Morbid: Episode 444: Rebecca Aylward

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Hey weirdos, I'm Ash and I'm Alaina.

And this is Morbid.

This is...

Morbid.

What?

I copied you.

I'm sorry.

You're so annoying.

You know what, there's been a lot of stuff going on lately.

Not with us.

Not with us.

But with a certain reality show that we have talked about many, many times that I know a

lot of you watch, these are the best days of our lives, the best days of their lives.

Maybe the worst of some of their lives, which makes my heart hurt.

First and foremost, I think we said it on the JVN episode, but Team Motherfucking Arianna.

In case you don't know, we're talking about Vanderpup rules.

We just went right into it, we're like Team Arianna.

But honestly, at this point, it really doesn't even need to be described.

I think somebody described it as Chandler cheating on Monica with Rachel and Joey knowing

the entire time in case you do not watch Vanderpup rules and you need a frame of reference.

But I feel like even if you don't watch Vanderpup rules, you've been hearing the echoes.

I was actually getting my Botox done yesterday and I had a new girly injecting my face.

And she said, I was like, do you watch Bravo?

Do you know what's going on?

And she was like, so I don't, but I know everything that's going on.

But I know the exact situation you are referring to.

And I think a lot of people are in that situation, like the people that don't watch.

And here's the thing.

If you don't watch it and you don't give a shit about this, don't worry.

We're getting into a true crime case in a couple of minutes.

We just, I know a lot of you do.

I know a lot of you with me, so we're going to chat about it for a minute because I swear

if I say to John on the couch at night one more time, if I just look up from my phone

and go, all right, so one more thing happened, and he bless him, bless his heart.

He's good at like being like, what's up?

He literally, he was like, okay, because I looked over at him the other day and I was

like, you're my best friend.

You need to hear this.

Okay.

All right.

I was like, I knew that would get you, but it's never the same as talking to somebody

who's been there since the beginning because we started Vanderpump rules together in 2014.

I had just graduated high school and I would skip going to college all the time and just

like my college classes.

I don't even know what the fuck they were called and I just would go to your house and

we would literally eat, sleep, breathe Vanderpump rules.

It's a really unique reality show in the way that it just rarely stops giving, rarely.

There are a couple of times like two or three years, but we stuck through that one.

We stuck through the Valley Village purchases.

We stuck through them trying to introduce an entirely new cast.

That didn't work out.

But we hung in there.

And we got Charlie out of it.

We got Charlie out of it.

I'm a Charlie stan.

And now, we have always loved Ariana.

Never wavered.

I have loved Ariana.

You have loved Ariana.

She's always been our girl.

Because she's real.

She is.

I think she's like the realest one out of everyone.

And you know what?

It's like you get your ups and downs with people in this crew, but like Ariana's always

been a ride or die.

Yeah.

She's like a steady, steady girly.

And I am horrified by Tom Sandoval and Rachel and Rachel.

But it's like, we need to talk about this just for a second.

Tom Sandoval dressed as his mistress for Halloween in front of Ariana.

That's another level of like deep-seated evil.

And then he's evil.

Rachel posed for a picture with him dressed as her, knowing full well they were having

a full-blown affair at the time in front of Ariana.

Do you understand that when the two of them come out and go, guys, we're so sorry.

We're so sorry that we hurt people.

And Rachel's like, I'm going to work on myself.

It's like, fuck both of you.

And are you kidding me?

And are you kidding me?

Her saying that she needs to heal?

Ah, what about Ariana, dog?

Well, it is just, I'm sorry.

You're coming out.

And you two are saying we're sorry.

We never meant to hurt anyone, oh my goodness.

But you dressed as your mistress for Halloween in front of Ariana while you were having an

affair.

No one believes that you're sorry.

You created an entirely false story to make it seem like Schwartz was the one like fucking

around with Rachel.

And also that was fucked up in and of itself because he was hot off a divorce with one

of their fucking cast members and friends.

And I like Katie.

I like Katie too.

And I feel like that was created and hurt Katie.

It's like, you put Katie in a position to be hurt.

Just so that you could save the weird like bro code that these dudes have is unlike anything

I have ever seen.

Oh my God.

I was just going to say I've never seen anything like it.

It goes beyond like this plane of reality.

It does.

Because they will sacrifice everything about themselves for their dudes.

For their bros.

And it's like, no, there is a time where you need to go time out.

This is bad news bears.

And I'm not going to create a fake fucking scenario and like dump my life down the dumpster

because you want to fuck somebody on the side and like step out on your girlfriend.

And it's also like, they were together for like nine years.

Ariana and Tom were together for nine years, purchased a home together.

Like she has a dog that like, I'm sure Tom became like a dad to married for all intents

and purposes.

I mean, that's common law marriage.

What is it?

It's seven years, right?

And just that existence is married for all intents and purposes without the paper.

I mean, people ask them all the time, like people think they're married.

Yeah.

And that's so fucked.

And yeah.

It's just a real bummer.

And then like seeing in the episode where I think Lala was saying like, you know, to

Rachel, she was saying, you know, like when you drink, I wouldn't let you around my man,

which is like, whoa, you got to really take a look in the mirror of somebody saying that

to you.

And then Rachel's response was good thing.

You don't have a man.

First of all.

You don't have a man around.

And it's like, whoa, you are gross, my friends, Christina Kelly wrapped it up perfectly when

she just pulled back the covers to protect herself from Rachel and was like, Rachel.

She literally goes, oh my God, Rachel Christina Kelly, Christina Kelly's like, like coming

back this season is everything to me.

I always thought she was hilarious.

Everything.

And we never got enough Christina Kelly, but you will, if you listen to somebody else's

podcast like back when you could, um, you would get a lot of Christina Kelly.

Yeah.

And I loved that.

That's true.

We love a Christina Kelly movie.

We do.

But honestly, the whole thing is wild.

It's insane.

It's getting wilder by the day.

And the other thing too is like, so like everything is coming out online, but then the season

is airing right now and we are watching it now through such a different lens because

as things are happening right now, the affair is already happening.

Like right now you're watching it and you're like, oh no.

And it just breaks my heart for Ari.

It's so nice to see that all the women are just walking around her and she looks like

she's thriving.

She's going to come out of this.

You never needed him to be a good girl.

I can't wait to see her revenge story.

Oh, I can't wait.

Just like living.

Cause she's going to be just fine.

Of course she is.

She's going to be just fine.

You see that Ariana?

And she's just fine.

She's got like a good heart.

You can tell.

Come on the podcast, Ariana.

I would shit myself.

We'll talk about everything but this.

We don't even have to talk about it.

We don't even have to talk about it.

Should we just like start a bravo podcast?

I know.

I would love to.

Oh my God.

That's my actual calling.

Just to sit here and do this.

That is my actual calling.

But I know a lot of you are with us and you've, cause we've gotten a lot of messages that

are like, I am a bravo, look ahead and I want to talk about this.

So yeah, we just had to get this out because guys, guys.

Fucking wild dude.

It doesn't feel real, but it is.

There's court documents.

There's court documents and it's not just Rachel.

No.

There have been other women.

Allegedly.

Allegedly.

Yeah, of course.

Allegedly.

There have been other women.

Like, oh my God.

It just keeps coming out more and more and more and it's getting worse and worse and

worse.

Every day.

Yeah.

It's wild.

Yeah.

But you know what?

We just, we had to get that out.

I'm so stressed.

And you know, I'm sure we'll have something else to, to bring forth about this on the

next episode.

Probably.

I mean, we're probably like, when this comes out, it's going to be a little old.

I think.

A couple of weeks old.

People are going to be like, oh, okay.

They're going to be like, all that information is two years old and you didn't even touch

upon this huge thing that happened.

We're two weeks behind.

So.

Well, ahead technically.

But you know, ahead technically.

On our schedule.

We're not behind.

But yeah.

So we had to talk about this.

We just had to get it off our chest, honestly, because we've been screaming about it to

Mikey all day.

I know.

Mikey is like, I don't watch Bravo, but I would, but he's into it now.

He will be.

We're getting away to it.

He will be.

He will be.

Honestly.

It's a good way to transition out of that and into a true crime case.

It's just, that's a terrible situation, but my goodness is this a worse situation.

This is a very sad situation.

This case is rough.

It like, it hurt me.

I don't know this one at all.

Oh, you don't?

No.

Um, I didn't either before I looked into it and I was just, I think I found this while

I was researching something else that always happens to me.

Yeah.

So, and then I was like, oh, and I fell kind of down this rabbit hole because we'll talk

about it.

You have deadlines in this case.

You read it and you're like, wait, what?

So then you start reading more and you're like, oh, okay, well that's layered.

Yeah.

So it all starts on the afternoon of October 22nd, 2010.

So it's not old timey guys, it's 2010.

Ash brings it newer.

Of course.

Sometimes.

Most of the time, but today.

So 15 year old Rebecca Aylward left her house in My Stig.

I looked that up and I really hope I'm saying it correctly.

My Stig is in Wales.

Rebecca had plans to go meet her ex-boyfriend in a wooded area just outside of Aberkenfig,

which I also looked up and I hope I'm saying correctly.

Now she was under the guise that they were actually going to be reconciling because

they had recently gone through a breakup.

They were going through hard times, you know, and, but this she was really excited about.

Okay.

So she told her mother, bye, mom, I love you as she grabbed her purse and walked out the

door and unfortunately that would be the last time that Rebecca's mother would see

her alive.

So let's talk about who Rebecca was.

She really went by Becca.

So Becca Oatley Aylward was born on February 25th, 1995 to John and Sonia.

She was the first child of what would eventually be three kids and she was beautiful and she

had one of those faces and we always say this, but I mean it.

She had one of those faces where you would see her in a crowd and be like, I want to

be that girl's friend.

Oh yeah.

That girl looks cool.

She had the perfect scene mangs because this is 2010 and I tried to cut those and I was

like, we all tried to have those.

We all did, but, but Becca had them.

Yeah, she did.

And she fucking rocked them.

But beyond looks, she was also a very smart girl.

Her mother Sonia said she was born inquisitive and I knew from well before she could even

speak that she was a bright girl, a girl who took everything in.

Oh, I love that.

She was very astute.

She was also just a really easy child to raise and to be around.

She loved being with her parents.

She was really close with her mom and when she was little, she loved playing dress up

in her mom's closet.

She put together like different outfits and accessories and she'd throw the heels on and

it's just like pure.

I love it.

I love that.

Now when she entered primary school, she was still known to be pleasant and easy going.

Her parents or her teachers would always tell her parents that they wish they had a class

full of Rebecca's.

Oh, right.

And of course as a parent, that's everything you want to hear.

That's exactly what you want to hear.

And of course, again, it speaks to who Becca is, but it also speaks to her who her parents

are.

Yeah, absolutely.

Raising a great daughter.

For sure it does.

So her natural curiosity and love for things like reading and writing, those things made

her a good student, but she also stood out in other ways.

She would always stand up for other students if they needed to be stood up for.

She would offer her help in the classroom.

When she got her work done, she was always helping somebody else that needed it.

Just a good person.

She was just willing to be there for someone.

And her willingness to help was extra appreciated at home because like I said, she was the oldest

and she took that role as oldest very seriously.

Her mom would always say that she was like a little mum.

Oh, a little mum.

So when her sister Jess was born in 1998, or excuse me, 1998, Becca loved helping with

the little baby and it was just like awesome.

She would get her dress, she loved all her little clothes, and she wanted to always feed

her little sister.

Oh my goodness.

She was so little and she was such a big help.

Yeah, that's how my twins are with the littlest one.

Oh my god, it literally reminded me of that.

It's the exact same thing.

And then five years later, she had a little brother, Jack, and he was born and her little

mum instinct had not gone anywhere.

It was still there.

And given the age difference between Becca and Jack, he really started relying on her

kind of like a second mom.

Oh, I love it.

Like his mom was a wonderful mom.

Of course.

He didn't need a second mom.

But he just got a bonus.

But he got a bonus, for sure.

And he would go to her if he couldn't sleep or if he was anxious about school.

Oh my goodness.

And just like confide in Becca and look to her to like feel safe and happy, you know.

And think about what like a nurturing child you have to be to have that kind of instinct

at young.

Yeah.

And to like act on it, how she did.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

So when she entered her teen years, she started thinking more and more seriously about her

life beyond secondary school.

And by the time she went into high school, her mom recalled that she had already got

her life mapped out, she said.

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It's the fall of 2017 in Rancho Tejama, California.

A man and his wife are driving to a doctor's appointment when another car crashes into them,

sending them flying off the road.

Disoriented, they stumble out of the car only to hear dozens of gunshots whizzing past them.

This is just one chapter of a much larger nightmare unraveling in their small town.

This is actually happening presents a special limited series called Point Blank, shedding

a light on the forgotten spree killings of Rancho Tejama, where a lone gunman devastated

a small town, attacking eight different locations in the span of only 25 minutes.

The series follows five stories of people connected to the incident, from a father that

drew the gunman away from a local school, to the sister of the shooter.

These are riveting stories that will stick with you long after you listen.

Follow this is actually happening wherever you listen to podcasts.

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Sonja wrote that in her book, and she said that Becca was a great student who studied

hard.

She wanted to pursue a law degree when she went to university.

And her ultimate goal was to one day become a barrister, which was like an intense lawyer.

A very intense lawyer, you know, that's how I looked it up.

That's the definition.

That's what Google says.

It says barrister.

Very intense lawyer.

A very intense lawyer.

Look it up.

S-square.

S-square.

Yeah, I forgot that part.

Of course.

She also had less career oriented and like more romantic goals for herself.

Yeah, of course.

Relatable.

Now, according to her mom, she would quote, spend lots of time planning every last detail

of her wedding, drawing her ideal wedding dress right down to the flowers that she'd

have in her bouquet.

She's multifaceted.

Multifaceted.

And I just like, I feel like you know who she is based off everything you get from her

mom and like what you see of her in pictures, like she just seems fucking rad.

Yeah.

Like romance, jeans, where she can be whimsy and romance and you can talk love, but she

can also sit there and be like, listen, this is what I want to do.

I want to be a serious barrister.

I want to work my ass off.

And also I have this motherly and spanked.

And also I can, I can mum my little, little siblings because I'm this nurturing, wonderful,

encouraging human.

Like what couldn't she do?

Like I'm sorry.

Like, do you exist?

What?

Seriously, she just sounds like an angel.

Yeah, she does.

She was an angel.

Yeah.

And that perspective love interest named Joshua Davies in 2008 and he quickly became a regular

presence in their family home.

This family welcomed him with open arms.

That makes me even sadder because I don't think this is going to be a good thing.

That's a pretty good feeling you had right there.

Mom Sonia would later say, pretty much right off the bat, Josh was loved and accepted by

everybody in the family.

And especially that Becca's little brother, Jack, really started to look up to Josh the

more and more time they spent together as like a big brother.

And Josh really seemed to be equally as fond of them at an age where most teenagers started

kind of pulling away from their parents.

Josh actually seemed like he enjoyed hanging out with Becca and her family and like wanted

to be like, as a family unit.

And that's, you want that?

Totally.

And he especially liked Sonia, like he found it easy to talk to Sonia and at the time Sonia

felt like it was easy to talk to him.

Everybody would talk about music a lot together because they both really loved music.

And Sonia would end up telling reporters in 2018, I liked him before it happened.

He was okay.

He was always polite and nice, no bad language.

He seemed like a decent boy.

We all knew his family.

His younger brother was friends with my two younger ones.

So this is like a community of people.

And these are always the things that stress me out so much is when you hear them, like

people be like, he was in my home.

Like I liked him.

There was no reason to think anything different.

It's like, that is the scariest thing because there's no warning sign.

That's exactly it.

Because I think a lot of times when we say this, like murderers and serial killers, people

are like, oh my God, like how could you not know that they were so evil?

Like look at them.

And it's like, no, the thing is they can switch that charming, like I'm an amazing person.

Little switch on so easily.

Exactly.

And blend writing.

They are master manipulators, master.

And that's an alliteration.

There you go.

Now in retrospect, obviously, Sonia could see that there were red flags indicating that

Josh might not have been as nice and polite as he appeared to be.

There were times where he would stay over for like no reason.

And Sonia didn't know why, but she would tell Jack to put his things away, especially his

toy swords or like potentially hurtful items.

It was like she subconsciously wanted to keep these things away from Josh.

Like a mother's instinct.

Now this is like he was racist.

So if you don't want to hear that, skip forward a little bit.

There was an incident where they were watching television together and they saw members of

the KKK and Josh commented that he wanted to join the KKK.

Time to get out.

Time to get the fuck out of my house and time to get the fuck away from my kid.

And his actual comment was like way more explicit to the point where I didn't even feel comfortable

repeating it here.

I'm sure you can find it in an article if you would like to know, but it was horrible.

So in the moment, Becca being, I mean, this is in front of her family.

So that's putting her in a real shit position of like, she's like, what the fuck?

Where did that come from?

So she lightly scolded him, but she tried to play it off like he was kidding.

Remember she's 15 and she's probably hoping he is.

She's exactly hoping she is.

But Sonia was made really uncomfortable and she was like, what that came out of left.

She's like, that is not a joke.

And that's not what we are about in our house.

That's not our humor.

Yeah.

She didn't like that.

So she ended up when Josh had gone home talking to Becca about it and she was like, what was

that about?

And Becca ended up telling her mom how uncomfortable she was and how shocked she was.

And she said later on, actually her and Josh got into an argument about it.

Oh, and it makes me so sad because that's exactly how this should have gone.

Where you didn't escalate things, you didn't make it a scary situation because if he says

something like that, you're like, okay, I don't know what you're capable of here.

So when he leaves, the mom did the right thing, Sonia did the right thing.

She walked up, she told her daughter, that made me very uncomfortable.

What was that about?

Her daughter agreed and said it made me very uncomfortable.

That's a really good, that shows a really good relationship and a really good line of communication

between mom and daughter.

Clear communication.

She didn't, she didn't blow it up to make it weird for her kid.

She talked to her afterwards and her kid felt the same way.

Exactly.

It's like that is like a really good relationship.

And it makes me so sad that it couldn't have translated into, because that's such a difficult

situation after that because it's like, now you have to hope that your 16 year old has

the strength to walk away from that, but then at the same time, someone who will say something

like that, that's dangerous and scary, and leaving them can create a more dangerous situation.

So it's like, that's a really difficult set of things, circumstances, and I feel bad for

them.

And at the same time, where Sonia was like so stressed out about this, she also can't

force her daughter to break up with her boyfriend.

Well, that's the thing.

And it's like, you are helpless.

And you don't want to, you don't want to try to go down that route and then lose that

clear line of communication with her and feel like she's hiding things from you.

So I think personally, just like you, I think Sonia went about this the best way she could

have.

I think she did.

I think she did the very right thing.

And I think if she had pushed, if you push too hard, especially at that age, like 16,

they're going to pull.

I'm terrified for teenage years just because of, I know it's a precarious time.

I remember how I was like, you don't listen to anybody and it's like, if somebody pushes

too hard one way, you might go down the same way.

And it's like, so I know she probably didn't want to push the issue and make her want to

cling to him more just out of going against, you know, even though it doesn't sound like

Rebecca was that type of kid.

Not at all.

You just don't want to play with fire with that stuff.

And you never know is the other thing like we covered cases where like they were never

that kind of kid.

And then one thing happens and you go down a trail.

Exactly.

That wasn't the case here.

Luckily.

Yeah.

It sounds like it was with Josh.

Like things just started going awry with him and the change in his personality was happening

slowly, gradually, like little things Sonia was starting to pick up on, Becca was starting

to pick up on and just getting like more and more uncomfortable.

And that's worse.

Yes.

Because you're not able to absorb it all at once.

So it's not, it's harder to manage kind of thing.

They've already shown you such an amazing side of them and they love bombed you and

you're in, you are in this now.

So now they can start peeling back those layers slowly.

And it makes it harder to rip away.

Exactly.

Exactly.

So yeah, it happened gradually, but Becca and her mom were seeing a slightly darker

side of Josh emerging.

He started spending hours in the woods with his best friend Daniel and they would occasionally

camp out in the woods overnight.

And this just made Sonia really uneasy.

Yeah.

Like what the hell are you doing?

And then it made her particularly uneasy because they started trying to convince girls

from school to come camp out with them in the woods and Sonia told Becca she insisted

she was like, you never, ever go into those woods with them alone or with anybody else.

Even if you think there's going to be other kids there, do not go into the woods with

them.

Yeah.

No.

So.

Oh, how scary.

Things were getting weird.

Now Josh, obviously, like I was saying earlier, he seemed to love Becca's family.

He seemed to like spending time with them.

But at school and around their friends, he didn't really seem to be proud to be with

Becca.

And he also wanted to hide the fact that they were a couple.

It reminded me of when we were talking about the Betty story a couple weeks ago.

It's like, why would you not be proud of Becca?

It's like, fuck you, Becca's awesome.

She is.

And you're not.

And you are not, my friend.

So the relationship really fell apart in January 2010.

And Josh was the one actually that ended up breaking up with Becca and immediately started

dating another girl.

Now the reason for the breakup or the reasons, they're still unclear, but Josh occasionally

told his friends it was because Becca had quote, tried to trick him into getting her

pregnant, which was not true.

Doubt it.

Doubt it.

Doubt it.

And that's the thing.

Most people, including us, who heard this explanation thought it was complete nonsense.

And even Becca was like, no, he broke up with me actually because I wouldn't have unprotected

sex with him.

Thanks, though.

Complete opposite.

Yeah.

Thanks, though.

Yeah.

Now they had only dated three or four months, but Becca was really heartbroken over

this.

It was probably one of her first loves or potentially her first love.

Yeah.

She was devastated by the end of it and she was going through it.

Of course.

But Josh, on the other hand, he seemed angry with Becca and it's like, but you're the

one that broke up with her.

You broke up with her.

Yeah.

I'm not, I'm confused here.

Yeah.

And then he, after the breakup, he started making comments to his friends about killing

Becca.

What the fuck?

We started joking about killing her.

Guys, no one jokes about killing someone.

It's a flat out blanket statement.

One of the biggest themes in this case is joking, quote unquote, about killing somebody.

Murder is not funny.

Murder is not a joke.

Murder does not have a punchline.

Yeah.

And those are your three rules.

If someone's, and especially if someone is consistently joking about murdering someone,

a particular person, call the fucking authorities.

Call the authorities, tell your mom, tell a trusted adult.

Tell someone.

Call someone.

Tell the mailman.

Call someone.

And especially if the comments are starting to build and build to be more and more specific

like what happened here.

And he told one friend after their breakup, I'm just going to kill her.

Wouldn't life be a lot easier if she wasn't here?

Just no, she's not, like, go away.

Also you're fucking 16 years old, life is as easy as it's possibly going to get.

You're going to live the rest of your life, probably never have to see her again.

You could walk yourself down to the principal's office and say, hey, I don't really want to

be in classes with her anymore and they'll probably rearrange your whole fucking schedule.

Exactly.

If you don't, deal.

Set up a different fucking table.

Yeah.

Like you're 15.

Get out of here.

You broke up with her.

Remove yourself from the situation.

I don't really think she wants to be around you at this point.

Exactly.

Oh, I just said exactly like you.

I've been finding myself doing that.

I love that.

I think you've like rubbed off on me.

We love a little tea.

I just realized that I did.

I was like, ooh, good job.

I pronounced that tea.

Matt would be so proud of you.

She would.

We love pronouncing things.

No, Josh's friends, like we were just saying, thought the comments and the threats were

just a joke.

But like I was kind of alluding to earlier, as time went by, they started getting more

and more detailed, more and more specific and more intense.

He was talking about how he could poison Becca with deadly plants and nightshades or, quote,

push her over a quarry into a river.

What the fuck?

Are you like the mad scientist from a nightmare before Christmas?

Like what the fuck is wrong with you?

Where the fuck are you going to get a nightshade?

Nightshade?

And the reason he wanted to push her into a river is because she couldn't swim and he

knew that.

Oh my God.

So how the fuck does that?

Guys, call someone.

Now one friend would later tell the court it was no secret that he hated Rebecca for quite

a long time after their relationship finished.

But it's so confusing because you broke up with her.

Like I don't understand.

That's what a breakup is.

Right.

You don't like each other anymore.

So you break up and you move on.

Then you move on.

And it sounds like didn't he start dating someone else?

Like if I was that girl, I'd be like, can you not obsessively talk about killing your

ex-girlfriend?

Yeah, I'd be a little one.

Like where was your brain, girlfriend?

Jesus.

Now, it seems like despite his charming personality with adults, Becca had seen Josh's darker

side probably more times than she ended up admitting to her mom.

Most likely out of uncomfortability, if that's a word.

Yeah, of course.

Or being scared.

Yeah.

Now during the investigation into her murder, detectives with help from Sonya actually

found several pieces of evidence indicating that Josh was actually abusive toward Becca.

Fuck that guy.

There were countless pages of threatening and abusive MSN chats.

Do you remember those?

Oh my God, MSN chats.

They used to chat over that and like he was awful to her.

And actually there was one incident where he used colored hairspray to write Becca is

a slag on her bedroom wall.

What the fuck?

Do you faced her parents' property and in her room wrote Becca is a slag?

I cannot imagine having to deal with this shit as Becca, but I can't imagine having

to deal with this shit as the parents.

No.

Because there's what a helpless feeling.

And I don't know if Sonya realized that, like that had happened when it did or after

the fact.

That's the thing.

It's like I can't even imagine knowing that later.

Right.

Oh.

It's awful.

I obviously struggle to keep it friendly and amical after a breakup.

So the fact that there was some animosity and heartbreak between Josh and Becca who were

two teenagers, it's understandable or would have been.

But this situation is completely different.

His hatred of Becca was just like very overblown, very unusual, again, especially considering

the fact that he was the one to end it.

Yeah, like move on.

And Sonya thinks this anger all stems from Josh's ego because once he got what he wanted

from Becca and she started setting boundaries around things like sex, Josh ended the relationship.

Yeah.

Intending to hurt Becca.

Yeah.

And he did hurt her, but not for very long.

I think he thought like this was just going to be the end all be all for her.

Oh yeah.

But when her heartbreak started to wear off, she proved herself to be way more resilient

than Josh had ever expected.

Of course.

She completely bounced back.

Yep.

She was doing incredible in school, so much so actually that she was doing better than

him.

Good.

And I think that miffed his ego.

Yep.

If he had intended their breakup as another way to control Becca, his plan was backfiring

and that's what pissed him off.

He failed.

And it was backfiring in a very public way, so I think he felt embarrassed.

Oh my God, get over your fucking ego.

Seriously.

Jesus Christ.

If you look up a picture of him.

Oh, I did.

Ego, ego, ego, ego, ego.

It's oozing out of his pores.

Yeah.

So by the end of the school year, Becca had actually already started dating another boy,

another Josh actually.

Oh.

But this is Josh Humphreys.

Better Josh.

Better Josh.

The new relationship really seemed to piss Josh Davies off because she had moved on.

And when it came, and I think he was really specifically angry about Becca's family welcoming

this new Josh in.

And he would constantly ask her if her mom liked this new Josh as much as she had liked

him.

It's like, are you all right?

Exactly.

Bro.

It's also like, you could still be a part of this family if you weren't a piece of shit.

Exactly.

But you suck.

It was like he felt some kind of ownership not only over Becca, but her family.

Yeah.

It's all ego.

It's like he deserved their love.

So weird.

And he would say things to her like, I bet she prefers me to be your boyfriend.

Probably not.

I'm like, no, I don't think so.

I'm going to say that's a no.

And Becca would be like, no, actually she does like new Josh.

She's a big fan of him.

You know what Josh doesn't do?

Joke about being in part of the KKK.

Yeah.

That's one of his most wonderful qualities.

It's pretty shining quality to me.

But when she would tell him like, yeah, my mom actually does love him.

And so does my brother and everybody else.

He would like storm off away from her in anger and like make a spectacle.

What a child.

Literally.

What a literal toddler.

So Sonya thinks again that it wasn't only just the ego, but that it was Becca's resilience

too that made Josh Davey so pissed off.

Oh yeah.

Yep.

He hoped that this was going to devastate her.

But just a month or so after he'd broken up with her, Sonya said she was doing better

than him in school.

She was popular and had a boyfriend.

And perhaps most of all, she was always her own person.

Go Becca.

No.

Now, while she may have been resilient and independent, unfortunately, she wasn't entirely

free from Josh's influence and control over her.

It's hard, especially at that age.

When you're 15.

Yeah.

This girl's 15 years old.

Yeah.

Like I remember being there and dating awful people.

Oh yeah.

Not as awful as this, luckily.

But you're in a cloud, like in a haze.

Yeah.

And you don't know.

You just don't know any better.

You'll believe a lot of things.

Exactly.

And especially as a romantic.

Mm-hmm.

So it's like, you just have that.

Exactly.

Now, just a few months after she had started dating new Josh, she actually ended the relationship

because old Josh started hinting that he wanted to get back together if she would get rid

of her current boyfriend.

So she did because remember, she knows old Josh and whatever piece of her still loved

him, loved him.

Yeah.

I get it.

He showed you the good parts and that's what you hang on to.

And I think because she was a romantic and this is just an inference because like speaking

from experience, I wonder if she had the like, I can fix him mentality.

Oh, I wonder too.

Yeah.

Like my mom really did like him.

So like there must be some good piece of him and there was all these good times and

like, I'm good.

So I can show him how to be good.

Mm-hmm.

I think it was that.

Yeah.

So when their relationship ended toward the end of summer, Becca stayed friends with Josh

Humphries, luckily, but she was still holding out hope that she and Josh Davies would get

back together.

Now, bad Josh was still privately quote unquote, joking with his friends that he could kill

Becca and get away with it.

Friends you got to speak up.

Like these friends are pieces of shit.

I was going to say this is on your shit too.

Yeah.

So by that fall, even his friends had joined in.

Oh, fuck all of you.

They were, they would say later that they thought it was all a joke, but it's not a joke.

You assholes.

Louder for the people in the back, joking about murder simply is not funny.

Yeah, if you got friends that are joking about specifically murdering one person, like you

got to move on, get out of there and call someone, let people know that's not just going

to go away.

You know, especially as like a teenager, if you're a young kid, that's not normal behavior.

No, and you don't just like stop joking about murder.

No, it's never a joke.

It's going to escalate.

Like I never had any friends who legit, who joked about killing someone.

It never happened.

Literally never.

Don't let it happen.

Okay.

So back to the morning of October 22nd, Becca woke up early on that morning and she told

her mom she was just too excited to stay to sleep because she had plans to meet up with

Josh that afternoon and he was still hinting heavily that he wanted to get back together.

She actually went out shopping with her aunt Linda the day before and bought a new outfit

for the date.

She bought a red jacket and brown ankle boots.

That destroys my heart.

And she just hoped that that would impress Josh and that they could start things up again.

She spent most of the morning just anxiously killing time.

At one point, Sonia drew a bath for her to try to get her like, you know, like excited.

She was like, okay, like, let's have like a fancy bath and, you know, like, we'll really

do this.

See, that's so sweet.

Yeah.

She was just killing time until she was supposed to meet Josh in the woods just outside of

Eberkenfig.

Now, as the morning went on, Becca was starting to get more and more concerned because she

hadn't heard from Josh about these plans.

They had made these plans earlier this week or earlier that week, excuse me, that he was

going to text her when he was ready.

But by that afternoon, she still hadn't heard from him.

So Becca tried to reassure her and she said, you know what boys are like, he's probably

still in bed.

Yeah.

Now, when Josh finally did text, it was around 1pm and Becca immediately called her out Linda,

who was going to be driving her to the park and she was like, it's time to go.

And she was so excited.

When Linda arrived, she grabbed her handbag, Becca did, and rushed out the door.

But just as she was about to head out, she looked at her mom and like I said, she said,

bye, mom.

I love you.

Oh, that's the part that just ruins you.

Wrenches my heart out.

Ruins you.

I mean, thank goodness she said that, but like seriously, no one should ever look at their

kid for the last time.

Never.

You know, like it's just like walking out the door.

No.

That's just awful.

So when Sonia heard about the plans that Becca had made with Josh that afternoon, she was

immediately suspicious and uneasy about it because she knew how badly the breakup had

affected Becca and again, she had learned some of those manipulative and abusive things

that he had said and done both before and after the relationship had ended.

But Becca had been working on her mom and trying to convince her that things were better.

She said things had changed and she said, he's okay now.

He's back to the old Josh again.

Oh, we've all done that.

We totally have.

And you just want your mom to like, you're like, come on, like, I know, like, it's always

that classic, I know him.

He's different when he's just with me.

You know, like it's always, I've said those words before.

Of course.

You know, like I remember trying.

And he's so many people have.

Yeah.

I remember trying to convince my parents that like, like bad John was, was like, no, no,

you don't understand.

He's so sweet.

Like he's like, no, he's like, he's so good to me.

He does that and it's like, you know in your heart that it's not the truth, but you want

it to be the truth.

And a mama knows.

And a mama always knows.

And Sonia knew.

But at the same time, I think she, I just think she was like a really good mom and I

think she wanted to, to tell Becca, like, you know, I'm really cautious about this,

but I want you to be happy.

That's the impression that I get.

Exactly.

And you also want your kid to experience and learn from situations instead of just directing

them what to do.

Right.

Like you would never think something like this would happen, whatever is about to happen.

And it's like, you think, okay, there might be some heartbreak out of this.

I am predicting it, but I, I will just be here for her.

Exactly.

I can only give her so much to go out there with, but if she is dead set on trying this

again, I will just be here to pick up the pieces.

And it's like, that's all you can do.

Right.

And they have, and then hopefully they learn from that and they take it into the next relationship

or whatever.

Exactly.

And so I think she was doing all the right things in my opinion.

I think she was too.

That's really all you can do as a parent.

I completely agree.

Like that must be a really hard position to be in.

And I think it was because everything in her was telling her like, I don't know about

this guy, but nothing inside of her was telling her like, I think Becca could get physically

hurt.

No.

Emotionally, absolutely.

Physically, no.

Physically, no.

You never would believe that.

No.

But the suspicions that things weren't going to really go well crept back up when Becca

called her mom about an hour after she had been dropped off at the park to say that she

still hadn't heard from Josh.

So he texted her at one and said, I'm ready.

Like let's go meet.

She got dropped off at the park.

And again, I don't think, I'm pretty sure Sonia didn't realize that they were going

to go off into the woods because she had told Becca like, don't go into the woods.

She thought this was the park.

And now she's been waiting at that park for an hour and hasn't heard anything.

So Sonia's like, what the fuck?

She's worried.

She doesn't want Becca hanging around a random park all afternoon by herself.

So she's getting more and more frustrated.

She's like, this is getting ridiculous.

He's giving you all these elaborate directions of where to go and what time to be there.

He's not even showing up.

She was like, it was like, it was some kind of mission between two secret spies.

Like it was ridiculous.

Yes.

No.

On his end.

Now Becca was like, no mom, it's okay.

Like I'm safe.

There's actually a police woman walking right behind me.

Like I'm okay.

And so they chatted for a bit because I think Sonia was like, well, stay on the phone with

me a little bit.

Like I'm nervous.

And as they were on the phone, Becca finally spotted Josh walking down the street in her

direction.

So she was like, oh, I see him.

Like we're good.

And I'll talk to you later.

And Sonia's like, okay, like be careful.

I love you.

Now what happened next is not entirely clear.

Josh Davies would eventually admit to killing Becca.

He did kill her.

That was good.

And his confession actually came well after a trial was over.

And his confession was rather light on the specifics.

So because of that, the details of Becca's murder would end up being kind of cobbled

together from the forensic evidence and testimony of his friends.

From what the investigators pieced together, Josh and Becca had walked to his house actually

and spent a little bit of time there.

And while they were there, this breaks my fucking heart because I picture like us doing

this.

And my sister called to give her an update and like said, like, it's going well.

Like this is what we're doing.

Like God, this kills me.

It's just so pure.

It is.

Like she's just, this is, this is everybody.

Just like a typical teenage girl so excited about like rekindling a relationship and calling

your sister like your best friend, be like, it's all, it's all like, it's all happening.

You know, like, oh, it kills me.

It's awful.

So at some point they left Josh's house for the woods nearby and they made their way to

an isolated area in the trees.

And this probably kills her mom too because her mom was so specific about do not go in

those woods.

Exactly.

15 year olds going to 15 year olds.

Of course.

And nothing would have ever gone through Becca's mind like I shouldn't go into the woods because

he's going to kill me.

She would have never walked into those woods if she had any inkling that he was going to

do something to her.

She probably was just like, oh, this is like a fun romantic rendezvous.

Of course.

A romantic little rendezvous.

Exactly.

Yeah.

That's like, you know, that's what she was thinking in her head.

She was like, oh my God, taking me for a walk in the woods.

Taking me for a walk in the woods.

They're going to the woods with boys.

No, I didn't actually.

You liked it.

Like I would have like little meetups that like there was this really cute boy.

But I can get it.

Like I could get why that would be.

Yeah.

And like why it's exciting.

Like I have had that experience and you're so excited.

Yeah, of course.

But they'd either been talking or potentially arguing.

We don't know because again, their relationship did get contentious at points.

And Becca turned away from Josh for a moment during this with her back turned to him.

He grabbed her around the throat suddenly out of nowhere and actually was attempting

to break her neck, but he didn't know how to.

And she started screaming, obviously.

And he was afraid that her screams were going to draw attention, he said.

So he grabbed a rock that was quote unquote the size of a rugby ball.

What the fuck.

And while Becca was still facing away from him, he hit her on the back of the head with

that rock.

My God.

So she fell to the ground and started screaming because probably most likely her skull was

fractured at that point.

And he just kept hitting her and hitting her while she's down on the ground like face

down.

Wow.

What a big tough guy.

Exactly.

And he would later tell his friends, and this is very graphic, that the worst part of all

of it was quote seeing Becca's skull give away.

Oh my God.

This was brutal, brutal on a level that I can't believe he's a 16 year old boy.

That's what is really getting me.

This is a 16 year old that did this to a girl he claimed to love.

He hit her a total of six times, which caused obviously significant head trauma and brain

damage that would ultimately be the cause of death.

And after the sixth strike, he realized that the rock was covered in blood and hair, so

he tossed it into some nearby bushes.

Wow.

You're so callous.

Awesome.

So callous.

You're disgusting.

I was also told friends that there was blood on Becca's face, so he flipped her over to

lay face down at one point, so that quote, nobody would see it.

What?

You're leaving her in the middle of the woods.

Somebody's going to see her.

Like, if somebody finds her, they're going to examine her body, you idiot.

It's like, no, I think you flipped her over because you're a piece of shit and probably

couldn't look at what you've just done.

Yeah.

You had to look her in the face.

Exactly.

Asshole.

Then he left her and just went back to his aunt's house.

He just left her in the middle of the woods.

And he started working on an alibi for himself immediately.

You're a piece of shit, Josh.

Immediately.

He changed his Facebook status to say that he was chilling out with friends.

And they just watched Strictly Come Dancing on TV.

And then he sent a bunch of texts to Becca's phone saying that people were starting to

worry about her and that she better get into contact with someone to let them know where

she was.

Gaslighting her even in death.

My God.

Even in death.

Still gaslighting.

That is so much thought and so much like, wow.

And it proves that you can't go on later and say that you had gone quote unquote insane

in that moment.

Yeah, you can't.

Because you took very serious and very intentful steps to cover this up and make it look like

you didn't do it because you knew that you had just murdered someone in cold blood.

And it wasn't even just like he flipped in the moment kind of thing.

He had been talking about killing her for weeks.

Of course.

And we'll find out there are entire text chains that will support that when we get time to

talk to a jury.

Who are these people that are texting with him about this?

Pieces of shit.

Like come on, everybody.

Jesus.

Jesus of shit.

It always bums me out when you hear that like a whole group of people are like this.

It's like, what the fuck?

Like where did you find each other?

Yeah.

So as that afternoon started turning over into the evening, Linda, who was the aunt

of Becca and Sonya's sister, so Linda calls Sonya and she's like, I haven't heard from

Becca about where she wants to be picked up.

And I'm starting.

I just have this gut feeling like Linda just felt like something was off.

Yeah.

This family's close.

And she actually told Sonya she isn't coming home tonight.

Oh, she just knew it.

I'd actually just, I've read that a million games and I still just got them.

And Linda couldn't put into words why she felt that way.

It was just something she knew.

That's so scary.

And Sonya was like, of course she's coming home tonight.

Like she's going to be home later.

She probably just got held up somewhere because I think in her mind, she was like, I can't

go there right now.

Of course not.

And then she remembered that Becca had mentioned something about Josh's mom driving her home

if it had gotten too late, like into their hangout.

But still, Linda couldn't shake the feeling.

The first indication that something definitely wasn't right came later that night when Sonya

again, or excuse me, Linda again called Sonya to tell her that she had actually talked to

Josh's dad, Linda had.

And the dad told her that he hadn't seen his son or Becca at all that day.

So by that evening, panic really was starting to set.

Every call to Becca was going unanswered and that was very unsettling because before Becca

had left the house earlier that day, Sonya had actually given Becca her cell phone to

use because remember this is 2010, Becca's cell phone had run out of minutes, but Sonya

didn't want her without a cell phone.

So she was like, take mine.

Good mama.

Now, since Sonya didn't have her own phone, she had to borrow a phone from her brother

and it was running out of battery and it wasn't like you could just throw it on a charger

and it was like good to go.

Those were the days when like you had to throw it on a charger and like let it sit.

So that made her totally reliant on information from others and especially so because she

was afraid to leave the house in case Becca came back.

She showed up.

Yeah.

Right.

So Sonya ended up calling the police at 7.15 p.m. to report her daughter missing and the

search for Becca officially began.

Oh, this is horrifying.

It is.

Now, as the night unfolded, friends and family, they searched for Becca everywhere they could

think of looking, anywhere she could possibly be.

Linda and Becca's little sister, Jess, went to Josh Humphrey's house, the new ex, good

job, Josh, but nobody was home.

So from there, they went to Sarn, where Becca was supposed to meet with Josh Davies that

afternoon, like the park.

Now, while all that was going on, Sonya was able to charge the phone from her brother

and she was just calling Becca and Josh's numbers over and over and over, desperate

to get an answer, but getting nothing.

So Josh is just seeing millions of phone calls from this girl's mother.

Yep.

And ignoring them.

Cool.

Yep, totally.

She also tried to get into contact with good Josh, but each time she would say who was

calling, he would hang up on her and eventually stopped answering calls.

There's an answer for that later.

Because I was like, Josh, I know I was too.

Good Josh.

Why am I calling you that?

Don't get mad at him.

Okay.

Don't get mad at him.

Okay.

There was a reason.

Now, Sonya was finally able to reach Josh Davies at his grandmother's house.

It's kind of confusing because he like, he's at his house at one point.

He's at his aunt's house.

Yeah.

He's at his grandma's.

He's not on the same street or what, but he finally, she was able to get in contact with

him at nine o'clock that night.

My God, her panic.

So Becca had left the house around one.

She's been gone for like eight hours at this point.

And he told Sonya that he actually wasn't able to meet up with Becca that afternoon.

And so maybe she had gone to kill some time with Joshua, the good Josh.

Josh Humphries.

Josh Humphries.

Now, for a minute, Sonya was like, I guess that makes sense.

And she's in a state where she's desperate to find her daughter safe and that's a reasonable

answer.

So she's like, okay.

Like in her head, kind of trying to figure it out.

But then she remembered that earlier when she was talking to Becca on the phone, she

had said that she saw Josh coming down the street.

So she said, are you telling me you weren't standing in front of her while she was on the

phone to me?

And he paused and then said, no.

Wow, liar.

And so Sonya asked again, like, so did you see Becca today, giving him another opportunity?

Come clean here?

And he just repeated the story that he had already told.

He hadn't seen Becca.

And as far as he knew, she was with Humphries.

Your pants are on fucking fire.

God, I wish.

So the police finally arrived at Sonya's house around 9.30 and they ran the usual battery

of questions.

