Cooper Moll
Appearances
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
His state of decomposition and his clothes were the first clues. Bermuda shorts and a light sweater. This was winter in Oklahoma City, and tonight, the temperature was below freezing.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
And it looked like someone else had last driven the Bronco.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
The officers ran the license plate. The car belonged to Norman Allen Rarig. He was 30 and lived in Dallas, Texas, about 200 miles away.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
Then the next clues. There was no weapon at the scene, no wallet. And here's the strangest part, no car keys.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
This is the unbelievable story of a femme fatale with a trail of bodies in her wake. From Sony Music Entertainment, this is Fatal Beauty, available now on The Binge. Search for Fatal Beauty wherever you get your podcasts to start listening today. Oklahoma City was shrouded in a quiet chill that December night. It was a couple of weeks before Christmas in 1985.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
Was this a robbery gone wrong? Still, something wasn't tracking.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
He had two gunshot wounds from a .38 caliber pistol, one to the head, precise and deliberate, and the other to the body, leaving no doubt about the brutality of the crime. The faint odor of death intermingled with the frozen air. The officers exchanged knowing looks. This, they knew, was murder. But how this man was killed was something they wouldn't know for a long time.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
And the victim himself, wedged between the seats of his car in a parking lot in Oklahoma in the dead of winter, had no idea of the danger he was in moments before he died. Alan Rarig was the kind of tall, broad-shouldered man that made people do a double take. An athlete. A hometown hero. The kind of man who would have aged gracefully. Chiseled even in middle age.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
Were he not face down on the back floorboard, his life ended. He hadn't fully appreciated that someone had it out for him. That someone wanted him dead. From Sony Music Entertainment, this is Fatal Beauty. Available now on The Binge. Search for Fatal Beauty wherever you get your podcasts to start listening today. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
Alan Rarig was found dead in a parking lot in Oklahoma. He'd been shot twice. Once to the head. You'd think his wife would be devastated. Not exactly.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
The hum of jet engines could be heard in the distance. Two Oklahoma City police officers were patrolling a secluded area not too far from the Will Rogers Airport.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
Was someone in there? It was hard to see. Frost clung stubbornly to the vehicle's windows, obscuring the inside, as if nature itself sought to shield the horrors within. As the officers approached the Bronco, the cold air felt heavier, almost suffocating. One officer gripped the passenger door handle, pulling hesitantly. It was locked, left with no choice but to pry it open.
Sea of Lies from Uncover
Uncover Introduces: Fatal Beauty from Sony Music Entertainment
Inside, the scene was chilling beyond the winter's cold. The partially decomposed body of a man in his prime wedged between the front seats, his head face down on the back floorboard. He was young, 30-something. His lifeless form seemed to have been abandoned in a final, grotesque tableau. Retired homicide detective Kyle Eastridge recalls the scene.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Introducing… Fatal Beauty
It was a baffling tragedy, one you would imagine would have devastated his wife, Sandra Bridewell. But as investigators started to piece together the case, a far more frightening set of circumstances came to light.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Introducing… Fatal Beauty
Alan Rarig was found dead in a parking lot in Oklahoma. He'd been shot twice, once to the head.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Introducing… Fatal Beauty
Soon, people began to wonder, who was Sandra Bridewell?
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Introducing… Fatal Beauty
And she had the charm to charm men, any man. This is the unbelievable story of a femme fatale with a trail of bodies in her wake and a lifetime of deception that has never been fully aired until now.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Introducing… Fatal Beauty
From Sony Music Entertainment, this is Fatal Beauty, coming April 1st to The Binge. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
And if Sandra was capable of lying about this, where did she draw the line? From the start, she'd played him. He was never going to be a father. This was it. Gloria felt she had to stop Sandra from profiting off her son's death. His money should stay within the family. Not go to the woman she suspected of taking his life.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Nearly six months after Alan was shot to death, Gloria still hadn't heard any new developments from detectives on arresting Sandra. But she did hear from the life insurance company that sold Alan his policy. And the news wasn't good. Since Sandra hadn't been arrested, she was going to get the payout in 24 hours.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Gloria knew if she had any chance of stopping Sandra from getting that $220,000, she needed to get a lawyer ASAP.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
David Wise was a probate attorney in Dallas. He wasn't a cop, but he was exactly the kind of professional Gloria needed. Someone who could fight Sandra in court, stalled out life insurance payout, and if possible, strip Sandra of her power over Allen's estate.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
This was a neighborhood where first impressions were everything. Alan apparently understood the assignment.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The letter claimed Sandra, the beneficiary, was the prime suspect in Allen's murder, so the payout should be delayed, at least until that suspicion could be ruled out or proven. David didn't stop there. We're talking murder here. This wasn't merely a probate case. So he set up a hearing before Nikki DeShazo, judge of Dallas County's probate court.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
He subpoenaed detectives Mitchell and Pacheco to come along with him.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Criminal defense attorneys in probate court. More fodder for the claim David was there to make.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
If David wanted to approach it that way, Judge DeShazo was prepared to play by those rules. Here he is recounting what she said.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
They left it at that, and the hearing would be continued at a later date. If Sandra couldn't be the administrator of Allen's estate, they had to put someone else up for the job. David suggested Allen's cousin, Robert Smith. He was local to the area and willing to rise to the occasion.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
In early July, an official application was filed to remove Sandra as administrator and replace her with Robert.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Robert stood in Sandra's way, plain and simple. So she might have had a motive to kill. And yet, it's unclear if Robert's death was ever investigated as a homicide. His death quickly deemed a suicide. By now, you're probably thinking, how on earth does this keep happening? That question was nagging me too. It seemed to me whether a death gets deemed a suicide or not was awfully subjective.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Turns out it wasn't until 1988 that the forensic scientists and medical community started laying out the criteria for what makes suicide a suicide. And that was two years after the last suicide in Sandra's orbit. But get this, in America, there's no universal standard for coroners or medical examiners to follow to this very day.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The sparkling SUV made its way down Lorain Avenue, cruising slowly in hopes of spotting a for rent sign. Instead, someone caught Alan's eye that June morning. Sandra was standing out in the yard talking to her yard man. She looked like a pinup living inside a Norman Rockwell painting. Might she have a lead?
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
That means a determination that a death is a suicide, not a murder, is a judgment call. Coroners and medical examiners commonly rely on what first responders say or witnesses who say the deceased seems suicidal or was depressed. I was shocked when I found this out. Because shouldn't it take more than a witness's word to have a death be ruled a suicide? For murder to be off the table?
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Especially if, like in Sandra Bridewell's case, they stood to gain financially. Detectives were still digging for that burden of proof the judge required. