Do you also get that feeling when you are listing to a great True Crime Podcast that you are one day going to run out of pods to listen to?
The best true crime podcasts are the ones that you aurally consume entire seasons of at a time. The ones that, just like the best documentaries on Netflix, are truly bingeable. These are compelling stories, telling us the kind of true crime tales that somehow, we feel we should already have known. True crime and podcasts work so well together simply because the medium is so accessible.
AS the world gets busier, it is often hard to slow down to catch a moment to read. This is where podcasts come in. In the last decade, podcasting has grown in popularity, increasingly featuring interesting content to binge as you go about your day.
Some of these podcasts aren’t new and many have simply added another season. But I’ve enjoyed them all.
Plenty of Podcasts
I know it is crazy – there are many more great shows for our ears than we have hours in the day.
Often it helps to add another platform like Pocket Cast. It makes slightly different recommendations, so I’ve discovered a who lot of new podcast.
I also suggest keeping a pen and paper handy (I know I’m old school). I listen to the few versions with advertising and enjoy hearing about new podcasts. I write down all the names and then look them up later.
I enjoy listening to different kinds of podcasts at different times. When I’ve got time, I love diving into a longform investigations. I also enjoy podcasts about cults and scams. (For me many of them operate in a similar way). I love old Hollywood and the music scene, especially regarding crime and misbehavior.
The best true crime podcasts below are a mix of investigative seasons and standalone episodes
So, let’s look at (or listen to) my top picks for the first half of the year.
Disgraceland and Badlands
Jake Brennan is the writer, host and producer of Disgraceland. He is also the creator of the podcast’s score and theme song.
Disgraceland is a music and true crime podcast that tells the jaw dropping stories of musicians behaving very badly… and some even getting away with murder.
Badlands is a true crime podcast that dives deep into the real stories of the famous at their most infamous. Hosted by Jake Brennan, each episode explores the real-life crimes and scandals of the world’s most popular cultural figures. In this brand-new season discover the wild true stories behind Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s stint as a teenage jewelry theft ringleader, Armie Hammer’s scandalous cannibalism kink, Drew Barrymore’s tragically early introduction to drugs, and many more.
Counterclock
CounterClock Season 4 is investigating the 2003 death of 17-year-old John Welles in Arcadia, Florida. Host and investigative journalist Delia D’Ambra is re-examining the facts and evidence in the case and digging up new clues that have not been previously known. The secrets hidden in the victim’s rural community prove to be the toughest and most dangerous case the team has pursued so far and forces Delia to go toe-to-toe with some of the highest government entities in the Sunshine state.
This year-long investigation includes never-before heard interviews and archive audio from suspects, witnesses, family members and police investigators. Delia has reviewed hundreds of documents, photos, and transcripts in her quest to answer the question…who killed John Welles?
Series 1,2 and 3 are just as awesome.
Hell and Gone
Host Catherine Townsend takes you along on a journey as she investigates the 2004 murder of 14-year-old Rebekah Gould. In Hell and Gone, you can put your detective cap on and help Townsend, a licensed private investigator, and writer, as she sorts through clues. Catherine moved to Arkansas to try and find Rebekah’s killer and get justice for the young girl. Every week, she and her team track down suspects and piece clues together to get closer to the answer.
The Trojan Horse Affair
Everyone loves a classic mystery, and The Trojan Horse Affair is that and more. Arguably the best show released by Serial Productions in a long time, it follows Hamza Syed and Brian Reed as they look into the eponymous British political scandal of the early 2010s and the mysteries around it. The scandal led to Islamaphobic tensions in England, and the two hosts take you through the many secret documents and twists and turns. This show will keep you on the edge of your seat.
Cold Season 1 and Season 2
Susan Powell vanished from her home in West Valley City, Utah on a cold December day in 2009. Her husband, Josh Powell had taken the couple’s two sons out camping in a blizzard. He claimed to have no idea where his wife had gone. While her husband Josh was a suspect from the outset, he was never charged or arrested and her body has never been found. Over eighteen hour-long episodes and three comprehensive bonus add-ons, Dave Cawley breaks down the case in granular detail. This is no true crime quick fix. Stories like this one take time.
The story itself is deeply upsetting and frustrating as Cawley reveals the desperation of the police at the time as they failed to snare proof of Susan’s husband’s guilt before tragedy struck again. But the case is, as the title says, Cold, and Cawley is still deeply involved, tracking GPS movements from 2009 and attempting to find his way into hard drives. It’s not easy but Cold is essential investigative journalism.
The Clearing
The Clearing offers an unexpected spin on the conventional true-crime podcast formula, with its central voice being not just an investigative reporter, Josh Dean, but also the daughter of the culprit, April Balascio, who tipped off police in 2009 after suspecting that her father was responsible for a spate of murders in the early 1980s
When April Balascio was 40 years old, something she’d feared for decades was finally proven true. Her father, Edward Wayne Edwards, really was a murderer. The Clearing is about what came after April called a detective to tell him about her suspicions — a call that led to her father’s arrest and eventual conviction on multiple murders — and tracks the emotional journey as she and host Josh Dean dig back into her childhood, unravel the truth of her father’s life, and overturn a viral online narrative that had turned Edward Wayne Edwards into a kind of serial killer caricature. Produced by Pineapple Street Studios in association with Gimlet.
Four Days, Five Murders – WUFT News
In August 1990 a serial killer terrorized Gainesville, murdering five students just as the fall semester began. How does trauma travel over three decades, and what mark does it leave on a town like Gainesville? WUFT’s “4 Days, 5 Murders” explores the answers
Somebody
In 2016, Shapearl Well’s son Courtney was found outside a police station in Chicago with a bullet wound. Despite an ambulance being called, he died four minutes before he reached the hospital. The podcast Somebody is the truly disturbing investigation by Wells into what happened to her son
Here in Somebody in her quest to find justice, Wells examines and discusses the clear prejudices when it comes to the murder of a Black man in Chicago. The podcast is an utterly compelling listen with a heart wrenching constant reminder of the reasons that change needs to happen so urgently.
Crimetown
In Crimetown, Marc Smerling and Zac Stuart-Pontier work in partnership with Gimlet Media.
Each season, they investigate the culture of crime in a different city. In Season 2, Crimetown heads to the heart of the Rust Belt: Detroit, Michigan. From its heyday as Motor City to its rebirth as the Brooklyn of the Midwest, Detroit’s history reflects a series of issues that strike at the heart of American identity: race, poverty, policing, loss of industry, the war on drugs, and our universal desire for a savior. Detroit’s a tough town, and its residents are even tougher. They’ve weathered riots, a drug epidemic, political scandal, and innumerable other hardships, but they’re still here—and they have stories to tell.
Down the Hill: The Delphi Murders
On Valentine’s Day in 2017, two teens, Liberty German, 14, and Abigail Williams, 13, were found murdered near a hiking trail in Delphi, Indiana, after going missing the day before. When police released a short audio clip believed to belong to the male suspect, it included only three words: “down the hill.” But the eerie voice, yet to be identified, was enough to make my hair stand on end. Here, the podcast breaks down the tragic story that continues to haunt Indiana today.
Killer Queens: A True Crime Podcast
Killer Queens is a weekly True Crime Podcast for anyone who loves all things 90’s. Hosted by sisters Tyrella and Tori, each case is discussed in a light, casual way that is always respectful to victims and their families.
White Lies
This devastating podcast from NPR, which looks back to the 1965 murder of Reverend James Reeb—a white pastor involved in the civil rights movement—in Selma, Alabama, is a powerful window into the secrets and unspoken truths of race relations in the American South.
In 1965, Rev. James Reeb was murdered in Selma, Alabama. Three men were tried and acquitted, but no one was ever held to account. Fifty years later, two journalists from Alabama return to the city where it happened, expose the lies that kept the murder from being solved.
Serum
Gary Davis, an Ivy League trained Black physician from Tulsa, Oklahoma, had one passion: to find a cure for Aids. In the 1990s, Davis brought his research to the FDA to start a clinical trial — but just hours before it was supposed to start — his trial was shut down. Davis had powerful critics, and ardent supporters. Some sued in court to be allowed to try Davis’ treatment, while others chose to ask for forgiveness rather than permission to get their hands on it. Desperate to get financial support to conduct trials, the doctor forged dubious alliances, and when he died unexpectedly, many of his followers suspected foul play.What was the true potential of Davis’ serum — and who are the people who say it saved their lives?
Bad Blood: The Final Chapter
True crime podcasts are packed with scams and fraudsters but very few of these cases are as public and brazen as the one of Elizabeth Holmes.
Holmes told the world that she had created machines that could perform blood tests on just one drop of blood taken from a finger. The only problem, even after endless money was poured into the company, was that she hadn’t.
Bad Blood: The Final Chapter is presented by journalist John Carreyrou who broke the original story of everything not being as it seemed within Theranos. Carreyrou went on to write a book about the case and is now back with this podcast as Holmes has her day in court.
The Dream
Emmy award-winning journalist and ex-This American Life producer Jane Marie dives into the seedy world of MLMs in this compelling eleven-part podcast.
While companies like Amway swear that they aren’t a pyramid scheme – “because that would be illegal” – the laws around the structure of MLMs are incredibly vague. Interviewing those involved at every level of MLMs, Jane Marie uncovers the fascinating truth behind these elaborate exercises in psychology, manipulation, and, of course, cold hard cash.
X-Files-style, it turns out that the nefariousness here goes all the way to the top.
Autopsy: The Last Hours Of…
Autopsy: The Last Hours Of… is a series that reveals the truth behind the controversial deaths of global icons and people whose untimely deaths were surrounded by scandal and intense media attention.
Fact and fiction are forever separated through reconstructions of their final hours using crucial medical evidence from the actual autopsies to explain how and why they died while interviews with friends and family shed light on the events that led to death—finally putting an end to the speculation. Hosted by Dr. Michael Hunter.
Father wants us Dead
In 1971, a mild-mannered accountant and Sunday school teacher from New Jersey meticulously murdered his wife, mother and three children.
John List left behind a letter explaining his horrific deeds and disappeared to start a new life. Now, two award-winning journalists go inside the mind of the killer, uncover new details about the doomed family and the twisted crime that took their lives, and take you along on the unbelievable 18-year quest to bring this father to justice, a saga even more bizarre and twisted than ever previously reported.