Did she have any reason to run away?

Did she have any reason or history of doing something like this and so on and so forth?

Yeah.

And it's just paint her to be somebody who just runs away when things get tough.

And it's like the answer is no, move on.

And so at first, of course, the officers kind of suspected that Becca had gone to a party

and drank too much.

So now she was waiting to sober up before coming home, not wanting to get into trouble.

Yeah, seems legit.

And Sonya was like, no, Becca doesn't drink.

Probably not.

Becca doesn't drink.

She said, actually, Becca did drink over the summer, this past summer, and she had a really

bad experience.

She actually ended up blacking out and she fucking hated it and she never wanted to drink

again.

Yeah.

So no, that's not the case.

But the police, they still insisted that this was the most logical explanation and they

were going to go around and check the usual's party spots.

So they wasted time after her mom told her, told them she's not at a party.

And they were like, OK, we're going to go check.

We're going to go check some parties, which like, I get to an extent, I know you have

to rule it out, but it's like, do you have to spread all your resources to them?

That's what I was going to say.

You want to check party spots by all means, send a couple officers, but you got to split

up your resources and start checking other places too.

You can't narrow it down right now.

Exactly.

Especially when you're being told that that's probably not where to look.

Now the rest of the night was just a flurry of phone calls, late night drives around

town, just desperately searching for her.

Literal horror.

No results.

So at 7 a.m. the next morning, Sonia called the police again, but they had no update for

her.

Now, when she called again an hour later at 8 a.m., she was told that the officer handling

this specific case had been called away, quote, on a rapid response.

Oh no.

So she knew.

As soon as she heard rapid response, she was like, I know, it was harrowing.

Her heart sank into her stomach and she was like, this emergency absolutely has something

to do with Becca's disappearance.

And unfortunately she was right.

Earlier that morning, officers were searching near the park where Becca was last seen and

they found her.

She was obviously, as we know, lying face down in that isolated area of the woods.

They'd spent all morning following up on leads they'd gathered throughout the night and they

spoke to Joshua Humphries, who told them he had been at a club the night before.

So when Sonia called from an unknown number, he kept hanging up because he couldn't hear

her over the music and he thought it was somebody who had the wrong number, which that makes

sense.

I'm not going to yell at you, Josh.

Exactly.

Maybe just say like.

Also, like, why were you at a club?

I think you might have been a little older and also you go home.

I think you can go to clubs a little bit younger.

I think it's like it probably means something a little different than what I'm thinking

of.

So they used to have, like, teen nights at clubs.

Yeah.

TBT to one myself.

I've got stolen that one.

Yep.

Good times.

Anyways, he couldn't hear her, so that's why he was hanging up.

Now, they then explained to Sonia that they had found Becca's body through information

from actually one of Josh Davy's friends, Liam Thomas.

Liam told his mom that he knew Josh had done something to Becca, so Liam's dad immediately

called the police to report the information and after hearing a little more from Liam,

they were able to locate Becca's body.

Now, I'm glad that Liam finally said something.

Took a long time.

Yeah, it's a little too late.

Oh, it's, I would say.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And also, it's like very interesting that you were able to send them right to where

she was.

Oh, we know why.

The detectives also told Sonia that they had arrested two boys that they believed were

responsible, not Liam, Joshua Davies and Daniel Ninnis.

You can just imagine that if I was Sonia, I'd be like, just put me in a room with them.

Just put me in a room with them.

And she's sitting there in complete disbelief that a boy she had welcomed into her home

that had played with her younger sit, like, played with her youngest children who she

treated like she would treat her own son, could be responsible for this.

And she actually assumed that Daniel Ninnis was the one who was truly responsible.

Yeah, because why would you ever think it's the boy that you knew?

Right.

Because she had actually hated Becca because Becca had turned him down on a date a year

previous.

Oh my God, the fragility of these fucking boys, right?

The fragility.

Mm-hmm.

My God.

So, Sonia's assumption was reasonable, but the detective actually corrected her when

she was like, it must have been Daniel.

He was like, no, it's Josh who's actually responsible.

And the detective chief inspector, John, I believe it's Penhal, told Sonia, I've not

seen anything like it.

So Liam had been the one to also bring up Daniel to the police, and now both Daniel

and Josh, like I said, had been arrested.

And of course, they were sitting in separate rooms blaming each other.

Of course.

So it was going to take some digging and pressing to get the truth out of them.

But now let's get into the dynamic between the three friends and what happened the day

of the murder before it happened.

That morning, Josh actually wasn't in bed.

He had met up with those two friends, or excuse me, he had met up with Liam Thomas at Cafe

107 in downtown Aberkenfig.

They usually met on Saturday mornings for breakfast.

So they waited about a half hour for Daniel, who was supposed to meet them, but he didn't

show up.

So they walked to, I believe, Josh's house.

Now, during their walk, that was when Becca started texting Josh about the plans.

So later on, they ended up meeting with Daniel, and Josh told his two friends his plan to

meet Becca that afternoon in the forest and said, I'm finally going to go through with

my plan.

Um, guys, call someone.

No Alina, they said that they thought he was joking.

My God, I can't.

And they said, actually, they thought he was joking, and informed investigators, actually,

that they joined in themselves and suggested various ways for Josh to kill and dispose

of Becca.

What is wrong with these little fucks?

Like just typical breakfast behavior.

Yeah.

Like, I guess by this point, everybody knew about Josh's hatred of Becca and killing her

was just a regular topic of their conversations.

So fucked up.

Because a few weeks later, excuse me, a few weeks earlier, when the three of them had

met up at that breakfast cafe, the subject had come up.

And when they all parted ways after breakfast, Josh texted Liam, who I don't like, and said,

what would you do if I actually did kill her?

And he responded, Liam said, oh, I would buy you a breakfast.

I would buy you a breakfast if you murdered a human being.

Wow.

So like, round them all up, cool that you told your daddy and your mommy that you were

so scared.

Yeah.

And that Josh had done something.

You knew that he was going to do something the entire time, and you lulled and said you

were going to buy him breakfast for it.

Yeah, these are disgusting little shits.

So go fuck yourselves, Liam.

Truly.

And at one o'clock that afternoon, Josh headed out as we know to meet Becca.

And before walking off, he solidified what he was going to go do and said to his friends,

the time has come.

Straight up implying that he was about to go head off and kill his ex-girlfriend.

And not one of them said shit to their parents.

Yeah, no.

I'm not impressed.

Not at all.

Not impressed by these kids.

It's like, sure, maybe he was joking the first 99 million times.

But if your friend is walking away from you and implying that they're heading off to go

murder someone, call someone, and then reevaluate your friendship.

That's the thing.

I'm like, what are you doing?

So about an hour and a half had gone by, and Liam decided to text Josh to find out what

was going on.

It's like, were you excited?

Yeah, like, did you do it?

So his text went unanswered because as we know, that was going on.

So Josh's silence prompted both boys to actually leave Daniel's house and walk down to the

park where Josh said he was going to meet Becca, which to me says they were starting

to worry that he was going to do something.

Absolutely.

They were going down to see if it was happening.

But after finding nobody there, they returned to Daniel's house.

And a short time later, they ended up calling Josh, and he actually answered.

And they were like, are you still with Becca?

And his answer was, define with.

I want to wail on this kid.

Like, I can, I would, vlogging.

I would get on a plane to Wales just to, like, throw a cup of piss in his face, just to spit

in his eye.

Literally.

Oh my God.

So he said, define with.

And then he asked both boys to come back to the area to meet him, which they did.

And they got there just after 2.30.

So this all happened very quickly.

Yeah.

So standing at the entrance to the forest, Liam called Josh again.

And when he answered, Josh demanded to speak with Daniel.

And he said Daniel needed to come meet him in that remote part of the woods.

The only reason that Liam didn't go with him is because he was on crutches because of a

rugby injury.

So off Daniel went into the forest.

Mark my motherfucking words, if that boy hadn't been on crutches, his ass would have been

following like the little piece of shit follower he was.

Like the little lamb that he is.

So Daniel returned a little bit later and told Liam that he had seen Becca's body lying

face down on the ground and said that Josh didn't seem phased or upset by any of it.

Oh my God.

And then they all went back to Daniel's house to hang.

Oh, OK.

He had just taken a human life.

And showed you.

Showed you it.

And now you're all just going to bro out this afternoon?

Disgusting.

What the mother fuck, dude.

Truly disgusting.

So at the house, Josh told them everything that happened.

I don't know if Daniel was like overwhelmed or couldn't accept it or if he's a fucking

piece of shit, I think the latter.

But he didn't seem at all emotional, Liam said.

Now Liam was starting to freak the fuck out.

As you should.

He couldn't tell whether Daniel and Josh were telling the truth.

But at the same time, nothing about what they were saying felt right to him.

So he called his mom and asked her to pick him up as soon as possible.

And before he left, Josh made Liam delete all the text messages between them and told

both of his friends, if anybody asked, to say that they had all been together all afternoon.

Oh my God, this kid is diabolical.

And also, sweetie pie sugar buns, text messages don't go anywhere.

Exactly.

If they want those, they're going to get those, honey.

So when he was arrested, Josh Davies told the police, oh, it was all Daniel.

He murdered Becca.

I had nothing to do with it.

No, of course not.

He said he had only told Daniel that he killed Becca in order to prank him because LOL.

And then when Daniel arrived at the scene and discovered that Becca was in fact not

dead, he went into a rage and grabbed a rock from the ground and murdered her in anger.

Yeah, that's likely.

What?

Seems like a legit scenario.

Didn't take long for investigators to determine that, uh, that was a lie.

Yeah.

And Daniel Ninnis was actually released into his parents custody 36 hours after he was

arrested.

Which he shouldn't be.

No, and I think Liam should have been arrested.

Yeah.

In your accessory.

I agree.

You were there.

So the news about Becca's murder and the arrest of the two local boys was reported a few days

later to the absolute shock and horror of the small community.

Horrifying.

The area actually had recently seen a large uptick in the number of murders that year.

And at that point, it was second on the list, um, to the village of Puntripit, I believe,

as the Whales murder capital.

Oh my God.

They were like, what the fuck is going on around here?

And then the details in Becca's case, they seemed worse than any of anything else that

had gone on that year.

And it would only get worse when more details would come out in trial.

Oh God.

Now, because Josh was a minor at the time of this, the police actually couldn't release

his name to the public.

So nobody knew who this was.

But they were able to release his age, which again came as a major shock to this community.

He was, I think I may have accidentally said earlier that he was 16.

He was 15.

Oh my God.

15.

That's horrifying.

Like it's one thing for a teenager to be murdered by an adult, but like that's horrific

and terrifying and scary.

But for a teenager to brutally kill another teenager for quite literally zero fucking

reason.

No reason.

That community was rocked.

Yeah.

They were terrified.

And they were like, is this the start of some kind of social shift that no one would

want to go through?

What the fuck?

So Josh actually pleaded not guilty to Becca's murder, even though there was a ton of evidence

against him and interviews to the contrary, but he continued to insist that it was Daniel

who had killed Becca.

And since his arrest, he had been housed at, I believe it's Vinnie Green.

It's on the outskirts of Bristol and it's for young offenders who have committed like

really serious crimes.

So like an intense juvie.

Yeah.

And the authorities were actually so nervous that the inmates might want to take revenge,

like the local inmates who maybe would have known Becca or even still just like knew where

she was from.

Yeah.

They were scared that they were going to want to like retaliate.

And so they couldn't tell anybody that Josh was in there for the murder of a local girl.

So instead they said that he was being held on possession of GHB.

I was like, yeah, let's not do that.

Like let's not protect him.

I, I agree, but at the same time, I'm like, protect him during the trial so that the family

can get peace and feed him to the fucking wolves.

But then you deal with the consequences of your actions, my friend.

Exactly.

And I think that's kind of what this was.

It was like, let's get through trial.

No, it makes sense.

Cause it's just like an initial reaction.

You're like, no, don't hide what he did.

Oh, that's my initial reaction.

But you are absolutely correct.

So he was mostly kept away from the other inmates to avoid any issue before trial.

Now, after eight months of negotiations, plannings, pretrial hearings, it all took forever.

Josh Davies trial finally began at the crown, excuse me, the crown court of Swansea on

June 22nd, 2011.

And it was expected to last around five weeks.

So the prosecutor was Greg Taylor.

And in his opening statement, he told the jury all about the breakup, how Josh had bragged

about wanting to kill Becca for a while now.

He continued to place the blame for her murder on his best friend.

And he said to the jury, quote, there's no doubt Rebecca was murdered.

She was hit a number of times to the head with a rock and a forest and abracan fig.

It was raining.

She was left for, she was left for dead on the forest floor in new clothes bought for

her the day before.

The prosecution says this boy sitting on the bench before you committed the murder.

And then he went on to tell the jury in full detail about all the abuse that Becca had

suffered from Josh in the months after their breakup and during their relationship.

Fuck this kid.

He and he included when he was telling the jury that Josh had told a friend, I want to

make her life hell and you won't convince me otherwise.

What the fuck was wrong with him?

So many things.

Oh.

Now, to close out his opening statement, Taylor drove home just how callous and cold

Josh was by telling the jury about the breakfast bet between the friends.

That's truly incredible.

And then told them about the group chat that the three of them shared where they went back

and forth with ideas on how to kill Becca.

You know, jokingly.

That's why these other two should be in trouble.

I agree too.

You weren't like, what are you doing in something and I'm worried about you two if you were

talking about that.

And I don't understand why they couldn't have been got on conspiracy to commit murder.

That's exactly what this was.

Planning it.

Exactly.

It's so messed up.

You want to pretend it was a joke?

It's not.

She was murdered.

So now you're in trouble.

And you should be.

Yeah.

So that's really frustrating to me that they weren't infuriating.

The first two witnesses called on the first day of trial were Becca's friends and they

were able to give even more details about the abuse and the constant talk of killing Becca.

One of the friends actually who was testifying had even been in a fight with Josh over how

he was treating Becca, but things were getting so contentious that Becca actually texted

him thanking him for standing up for her, but saying not to because it was basically

implying it would just make things worse.

Yeah.

Now the third witness called that day was Becca's mom, Sonia.

Among other things, she told the jury about her daughter's relationship with Josh, the

way he had been welcomed into her family.

And she's told the jury how she had been and she said she was very cross with him in that

past year for how he was treating Becca after the breakup.

And she told them how she was anxious that fall when Becca started bringing up the idea

of getting back together with him.

And finally, she told the jury all about the morning that Becca had spent getting ready

so excitedly to meet Josh.

That kills me.

She said how she was so excited she couldn't even sleep.

She told them about the bubble bath that she had prepared for Becca to get ready, just

like a little girl time.

And how nervous Becca was, but excited to start the relationship back up again.

That kills me.

And it must have been fucking gut-wrenching for her to go through that, but I'm so glad

she got the opportunity to paint that picture for the jury.

Yeah.

Like, my little girl was so fucking excited for this, and this is what he did to her.

That, it's fucked.

So when she finished answering the prosecutor's questions, Sonia prepared herself for the

cross-examination by Josh's defense lawyer, Peter Rouch.

Since Josh had tried to place all the blame on Daniel, Sonia was expecting a ton of questions

about Daniel and his relationship with Becca.

But he only had one singular, very bizarre question for Sonia, just one.

He asked her, could Becca swim?

And when Sonia said no, she couldn't, he declared he had no further questions.

That's chilling.

How weird is that?

Now the question confused Sonia, and it would actually be weeks until she learned it was

asked because there was a supposed plan that Josh Davies had developed with Daniel Ninnis

to throw Becca into a lake or quarry, which he thought would be easy because of her inability

to swim.

That is, I don't know.

My brain like won't even comprehend this.

I don't really understand what the defense thought they were doing here.

Like what was the rest of your line of questioning?

Because it's like, was it bolstered when she said no, she couldn't swim?

Well, I think that's probably, like, but what a risky move to make.

Because it's like, that was a 50-50 shot.

If she says yes, then maybe you can say, well, then this wasn't him planning her death,

she can swim.

Like they were just gonna, they were pranking her, but if there's a 50 shot, she says no.

And then you've just outed the fact that he was definitely planning to kill her because

she couldn't swim.

Well, and I think that's why he had no line of further questioning.

But like, why would you even give that a shot?

That is a risky, that's a bad lawyer.

Bad lawyer, right there.

Bad lawyer.

Now, there was a ton of testimony given in court, but once they had adjourned for the

day, all the press could report on was the ridiculous joke about Josh winning a free

breakfast.

And that was actually the headline that I saw, and I was like, what the fuck?

So I started reading about this case.

Now the headline of the times the next day read, youth murdered girl after promise of

a free breakfast.

That's so fucked up.

Like sensationalizing this entire thing, and also completely ignoring the detailed accounts

of abuse and threats that led up to the murder.

He didn't just murder her for free breakfast, there was way more at play there.

But of course, following lead, countless other news outlets honed in on the free breakfast

and just concentrated on that.

And this became the free breakfast case.

Of course.

It's like you're completely ignoring the themes of domestic violence and abuse here,

but cool.

Yeah.

Can we please talk about that?

Now, of course, while it may have been blown out of proportion, the comment about the

free breakfast was of significance to the prosecution's case because it shows how callous

and cold they are.

No, it's definitely important for sure.

But it's the fact that it's sensationalized by the media is not cool.

And the fact that it's being touted as like, this is why he did it, it's like, no, it's

even worse.

Yeah.

It really isn't one.

Like, that was just a joke.

But for the prosecution, they were like, we can use this because it shows intent and

premeditation.

That I understand.

I totally get that.

A little malice of forethought for you.

So the jury was actually shown two text message chains between the friends.

The first messages shown were sent the week before and included that original comment

about the breakfast.

