some random forest somewhere. He could have been hiding out on some of these property behind somebody's house, lurking in their backyard, looking in their windows, even hiding out in a barn possibly.

And who was to say that he wasn't hell bent on killing more people, maybe going on this weird murdering spree. Because remember at this point, nobody is even thinking about what the motive could have been. Nobody knew about the affair.

So it seems like he had some sort of psychological break and just started killing people and took off. Not to mention, Todd told the authorities, "My son, Devon, is still missing too, which they immediately put out a bowler beyond the lookout,

and the theories about what a round might be doing with Devon. They started spiraling out of control." What's even worse is that investigators had contacted Devon's school and when they did that, they learned something very odd. According to the school, Todd had called the school earlier that day

and had arranged for Devon to take his normal bus route home. Not the one to his grandparents' house, not the one that his mom wrote the note about, but his regular route. Meaning it seemed like Devon had made it home that day after all.

Now, here's the thing. It might sound like all of this was happening over the span of multiple hours and they were making progress on the investigation,

but the reality is that it was all happening in between Todd calling 911

and then going to the house to check out the crime scene. It all happened very quickly. So the police issued an endangered missing child alert because they feared that he had actually gone on the run with little Devon. But what they didn't realize was that that scenario

“was not the worst thing that could happen.”

Because once the police arrived, they realized that Devon had never been missing at all. But he also wasn't in the house hiding from a room in his own room. Hidden underneath a pile of clothes was Devon. And unfortunately, he wasn't alive either.

He had suffered the same fate that all of his family members had. He had been shot twice once in the arm and once in the torso. So now everybody was freaking out. Not only had this murderer killed three adults, but he had killed a child.

A child that was his own family member. A child he had been close with, someone who trusted him. That is just a whole other kind of evil. And he was still out there on the loose. Okay, if you've listened to this show for a while now,

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Now what's really crazy is that a loan hadn't just immediately gone into hiding after fleeing the house. While he was at the house before Todd came in and confronted him, he had found some cash lying around the house that he grabbed and stole. So after leaving the house, he drove to the nearest store.

Blood soaked cloves and all, and he bought new fresh clothing. Now how nobody in that store found this guy who was covered in blood to be some sort of issue? I have no idea. I mean, the thought of being in a store and looking down the aisle

and seeing this guy picking out clothing, while he's completely soaking wet head to toe in blood and not saying anything and not calling the police, how that happens, I have no idea. I mean, it's beyond.

But in any event, he did get new clothes, he changed his clothes, then he left Tammy's truck abandoned, and he went into the very dense southern Ohio woods. For the next two nights, there were dozens of police officers looking for him. They had sent dogs, drones, everything.

But somehow he managed to escape every single last one of them, and a run was nowhere to be found. For the search is expected to start again just about daybreak. We hear the church bells going off right now. We know that it is seven o'clock.

And so it should get daylight in just a little bit. We went to the command center, which is just a few miles down the road. We had trouble getting our live view to connect. But crews are already out there preparing and getting ready to go. Head back into those woods and search for Aaron Lawson.

Again, who the search they didn't find to me yesterday when he ran off into the woods, they exhausted those resources. Still have them out there again today, searching for him. A firefighter did say earlier today when we saw him at the gas station. He said that Aaron is an avid hunter.

And that there are mushrooms out in the woods that he could possibly be eating. It is pretty chilly this morning. And the firefighter said that with Lawson being an avid hunter, he could possibly be stuffing leaves inside his shirts or his clothing to stay warm. So again, not sure the exact location of where Lawson is this morning.

But crews are hoping to find him today.

They said due to this manhunt ongoing.

“It's just best if they do close their schools.”

Then there was a huge break.

Around finally was caught.

But he didn't get caught by the investigators. He actually turned himself in. But it wasn't as though he turned himself in because he was feeling guilty and felt Remorseful for what he had done. Actually, the reason he turned himself in

was because the second night out in the woods was too cold for him. He couldn't hack it. He was freezing. He was uncomfortable. So in his mind, he's like, you know what? Prison is better than sleeping out in the cold. I'm going to go just turn myself into the police department.

Which let's just take a beat on that for a second. What a coward. First of all, it's like, you can go on this mass murder spree. But you can't hack it in the cold for two nights. You need more of a cushy life than that. You can't hack a couple of nights camping.

But you can take the innocent life of a young child who is your family member. How does that equate? I just don't understand. So he was immediately taken into custody. And there was literally a crowd of people waiting for his arrival outside of the police station.

“It was a moment that locals say that they will never forget.”

People were crying, yelling, applauding that he had been apprehended. And not only people who knew and loved this family, but strangers as well. And the people who couldn't be there in person to witness this physically. They were watching all of the news coverage live. Knowing that they were experiencing a horrific piece of the town's history right in front of their own eyes.

After being taken into custody, a rune confessed to everything.

I guess he finally felt like he had nothing to lose at this point and wanted to be honest.

However, when considering the crime scene, and everything that Todd had come home to and walked in on, was the story as cut and dry as it seemed. Had a rune planned a stacey's murder and then just rolled with the others as they fell into his lap. Which let's go over what happened that day.

Step by step from a rune's perspective. I mentioned earlier that he didn't take the break up with stacey very well at all. He wasn't happy with their relationship going back to what it once was. Just, you know, his cousins has family. He wanted more.

“And that's when he knew in his mind if he couldn't have stacey.”

Nobody could. One couldn't have her as a wife. Devon and Braxton couldn't have her as their mom.

Donald and Tammy couldn't have her as their daughter.

Nobody deserved to have her. He was angry and simply feeling those emotions. It wasn't enough for him. He wanted revenge. He wanted her to feel as hurt as he felt when she broke up with him.

So the day before the murders, he began plotting. On Tuesday, October 10, he walked down to Stacey and Todd's house. He made sure to arrive when Todd was still at work so that he wouldn't have to deal with him being around and seeing his every move. He knew that Stacey would also be distracted with the kids.

So doing what he planned to do next would be easy. It was just Stacey and the kids at home. And this visit of his kind of played off just as that. A visit. It wasn't odd.

It wasn't out of the norm. I mean, the family pretty much had an open door policy. If you wanted to come over and hang out, just come over and hang out. Then whenever they wanted you to leave, they would just tell you. But they all lived nearby.

So people coming and going, especially family members. That happened on the regular. Now even though Stacey had put her foot down about their intimate relationship, she hadn't told him that he wasn't allowed to come over to the house or be with the kids or say hi or anything like that.

Plus, if she did, if she tried to tell her own cousin, he wasn't welcome at her house anymore. That would look weird. So, there, a run was just hanging out. Then at some point while Stacey was just doing her thing, maybe making dinner, laundry,

or playing with the baby, a run took his chance to do what he had been planning all along. When Stacey wasn't paying attention, he snuck into one of the bedrooms toward the back of the mobile home. Now, which bedroom it was, the court documents didn't say. But I do have to wonder if it was a room that maybe wasn't used very often. Based on what I'm about to say here next.

Because once he was in that bedroom, he took a book that was lying nearby. Opened the window and stuck the book underneath to prop it open. Now, like I said, I don't know which room this was, and we are talking about a mobile home here. But I would think that if it was the main bedroom or the one that Todd and Stacey were often in, they may have noticed that there was a draft or something like that from this window being propbed open.

It's October, yes, but it's also Ohio. It can get a little bit cool. But whether they noticed it or not, I mean, just like that, he had created a way for him to get back inside the house without anybody knowing. Now, by this point, he had already made up his mind, too.

It wasn't like he was considering what would happen, or like he was struggling with the decision or going back and forth about his plan. He knew what he was going to do.

“It was only a matter of time before he found the perfect moment to live out this dark fantasy he had in mind.”

And trust me, it is dark as you'll see here in a minute. So the rest of that day into the evening, he just continued hanging out with Stacey and the kids. He smiled right to her face knowing that by that time, the very next day she would likely be dead.

Then later that night, at around 7.15 pm, Todd finally got home from work, and pretty much as soon as he got home, Stacey basically volunteered him to drive around home.

Kind of being like, okay, well, that's a wrap. You know, Todd's going to give you a ride home, have a good night, and this was something that apparently really bothered around. It just fueled his rage. The next day was October 11th, the day of the murders. And around was more than familiar with Todd's schedule, so he knew that he was going to be leaving pretty early in the morning that day.

And like I mentioned earlier, he left around 4.30am, which by this time, Around was already awake and waiting. But he wasn't waiting with empty hands. He had his 20 gauge shotgun and 8 shells loaded with slugs. And that wasn't all he had.

He also had come prepared with a backpack loaded with supplies.

There were multiple flashlights, knives, toilet paper, a tarp, food.

I mean, it was clear that he wasn't planning on staying at this crime scene. He was planning on running. So about 30 minutes after Todd left, at around 5.30am, Around snuck into the house, through that window that he had propped open with the book the day before. And then he sat and waited.

He could hear everything that happened that morning from the kids waking up, to walking through the house and getting ready, to cooking breakfast, all of it. But still, he just sat there and waited. Because in his mind, he knew it wasn't the perfect time to strike it.

“And at first, it honestly kind of seemed like Stacey was his one and only target,”

which it's crazy then in hindsight to think about how far things ended up progressing. Around then heard Devon say goodbye to his mom and his little brother. He went out the door and got on the school bus, and he knew that with every passing minute, it was almost his time to strike. Then, at around 8.30am, Stacey went into that back bedroom that Aron was hiding in.

Now, he must have known at some point that Stacey would be going in there, just walking right into his trap. It was also just Stacey and two-year-old Braxton in the home at this point, but Stacey didn't have Braxton with her when she walked into that room. And as soon as she walked in, she saw Aron.

And he wasted no time in doing what he had planned to do. He shot Stacey with the shotgun. Three times twice in her chest and once in the back. And as you can imagine, it didn't take very long with multiple shotgun wounds for Stacey to bleed out and die.

Now, I want to give you a huge trigger warning here. For those of you who have weak stomachs, you don't even have to have a weak stomach, actually, to need this trigger warning because what I'm about to share next and what he did next is absolutely foul. Aron dragged Stacey's body into Devon's bedroom.

He then laid her out on that futon bed that was in the room. He undressed her body, put a condom on, and he had sex with her deceased corpse. I mean, if you aren't gross enough with the incestual relationship that's already going on, adding necrophilia to the list,

that certainly is like next level unhinged and deranged. I mean, it is so sick. It makes me speechless. Very rarely do we hear about necrophilia in cases at all, but now we're hearing about it also with their own family member.

It is, oh, God, it makes me sick to my stomach.

“Truly, I mean, like what in the actual F is going on here?”

And I have to say to the detail of him using a condom, it's kind of a detail that I get stuck on a little bit.

At first I thought that maybe it was so that he wouldn't get any DNA

on her body when the police arrived and when they, you know, do an autopsy and all of that. And so that he wouldn't get caught for the murders, because that I feel like would make the most sense in all of this, right? But it wasn't like he took it with him or disposed of it.

After he was done, he just dumped the used condom in the kitchen trash can. So regardless if it was that day or weeks later into the investigation, I mean, they were going to know that it was him. They were going to find this. Plus, the fact that he had brought all of that supplies with him to go out on the run

and to flee, it makes me think that he knew that he would be the one and only suspect and that he was going to have to go out on the run.

Maybe there's something I'm not thinking which tell me if you have other thoughts. Now, revolting as all of that is which I know it is absolutely disgusting, atrocious revolting makes you want to vomit. But this next part is even harder for me to describe at around 9.30 a.m. About an hour after killing Stacey,

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I mentioned earlier that Devin was supposed to ride the bus to his grandparents house that day after school, right? Stacy wrote that note to Devin's teacher in the morning saying that Devin was allowed to change buses and bus stops. But as we know, around is a sick, twisted individual. And seemingly on a whim, he decided to switch things up with that plan.

He knew where Devin went to school again because he was family. He also knew Devin's teacher. He knew the people who worked at the school. He knew what the rules and the policies were. So that morning, he called Rockhill Elementary School posing as Todd.

“When they answered, he said that he was Todd, Devin's dad,”

and he asked if he could quickly speak with the guidance secretary. And he made sure to make this phone call from Stacy's phone so that if the school had caller ID, the number that would be on file would be the one from Stacy, Devin's mom, their family, it would all make sense. It would prove that he was Todd.

So he gets transferred over to the secretary. And that's when he very calmly spoke with them. Letting them know that although Stacy had originally planned for Devin to go to his grandparents house that evening, there was going to be a change in plans. He explained the Devin's grandfather got sick, so he wasn't going to be able to watch him after school after all.

So Devin now needed to take his normal bus route home. So the school was kind of like, "Of course, no big deal at all. We hope he feels better. We hope that everything goes well. We will make sure that he gets on the right bus home and gets home safe and sound." And technically, Devin did get home safe and sound.

It was once he was home in his usual, happy and safe space that he was now in a literal nightmare.

Devin was eight years old, and if you don't have an eight-year-old or if you've never been around one,

you might think that they're just young and naive, but at that age, they're pretty smart. They're old enough to be pretty intuitive, as well, especially about different situations that are around them. They also are old enough to make note of differences in their usual routine, and they're bold enough to ask why. Kids don't really have a filter at that age, so if something feels off or something's different, they will just outright ask the question or say it.

Sometimes, to their detriment, because they don't know if they're being off-putting or rude, at least price sometimes, but they don't have a filter. So when Devin got home, he was taken by surprise. I mean, usually, it was his mom's stay-see at home waiting for him, or even his dad taught if he had the occasional day off. But regardless, it was almost pretty much always one of his parents.

So when he walked in the door and only saw a rune, it just completely threw him off.

And at first, he kind of just thought, "Cool, I get to hang out with a rune, my family member,

but it didn't take long for him to start getting creeped out and weirded out by the situation. Aaron would, yes, sometimes babysit for them, but usually his parents would tell him about it beforehand."

So this was different. Why was he there alone? Where was Stacey? Where was his mom?

“The two of them sat in the living room together, talking about what Devin had done at school that day.”

However, once the conversation ended, things started to get pretty awkward. Being a normal eight-year-old, Devin started asking questions like, "Why are you here? Where's my mom? Where's my dad?" And eventually, aaron got annoyed with Devin, annoyed by this line of questioning. The questions were back to back one after another, and Devin wasn't accepting a simple, you know, just because as an answer. And I guess when aaron originally planned for Devin to come home that day, he just thought that it wouldn't be that big of a deal.

Like Devin would just roll with whatever he said, he wouldn't ask any questions, he wouldn't push on anything. But this now was not proving to be the case. And even weirder is all day long whilearon had been at the house with only two-year-old Braxton. He was almost like playing a house with him, pretending like he lived there, taking care of Braxton, changing his diapers, feeding him, even laying him down for a nap at one point.

Like stepping in to this role as though he is the parent in all of this. All while Stacey's body was lying dead in the other room after he had just assaulted her as well.

“However, two-year-olds aren't eight-year-olds.”

Braxton went along with it, he didn't know any different, but now here was Devin, and Devin was going to ask a question, it was human nature. Andaron just really underestimated him. He wasn't expecting that at all. So that is whenaron decided that Devin was interfering with whatever half-assed plan he had made. What that plan was, we still don't entirely know.

We don't know if he was going to kidnap one or both of the boys and then flee into the woods. It's unclear completely. Personally, I don't really think he had much of a plan, but he was now becoming irritated by the line of questioning. Soaron tells Devin, like, "Hey, look, I brought over my PlayStation to the house so you and I can play." Which, of course, eight-year-old Devin was stoked on this.

Soaron told Devin that he put the PlayStation in his bedroom behind the dresser. Even though Stacey's body was still inside that room covered up by a sheet. But, of course, Devin didn't know that. He didn't suspect it. He was this innocent little kid. He was being promised a fun day of video game playing. So, he had tunnel vision, a one-track mind.

And he ran, be lined at directly to his room and to the dresser. But when he peaked behind the dresser, he noticed that nothing was there. He was also too young and too innocent to even question why it would have been behind the dresser to begin with. But he had done exactly whataron wanted him to do. Which was turned around, have his back to him, and head towards his bedroom.

Soaron, being the complete utter coward that he was, he took that opportunity as Devin's back was to him running, excited to play his PlayStation. He took that opportunity to shoot and kill Devin without having to look him in the face. In fact, Devin was still facing his dresser. Looking for that PlayStation, he was promised when he was shot and killed. Around shot him once in the arm and once in the torso.

Now, unlike when he killed Stacey, he just left Devin's body right where it fell. He didn't even try to move him or touch his body at all. Instead, he just threw piles of Devin's own clothes right on top of him, trying to hide him and conceal him. Which I don't know, maybe it was just the shame of having to see his little body lying there, and he couldn't, you know, cope with that.

So he just threw all of these clothes on top of him to quickly hide him.

“And maybe that's why he also shot him when he had his back turn to him because he's such a coward.”

And he could only do it if he didn't have to look at this innocent little eight-year-old. And the court documents didn't specify when exactly they believed Devin was killed, just that it was some time after school. When promised, this video game, this PlayStation. Which it's just so sad to think about because had all of this gone the way that it was originally supposed to,

with Devin going to his grandparents' house after school.

He never would have been in the same house with aaron,

and he certainly never would have been in the same room as his dead mom. Which I don't know the true diabolical nature of why aaron called the school and changed the bus route if he didn't have any intention of killing Devin at first. I don't know what the plan was in all of that. It just doesn't make sense to me, especially because as we know, Braxton was left unharmed.

So I don't know, maybe it was just a spur of the moment, part of the plan, maybe it was part of the grander scheme and all of this. Maybe he wasn't thinking, I don't really know. So like I mentioned earlier, Todd was pretty much calling and texting Stacey all day. Then it was between 6.30 and 6.40 pm that he tried calling her one last time,

before ultimately calling Stacey's mom, Tammy.

Nobody was answering the door, but at this point, aaron was still inside the house.

“He was in the main bedroom, listening to Tammy knocking on the door.”

He was far away enough that she wasn't able to look inside and see him, but he was still close enough to hear every single move that she made. Which I would imagine that he thought that maybe she would just give up and go home, assuming that nobody was home. But instead, he heard her start breaking into the house,

just as Todd had instructed her to do. So in that moment, her fate, unfortunately, was sealed. He stood right there behind the bedroom door, gun in hand, waiting. Then once Tammy was inside, she quickly started going from room to room, looking for Stacey and the kids,

and as soon as she walked into the bedroom, around it jumped out from behind the door and shot her. And I mentioned earlier that Todd was still on the phone with Tammy when he heard her scream. Remember, he heard her scream.

There was that loud noise, and then it went completely silent. Which, as you can guess, the loud noise was the gunshot that ended up taking her life. After shooting Tammy, around quickly dragged her body across the house to the laundry room, then he covered her up with a blanket as well.

Which, why he put her in the laundry room, separate from Stacey and Devon. It's still unclear. It's never been stated. I just don't know. I mean, Stacey and Devon's bodies were together in Devon's room.

And to me, it would make sense to keep them all together. But maybe there was some other reason why around did what he did. Or I don't know. Maybe there wasn't.

It's one of those little details in this case that we may never understand.

Now, I'm not entirely sure where two-year-old Braxton was during all of this. We do know that at some point around put him down for the nap earlier in the day, right? So I don't know if the crib was in the main bedroom or a different room. I don't know if that's where he stayed the whole time. But I would imagine that anybody would be woken up to the sound of gunshots,

especially a two-year-old who, in my opinion, two-year-olds are usually light sleepers. At least mine were. So not too long after this is when it taught had called Donald. Then the same exact pattern played out as it did with Tammy. Around just sat in hiding, listening to Donald try every single possible way to get into the house,

and just waited for him. Eventually, Donald kicked in the front door because he clearly, at this point, understood how sketchy this whole situation was. He knew that he had to get inside that house one way or another.

“I mean, the only thing on Donald's mind was making sure that his family was okay.”

But as soon as Donald stepped foot inside the home, around shot him. And this is just my speculation, but I would imagine that around knew that if it came down to a physical fight, he wouldn't have been able to overpower Donald. He had let Stacey, Tammy, Devon, all of them move around the house, walk around the house, and kind of go about their day until eventually blitz attacking them.

But that's not what he did with Donald. He just immediately struck, and then we get to the point where Todd came home. Now, by the time Todd arrived, around was way more vulnerable, because this time around, he didn't have the one thing that kept him safe and kept him powerful, a shotgun. He had completely run out of ammunition by the time that Todd was home.

So he hadn't really thought all of that through. He only brought the limited amount of slugs or shells, or whatever he would call it with him, which I truly believe. If he even had at least one round left, I think that this story would have ended very differently. And I don't know that Todd would have survived it. Now, what's interesting is that around and Todd both recall what happened next a little differently.

They both agree on the fact that Todd came inside the house, around stabbed him, and Todd overpowered him. They also both agreed that Todd had asked around why he had attacked him.

But for some reason, the answer is different depending on who you ask, though.

I, of course, am inclined to believe Todd's account more than I would, around. But as I said earlier, Todd had said that around played it off as he accidentally stabbed him. There were people breaking into houses all through the neighborhood, he thought that he was an intruder,

“and that's why he jumped on him and started attacking him.”

But around claims that he said to Todd, "I don't know. It was just a blind thing of anger." So, too very conflicting answers, right? But like I said, I'm more inclined to believe Todd over dirt-bad coward loser around. Regardless, it's just kind of odd and worth noting.

So, Todd was taken to the hospital after the attack, and he was treated for his injuries, and luckily, he was able to fully recover from his physical injuries. With bandages visible from the back of his neck, family surround Todd Holston. Shortly after he was released from the hospital, the sole survivor of Wednesday's brutal attack. And I'm fine, I mean, I'm holding up, I gotta be strong.

It feels like I walked through the door, he just started attacking me. I don't know why he would do something like this.

You know, go grocery store shop and everything else. I just don't know why he would do things like this. After Aron's arrest, he was indicted on four counts of aggravated murder. And even though he had originally confessed to the crimes, he pleaded not guilty to the charges against him. Time passed and everyone was eagerly waiting for his trial to begin,

hoping that justice would finally be served once and for all.

And over a year passed, when suddenly, on February 11th, 2019, Aron had a change of heart. Instead of pleading not guilty, he decided to plead guilty. This against his defense team's advice. Now why he did it?

I truly have no idea.

“Maybe he suddenly found religion in prison, which we always hear about right?”

Maybe he finally fell guilty and remorseful. Maybe he heard about how badly child murderers get treated in prison. I don't really know. Really, it could have been a little bit of everything, who knows.

His defense team later said that he basically just didn't want to have to put everybody through the trauma of a full trial.

Of what they, quote said, would be full of all of gruesome photos that would be presented and all of the things that would be said about him. Before his sentencing, he briefly spoke to the court. And shockingly, he wasn't asking for forgiveness. Which this video is a little bit difficult to hear for my audio only listeners,

but he's pretty much saying that he doesn't expect any sympathy during the sentencing. I don't expect sentencing. I expect what he did to be treated. He said, "You get everything."

“In the end, he was ultimately sentenced to death for the four counts of murder.”

And on top of that, he also received a total of 59 years and six months for the other non-capital counts. That was in February of 2019. His execution date was set for January 6th, the 2026, although we all know that in capital punishment cases, his team is going to be scrambling to do whatever they can do to put it off for as long as possible. Now, really quick, I do want to just say this.

Put yourself in Todd's shoes for a moment, okay? He entered his house that night, found his wife, his son, and two family members, his in-laws deceased. Then discovered that it was their other family member who was responsible for all of this. And that he went off and took off and was on the run. So imagine trying to calibrate all of that in your mind, reconcile all of that to where it's like,

"Oh, my God, my whole family has been annihilated or a big chunk of my family has been annihilated." And it was our own family member who did it, that what the hell is going on. Then, once he is reprimanded and confesses to everything, you also discover that your wife was having an affair, cheating on you, and not just an affair, but with her own cousin and her own murderer. I don't even know where your mind goes after that and how you come back from that.

I truly don't know. I feel like there are just so many layers to this that are wild. But in poor thought, it's like blow after blow, you lose your wife, you find out she was having an affair, you find out that she was having an affair with her own cousin. Like, where do you go from there?

Right?

“Honestly, where do you even go from there?”

So this case is honestly one that just does not even feel real for so many different reasons. I mean, we've heard of so many different crazy things and a lot of these cases that we've talked about, but a quadruple homicide over a love-obsessed cousin. I mean, that's a new one. That's a new one, even for me.

My heart just goes out to all of the family members and friends of these victims. I don't know how you begin to have peace with that or any sort of closure.

I mean, hopefully they do have a little bit of peace knowing that a grown will never see the light of day again.

But I'm sure there's a lot of internal struggles with why this all happened to and the motive behind it and I don't know. It's just a tough one, a very complex case. So thank you so much for listening or watching. If you're on YouTube, take a quick second, hit the subscribe button so that you don't miss any other episodes. If you are listening to this on the audio version, make sure that you are following the podcast.

Just hit the little top bottom button or top button wherever it is and press follow totally free. But that way you won't miss any other episodes. And as a reminder, we have an all new episode coming out tomorrow. But it's on the 10-to-life podcast feed. So if you're not following that podcast, it's a totally separate podcast, but also true crime.

It's called 10-to-life. Search it wherever you listen to your podcast. It's totally free. Make sure you follow it because we do put out new episodes every single Tuesday. And for those of you who are watching this on YouTube.

I do want to just let you know.

“You can always listen to the uncensored version of these cases on the podcast.”

YouTube makes me censor.

They make me cut certain things out.

“So you can always have the uncensored version on the podcast and a little bit earlier than when they release on YouTube.”

So thank you guys so much for tuning in to today's case.

I will be back on the mic with you tomorrow on 10-to-life and until the next one.

Be nice. Don't kill people.

“Please do not have an affair with your cousin.”

And just don't be disgusting human being. All right. Thanks. Bye. [MUSIC]

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