WEBVTT
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69 South 69 South 69 South.
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69 South 69 South.
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Welcome everyone to Podcast 69 South, where we discuss and discuss true crime, cold cases, current events and hot topics, along with our state of society today.
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This is your trigger warning.
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Our podcast content is produced for adult listeners, 18 years of age and older.
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We discuss situations that may be offensive and triggering to some listeners.
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Sit back, relax and enjoy Happy Friday everyone.
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Welcome back to another episode of 69 South Podcast.
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I am Chop, your host, and with me always is my beautiful co-host, julie.
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Hello.
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This is part two of the horrible, horrible probable cause affidavit from the Stafford case.
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I got to say I don't know about you, julie, but yesterday I was kind of glad that the time was running out and we had to stop.
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Some of this stuff is almost unbearable to read.
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It's disgusting, it's really disgusting the way these children were treated, but we got a lot to still go through, so we're going to jump right back into where we was yesterday, because these are two special episodes.
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We ended with a question, so once again, if you're new to this little series, julie is playing the state attorney and I am playing the lead investigator from Morgan County Sheriff's Department.
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Go back to the questions.
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What did she disclose about Brian and what happened with her?
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She disclosed an incident that took place in the chicken coop on the property.
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She talked about how Brian would touch her under her clothes all essential of her body.
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Clothes, all essential of her body.
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She also talked about how Brian would use lotion and put lotion on his hands and touch her private parts under her clothes in the chicken coop.
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And then she also talked about how she described the creamy stuff that would come out of his private parts while they were in the chicken coop together, Jesus.
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Did she describe that essentially, what sounded like he would masturbate in front of her in the chicken coop?
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Yes.
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Wow, and did you get a sense from Victim 2's interview how many times this would happen with Brian?
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She had said pretty much any time that they were alone together he would do this to her.
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she had said pretty much any time that they were alone together, he would do this to her and did she make any statements in her disclosure?
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Something to the effect of it got so bad she started having other people go with her when she was out on the property.
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Yes, she did.
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Did she talk about an incident with the shower when she had been showering and she got out of the shower and Brian was standing there looking at her body?
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She did.
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She had talked about how she got out and Brian was there essentially just staring at her and looking at her.
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Did she talk about an incident where she saw something similar happening to one of her sisters?
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Unfortunately.
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Yes, she did.
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And what did she disclose?
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That she witnessed, she had disclosed that she came up.
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She did, and what did she disclose that she witnessed?
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She had disclosed that she came up.
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She was walking on the property, came up to the chicken coop and saw Brian down on his knees with her sister Victim 3, and he was touching her in her private parts as well and did.
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Victim 2, in her interview, give some sense of how old she was when the molest with brian started.
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Yes, she did.
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I suppose I can ask it a different way.
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Did she disclose or from your recollection of her suzy's place interviews, did you get the impression that the molest happened when she was under the age of 12?
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yes, she did yes.
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She said yes, she did Initially.
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When she found out about the younger children, she had apologized that it had happened to them there was a previous disclosures that we'll talk about later Apologized but told him that she could not turn Brian in, and so we've talked about victim two.
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Let's talk now about victim three.
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She is the second child that was removed from Brian and Sonia in May of 2024, correct?
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That's correct.
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Okay, and again, just to kind of orient the court where we are, victim.
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Three was the first group that was adopted with Indiana, the Indiana children in 2011,.
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Correct?
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That's correct.
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And I believe you had testified that victim three was about two years old when she was adopted by the Staffords.
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Yes.
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Okay, is she really the only child that we have that has been there since 2011 to 2024?
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That's correct.
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And so was victim three, also interviewed twice at Susie's place.
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Yes, she was.
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And the first time was immediately after they were removed, correct?
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That's correct.
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Okay, and then the second time.
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I think you had testified that victim two was interviewed in October of 2024 or November.
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Is that correct?
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Yes, october of 2024.
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Yes.
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Okay, Victim three was interviewed the same day the second time.
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That's correct.
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Okay, and so you've talked through victim two's interview and her disclosure about sort of a day-to-day schedule, the punishment things that were in place at the farm.
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Did Victim 3 corroborate much of Victim 2's disclosure?
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She sure did.
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And did you learn any additional information about sort of the day-to-day that Victim 3 disclosed?
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That helped kind of give you a better picture of what was going on.
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I did?
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What did you learn?
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That gave you a better picture.
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She kind of walked through a little bit about how her day started.
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She disclosed that her day started at 5 am.
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She would get up, she'd start doing her chores.
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She had some that were, you know, taking care of the animals that were on the property, sweeping and mopping the floors, doing dishes.
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She specifically mentioned that the dishes that she would normally have to do were the dishes that were left over from Brian and Sonia from the night before that they didn't take care of themselves.
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Then she talked about how she was able to eat breakfast and then continue through her day with school work and other chores that she had as well.
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And so, combining victim two and victim three's interviews that were conducted, did you get the impression that the girls were made to work from the beginning of the day?
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When they were told to wake up out on the farm, they had their chores, they had to do, they had their schoolwork and then, on top of that, they basically were there to take care of whatever Sonia deemed necessary around the house.
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That is exactly the impression that I got around the house.
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That is exactly the impression that I got.
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Did it seem that they were all doing work and Sonia was doing?
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essentially nothing.
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That's also the impression that I got.
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Okay, and so did she talk about the food regimen, the schedule that the three of them were forced to follow.
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She did Her disclosure on the food schedule was consistent with the others.
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Follow she did Her disclosure on the food schedule was consistent with the others.
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She did mention that the only time that there would be like a deviation or change in the schedule was if there was other food that Sonia was going to throw out, so basically garbage.
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So they had talked about food that was going bad, food that was rotten.
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Essentially it could have been given to the farm animals or the girls were allowed to eat it.
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So did we learn from Victim 3's disclosure where the girls ate their meals?
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Yes, we did, and where's that?
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They had to eat in a separate location.
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So they started eating in the barn, which the barn has a storage room where their food, their sardines, their Roman and stuff is stored.
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They had.
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Well, she initially talked about how they ate in the room and later on had talked about how they just sat on the floor out in the main barn and would eat and they weren't eating in the main residence.
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And I might be jumping around a little bit, but during the course of this investigation did you find yourself go out to the property that the Staffords owned?
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Yes, I did.
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And was there a functional dining room in their home that had space for the children to eat?
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Yes.
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But from their interviews did you learn that they were not really allowed to use that space?
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Yes.
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Did victim three in her interview talk about any injuries that she had sustained while in Sonia's care?
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She did.
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She had talked about some frostbite that she had sustained as a result of not being able to wear adequate clothing during the wintertime as a punishment.
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And I think you testified that during victim two's interview she had talked about they would be punished by only being allowed to wear their bra and underwear outside in cold temperatures.
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Was that consistent in Victim 3's interview as well?
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Unfortunately, she disclosed that to me as well.
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yes, and so I'm showing you what's been marked as States Exhibit 2.
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Is that the scars of the frostbite that was on Victim 3?
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Yes.
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Okay, and is that a picture that was taken by DCS, I think, on May 22nd of 2024?
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Yes, it was.
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Okay, and where are the scars?
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Just under the kind of you can see, just under the pant line where she's rolled them up for the picture.
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So mid-like shin just under the knee.
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And did she give you the impression that these were kind of a result of her farm boots rubbing against her legs?
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Yes.
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Okay, the court moves to admit Exhibit 2, and the state has now admitted that into evidence.
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So did she also talk about in Victim 3's interviews?
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Did she talk about the alarms on the bedroom doors that had came up in the investigation with the Oregon kids?
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Yes.
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And what did Victim 3 disclose about those?
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She talked about the alarms being on the door and if they were to open the door it would send like a loud noise throughout the home.
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If they were to open the door, it would send like a loud noise throughout the home.
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Some people who know, essentially, if they were coming out of the room when they weren't supposed to be.
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And did victim three also talk about schooling and what was required of them when they were living with the Staffords?
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Yes, she did.
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Did she disclose anything that stood out to you and that we haven't already discussed about the schooling they had to do?
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No, that part was pretty consistent among the children with their schoolwork.
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And did you get the impression from victim three that the girls were rarely, if ever, allowed to leave the farm?
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Yes, I did.
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If they were to leave, were they always with Sonia.
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Yes.
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Did victim three also talk about holidays, similarly to how Victim 2 talked about holidays?
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Yes, she did and what she disclosed consistent with Victim 2's disclosure.
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Yes it was.
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Was there anything that stood out to you that's different, that we haven't talked about?
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No, not to this point.
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No, not to this point and did victim three also between her two interviews talk to DCS or talk about DCS visits out to the Stafford farm and whether the children were required to lie or not tell the truth.
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Yes, she did.
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What did she?
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disclose about that.
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She disclosed consistently with the others that they were told to lie and receive threats of being separated, not being able to see their siblings anymore, and that Brian or Sonia could go to jail.
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And was that and was this a threat that was made again by Sonia to the kids?
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Yes, it was.
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Okay, did victim three disclose anything about Brian?
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She did.
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She had disclosed that Brian molested her also.
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Victim 5, victim 11, victim 6, victim 2, and Victim 4.
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Did you get the impression from Victim 3 that it was pretty well known in the family that this was something that Brian had done to most of her sisters?
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Yes, I did.
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Did she talk about how the molest had started with her when she was approximately seven years old?
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She did.
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What sort of molest actions did she disclose that happened with Brian?
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She talked about how Brian would touch her over the clothes on her breast.
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She also talked about an incident which he described as in the chicken yard, which we've determined was the chicken coop actually, where he had molested her, touched her private parts inside in the chicken coop.
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And was that the same incident that victim two had disclosed walking in on?
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Yes, it is.
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Did victim three ever disclose to Sonia what was going on with Brian?
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She did.
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And did she, through her interviews, explain what Sonia's reaction to the disclosure was?
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That was all pretty consistent too.
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She had apologized.
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She couldn't turn Brian in.
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In previously disclosures to Sonia, Sonia also accused him of lying about it, because Brian was confronted at one point about it and Brian essentially said that the girls were making it up.
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So Sonia took him at his or her word and told the girls that they were lying about all of it.
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And for clarification, I guess for the court.
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Did you get the impression throughout your investigation that all of the girls that lived there at one point or another went to Sonia and disclosed Brian had been molesting them or exposing himself to them, or and disclosed Brian had been molesting them or exposing himself to them, or something to that effect?
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Yes, and with Sonia throughout these disclosures with multiple children, was she not very receptive to those disclosures?
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Would that be a fair way to categorize it?
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Absolutely.
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Okay, and you mentioned that at one point she had told the girls that she accused them of lying.
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That's correct.
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Did Victim 3 talk about what Sonia's reaction was when she learned about Victim 11 and Brian's kind of quote-unquote relationship?
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She talked a little bit about it.
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Sonia was not happy when she discovered that Brian and victim 11 were in an actual relationship together.
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And I know we've talked about a lot of different kids and we have a lot of different timelines.
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But to kind of orient the court and make sure our record is clear, when victim 11 and Brian's relationship came out, was victim 11 still living with Brian and Sonia Stafford.
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Yes.
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And do we know from your investigation that that relationship was disclosed around victim 11's 18th birthday, which would have been in October of last year?
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Yes.
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Okay, and do we know what ended up happening after Sonia learned about Brian and Victim 11's relationship?
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We do.
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And what ended up happening.
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Temporarily Victim 11 went and stayed with Brad in Bloomington and she stayed there for several months after Sonia first learned about their relationship between the two.
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And so you said initially, kind of stayed with Brad.
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Did victim 11 end up returning to the farm?
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Yes, she did Okay and so she was.
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As you testified previously, she was there in May of 2024 when DCS came out and started kind of their investigation.
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Yes.
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So the third child that had been removed from Brian and Sonia.
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Victim four was she also interviewed at Susie's place two times.
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Yes, she was.
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And the first time was she interviewed pretty much immediately after removal?
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Yes, and then the second time, was it the second day as her older sisters?
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It was the second day as her older sisters.
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yes, and, just as a reminder, was victim four from the very last group of children that was adopted from Florida in 2015?
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That is correct.
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How old was she when she was adopted?
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Victim four would have been five when she was adopted when she was adopted.
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Victim four would have been five when she was adopted and were both of victim four's interviews at Susie's Place, the shortest interviews out of the girls?
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Yes, they were.
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What did she disclose about Sonia in her interviews?
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She had talked about the showers, that the shower schedule that they had, how they were only allowed to take a shower twice a week.
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She also talked about the button box, consistently with what the other disclosures were.
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She did mention that she would start off with 500 points each day and they would have to work out, work off.
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And then she would also talk about how Sonia would grab her by her face and squeeze her on her face.
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She would have scratches and stuff on her face.
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Did you get the impression from the older girls from victim two and victim three's interviews that victim four kind of got the worst treatment while they were living at the Stafford's home?
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Yes, I did.
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Her disclosure of starting off with 500 points.
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Was it your impression that victim four basically started off in the hole as the system was designed and that she was constantly having to work points?
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off.
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That's exactly the impression that I got.
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Did victim four have any injuries that we haven't talked about when they were removed from the Staffords on May 22nd 2024?
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I think you mentioned some scratches and maybe some bruising.
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She had some marks on her right thigh which I believe from her disclosure were wax from Sonia.
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And during Victim 4's second interview did she get emotional?
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She did.
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And did she tell the interviewer that there were things that she hadn't talked about, that she just really wasn't ready to disclose?
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She did.
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During the interview she started getting really emotional.
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The interviewer kind of brought it up, trying to see what was prompting the emotion, and that's when she said that there was things that had taken place and that she was essentially wasn't ready to talk about them yet Okay.
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So during the first round of interviews at Susie's Place, did it become apparent to you that there was going to be a necessity to go out to the house on 5600 Herbie Mont Road?
00:18:51.034 --> 00:18:51.275
Yes.
00:18:52.359 --> 00:18:55.448
And did you obtain a search warrant to do that?
00:18:56.230 --> 00:18:56.872
That is correct.
00:18:57.381 --> 00:18:58.759
When was this executed.
00:18:59.280 --> 00:19:03.371
It was executed on the 23rd after the Suzy's Place interviews were.
00:19:03.371 --> 00:19:07.384
Well, I apologize, we obtained it during the search warrant.
00:19:07.384 --> 00:19:19.685
During the interviews I have, in between interviews, coordinated with Detective Shane Norris and Corporal Zach Dodson to see if they could start executing the search warrant while they were when they were granted.
00:19:19.685 --> 00:19:29.192
So I actually coordinated with them after our first Susie's Place interview and they went with uniformed deputies and secured the residence and started executing it.