And the second chain occurred the Thursday before the murder, and I'm going to read it

to you.

Okay.

I'm going to text Liam and says, don't say anything, but you may just owe me a breakfast.

What the fuck?

And Liam says, best text I ever had me seriously.

If it is true, I'm happy to pay for a breakfast.

Pick up Liam.

Yeah.

Everybody, let's go pick up that little shit stain.

Then Josh said, I hope by then it will be done and dusted.

Liam said, I want all the details you sadistic bastard, smiley face.

Josh said, large breakfast with extras of everything.

And Liam writes back, sick, sick boy, you are fucked, and you are just as motherfucking

guilty.

That's like shocking.

And for him.

That that kid was just out fine, like free.

Sick, sick boy.

Also, you guys are being fucking weird.

Well, I was just going to say, are you all right?

Yeah.

Like, okay.

And then to act like you're this terrified little puppy dog who's so scared that you're

going to get in trouble that you had to call mommy to come get you, go fuck yourself.

Yeah.

It's like, here you are talking a big game to your friend, the murderer.

And did you tell your mom that part?

Yeah.

Were you scared of yourself?

Did you tell your mom that you wanted every detail and you told him that with a winky

smiley face?

And that you were the one going to get the free breakfast?

Yeah.

Did you let mommy and daddy know that?

Did you let them know?

Liam.

You piece of shit.

I'm like right in the face.

I'm so angry.

I could feel it.

So gross.

So in the next day at trial, Daniel Ninnis and Liam Thomas' statements were given in

two parts.

First, the jury saw video testimony where both boys gave their accounts of what happened.

And then each boy was called to the stand to testify again to what they had seen and

heard on the day of the murder.

And I hope they were shaking in their fucking boots.

And I hope everyone on that jury saw them for exactly what they were, accessories to

murder.

Exactly.

They had slight variations in their stories, of course, because they're two teenage boys

and they're not going to see things the same, but they were pretty much the same.

And like many of the other teenagers who gave statements and testimony, they both said they

never took Josh seriously.

Daniel told the prosecutor, I thought it was a joke, a sort of slag-off sort of thing.

Oh, God, shut the fuck up.

But he did admit to the jury and to the prosecutor that in the weeks before the murder, Josh's

violent rhetoric got, quote, unquote, a lot more weird and specific.

But still, everyone just thought he was angry and just talking shit.

I was going to say, but still we decided, let's not say anything, whatever.

So after the testimony from Ninnis and Thomas, two pieces of human garbage and wet lettuce

and everything awful in the world, like that junk that gets caught in your dish strainer

when you're in the sink and it starts to smell bad, after that, a forensic analysis

provided the jury with an overview of the physical evidence collected at the scene,

which included 12 fibers from Josh's jacket on the rock that had been used.

So you really want to sit there and say it was Daniel?

Good try.

Not going to lie, Daniel's a piece of shit.

I was going to say it was all pieces of shit, but varying levels of pieces of shit.

Exactly.

Now, the pathologist, Dr. Stephen Ledberger, I believe it is, provided a detailed account

of the injuries that Becca had sustained.

He told the court, given the fragmentation of the skull, there had been blunt impact

to the back of the head, but the grazes, bruising and splits to the face might not have been

due to direct impact, but from the surface against which the face was lying against

further impact from the back of the head.

So basically what he was saying was, there was a lot of damage to the back of the head,

but then when we looked at the front of her face, there were scratches and bruises everywhere,

but that was because he was essentially beating her into the ground.

Oh my God.

As she was lying face down.

Oh, that's awful.

Brutal.

Absolutely.

Brutal.

Truly.

And his testimony stressed how brutal this was because not only had Josh tried to break

Becca's neck, he also continued this assault on her after she was motionless on the ground.

This was overkill.

So closing arguments were given by the prosecution and the defense on July 21st, and then the

jury adjourned to deliberate.

And they actually deliberated for nearly three days.

Oh, wow.

And they returned their verdict on Wednesday, July 27th, guilty as fuck.

Guilty.

Guilty.

Guilty.

So on September 2nd, 2011, Josh headed back to Swansea for sentencing.

And the judge in the case, Justice Lloyd Jones, read him to fucking filth and showed just

how disgusted he was with Josh's complete lack of remorse for the murder.

He described him as devious, calculating, and controlling, and added that he robbed

the Aleward and Oatley families of watching their, quote, precious and perfect girl flourish

into a successful young woman.

It's so true.

It is.

Because she would have been like a star in this world.

Yeah.

She would have.

She would have gone on to do huge things.

She had all the pieces.

And she would have added like so much kindness to wherever she was.

She just seemed like that way.

Oh, it makes me so sick.

Now when he finished with Josh, he sentenced him to life in prison with a minimum of 14

years, which was the maximum penalty allowed for an underage offender.

Bye, bitch.

And when the trial concluded, Sonia was able to make a statement to the press where she

called for the return of the death penalty and told them she hoped Josh would never

see the outside of prison again.

She said, I don't blame her at all.

I would have said the exact same thing.

She said, we will never forgive him for tearing our world apart so brutally.

And I would welcome the return of capital punishment for the likes of Joshua Davies,

who forfeited his human rights when he chose to take my daughter's life.

And I don't blame her one bit.

I still like my goosebumps have goosebumps.

I don't blame her one bit.

Nope.

I would have said the exact same thing.

That's her baby.

And that's, that's like her first baby.

Yeah.

That is your baby girl.

You have a right to say whatever the hell you want to this piece of filth.

Like Becca made her a mom.

Yeah.

And he took that away.

Oh, I can't.

He could never take that away.

But that took Becca.

Took that baby away from her.

So at the end of the day, Sonia was as happy as she could be with the outcome of the trial.

And she, she knew that the judge imposed the maximum sentence allowed.

So there was that.

Now overall, just the fact that a teenager could be so cruel to murder his ex-girlfriend

for what they thought was a free breakfast was totally sensational, like I was saying.

And readers were shocked around the UK.

But I think it's so important to stress that it wasn't about free breakfast.

Josh was controlling and he was abusive.

And he manipulated Becca during their relationship and after it.

I think he hoped that dumping her would be devastating to her, but it wasn't.

So this was like a final dig when he didn't have any use for her anymore.

Cause she didn't need you.

And that's what upset him.

That's exactly, exactly what it was.

He was an abuser and I think killing Becca was his final act of control over her.

Absolutely.

And when the trial ended, Sonya actually ended up moving her family away from the area to

start the grieving process.

And in 2014, she published by mom, I love you, which is a memoir about her experience

with the justice system in the wake of Becca's murder.

Oh my God, destroy my heart.

And I actually ended up using it a lot for research on this case.

And so did Dave.

Dave.

And now in 2018, Josh Davies actually finally confessed to Becca's murder.

Interestingly enough.

He actually confessed.

In 2018 though.

Oh, but you had said he didn't get, he was very vague, right?

He was very vague.

His reasons for murder still remain unclear.

Piece of shit to the end.

And Sonya believes that his confession was only made in preparation for an appeal.

Which I agree.

I absolutely agree with that.

She told reporters he's only doing it for his own benefit, not that he has any empathy

for this family.

It's cruel.

It is cruel.

Now if that is the case, like if he does try to go up for an appeal or probation or

anything like that, Sonya and Becca's sister Jess are ready and waiting with their own

victim impact statements and they are hoping that that will keep Josh in jail for as long

as humanly possible.

Hell yeah.

And I will get on a fucking plane to Wales if they need me to and stand there next to

them.

After hearing this, I'm like, hell yes.

Like keep that motherfucker in jail.

Is there a petition?

I don't think anything has happened yet.

Like no kind of appeal that I saw.

If there's an appeal, we're doing it.

Get that shit going.

Hell yeah.

Because that is a horrifying tale.

A horrifying, horrifying tale.

It reminds me of the Slenderman stuff.

It does.

Yeah, it's got that same vibe.

It does.

But even kids.

It's just the kids stuff.

Kids hurting kids like always, oof.

It's just awful.

Destroys me.

And it's like, oh.

For what?

For what?

Yeah.

For what?

For your ego?

For your ego?

Yeah.

How's he doing in prison?

How are you doing in there?

And he thought he was going to get away with it.

Yeah, of course he did.

He thought he was diabolical.

He was like, oh, I got this.

I'm cunning.

I can do it.

And then I'll just go get free breakfast.

Yeah, I'll get free breakfast and I'll blame it on my friend and it will be fine.

I hope that every breakfast he has gives him food poison.

Oh yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

Fuck you.

Diarrhea.

Fuck you.

Fuck you.

But yeah, guys.

Horrifying.

That was the sad, sad case of Rebecca Ilward.

Wow.

Thank you for sharing.

No prob.

So yeah, guys, we hope you keep listening.

And we hope you keep it weird.

I don't have to tell you not to keep it this weird and if I do, oh my god.

Call someone.

Everyone.

Or someone should call someone for you.

Call, call, call.

Yeah.

911.

What's your emergency?

Call 911.

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Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.