Bonus Episode: Updates on a case, on life and on the podcast - unfiltered

We share a raw, unedited bonus that pulls back the curtain on how the show gets made while we juggle real life behind the mic. We also bring a meaningful update on the New Bedford Highway Killings and answer listener questions with zero polish and full honesty. 
• new movement in the New Bedford Highway Killings after a Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling 
• why DNA testing in the 1988 Dartmouth case could matter beyond one conviction 
• how we research true crime cases using documents, archives, and timelines 
• why scripting focuses on human stakes instead of fact dumps 
• the unsexy reality of audio cleanup and late-night editing 
• balancing the podcast with ER work and single motherhood 
• a fiction project about a nurse vigilante and the ethics of sympathetic villains 
• listener Q&A on case selection, fear, paranormal belief, and time management 

If you have any, send them in and I will gladly cover as many as I can. 
If you want to weigh in on what I read from the book or what questions you want answered on the next time, drop in in the Patreon comments. 

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Please send cases you want covered or stories you want read on the podcast to darkcrossroadspodcast@gmail.com. Don't forget to like, share, rate, review, and subscribe wherever you're listening to us. You can subscribe through the link in the episode notes to receive bonus content, discounts on future merchandise, and other extras.

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Transcript

Raw Bonus Episode Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:46

Hey guys, it's Roxanne, and this episode is just for you. The most raw surrealist episode, most unedited episode that I have made so far. There will be probably a little bit of noises in the background. I'm sorry for that. Um, there's no deep dive case this time. Instead, I'm pulling back the curtains a little bit. I have real updates on a case that I covered before. I look at how everything is made around here, and some chaos from the cutting room floor, and I'm also answering some of your questions, the good, the bad, the weird, and the are you okay ones. So grab your coffee or whatever gets you through your day, because let's be honest, that's more accurate for me these days. So yeah, let's get into this. So if you have followed this podcast from the very beginning, you will know this case. It's about nine women, maybe more, New Bedford, Massachusetts, late 1980s. A killer who was never caught in a case that sat cold for almost 40 years. Well, guess what? There's actual movement in this case. Back in April, the Massachusetts Supreme Court made a ruling that's got investigators and victims' families cautiously hopeful. Here's the connection. There was a separate 1988 murder in Dartmouth. A man named Sean Tanner was convicted of it. Tanner always maintained he was innocent, and before he died, he had been fighting to get old evidence. Fingernail

New Bedford Case Gets Movement

SPEAKER_00 2:15

scraping specifically tested for DNA. Why does this matter to the case that was covered by Dark Crossroads? Because the method used in that Dartmouth murder, strangulation with an article of clothing, is strikingly similar to the highway killings. It happened in the same time frame, same general area, same brutal signature. So the families of the highway victims argued, if we test this DNA, it might not just clear or convict Tanner. It might finally point us toward the real highway killer. And the court agreed, and testing is moving forward. Now I want to manage expectations here. This is not a case-solved update. It's a the door just cracked open a little bit update. But after almost four decades, a crack is still something. And don't you worry, guys, I'm gonna keep you posted the second that there's more information about this. Okay, so switching gears a little bit, a bunch of you have asked some version of how do you even research this stuff? So let me actually walk you through this. It usually starts off really messy. I'm talking court documents, old newspaper archives, sometimes grainy local news footage from the eighties and nineties, books written by journalists who covered it in real time. Like the reporting that exists on the New Bedford case. I read everything I could get my hands on before I write a single word of script. Then comes the timeline. I build out a literal chronological map. Who, what, when, where because true crime cases get messy really fast,

How I Research And Script

SPEAKER_00 3:56

especially cold cases with decades of false leads and dead-end suspects. If I'm confused about writing it, you're going to be confused listening to it. So the timeline is a non-negotiable for the podcast. Only after that do I start actual scripting. And that's where the Dark Crossroads voice comes in. I'm not just reciting facts at you. I'm trying to put you in the passenger seat. What did the air feel like that night? What did her mother say when she got the call? That's the difference between a Wikipedia article and the story that sits with you at the end of our episodes. And then audio cleanup, which I am still getting the hang of, which nobody talks about because it is not glamorous, but it's hours of noise reduction, level matching, breath removal, the unsexy part of the job that makes it sound like a real show instead of someone talking into their phone in a closet, which half the time is literally what is happening. Okay, real talk for a second. I am doing this show. I am researching, scripting, recording, editing, I'm doing all of this. While I'm also working full-time in the emergency room, and while I'm also navigating becoming a full-time single mother. So there have been episodes that have been dropped a few days later than planned. Actually, weeks later. Or my voice sounds a little more tired than usual in this segment. This is why. I'm not saying that for sympathy. I'm saying it because I think there's something honest about showing you the reality behind the mic. The show does not get made in some quiet, orderly studio. It gets made in stolen hours after

Making The Show While Exhausted

SPEAKER_00 5:41

a 12-hour shift, after my kids finally asleep, sometimes at 1 a.m. with a cup of coffee that has gone cold twice already. And honestly, the emergency room probably makes me better at this. You see a lot of raw humanity working in the emergency room. Fear, grief, resilience, the same stuff that shows up in every case that I cover. It's not lost on me that I go from real trauma at work to researching other people's trauma for the show. Some days that gets heavy on me. Most days it's why I keep doing this. Because I think that these stories and the people in them deserve to be told with care. So thank you from the bottom of my heart for being here. Genuinely. This tier of support is what is part of what makes it possible for me to keep going. Okay, so also something I haven't talked about much publicly yet is I am deep in writing a novel. I wouldn't really call it a novel, more like it's a fiction book that I'm very passionate about. Um it's not true crime this time, it's fiction. The premise is a nurse who becomes a vigilante serial killer. I can't give away too much yet, but I will say writing a protagonist who's supposed to be sympathetic, who you're supposed to root for even as she's doing genuinely terrible things, is one of the hardest and most interesting writing challenges that I've ever taken on. Some of it is definitely informed by things I've seen and felt in the emergency room. Moments where the system fails people, and you understand uncomfortably why someone might want

Writing A Vigilante Nurse Thriller

SPEAKER_00 7:13

to take justice into their own hands. Not that I would ever endorse that, of course, but understanding it, that's a job of fiction. More on this soon, though. I might even read you an excerpt in a future bonus episode if you guys are interested, so let me know if you are. Alright, so let's get into some listener questions. These are ones that I've drafted based on what tends to come up the most. I get a lot of the same questions, or I get a lot of some that are very similar. If yours isn't in here, send it in and I'll answer it next time. First one is how do you pick which cases to cover? Honestly, it's a mix of what's haunted me, cases I can't stop thinking about, and what I think deserves more attention than it's gotten. Sometimes it's a case with a huge following already, and I want to bring my own angle to it. And sometimes it's something obscure that maybe three true crime accounts have covered. Some of the cases I also get sent to my inbox, family members or friends asking for a case to be

Listener Questions And Honest Answers

SPEAKER_00 8:13

covered to get more light on it and get some more answers. I have done a few of those and I am always willing to do more. If you have any, send them in and I will gladly cover as many as I can. Does researching this stuff ever scare you or get to you? Yes, absolutely. Some nights I'm reading through case files right before bed, and I have to physically make myself stop and watch something mindless for about 20 minutes because I won't be able to sleep. It's part of the job, it's part of this hobby, but I don't think you should get fully numb to it. The second this stuff stops affecting me is the second I stop telling these stories with the respect that they deserve. Do you believe in the paranormal stuff that you cover or is it just for fun? It's somewhere in the middle, I would say. I don't need to believe something is literally factually true to find it worth exploring. Folklore and legend exist because they are doing something for the people who tell them. Processing fear, explaining the unexplainable, that's true whether or not a Wendigo is real. But I do have my own firsthand experiences with paranormal. And I do believe a lot of it happens. And if somebody sends me their story or their first hand account, I will always believe them. I will always hold that space for people. Last question is how do you have time for all of this? I don't. I just don't. And that's the end of that one. So that's a bonus episode for you guys. Thank you truly for being in this tier, for sticking with the show, and for letting me be a little more unfiltered with you here than I can be on the main feed. Next main feed episode is coming. I actually recorded it right before this. And if you want to weigh in on what I read from the book or what questions you want answered on the next time, drop in in the Patreon comments. Until next time, stay curious, stay a little suspicious, and I'll see you at the crossroads.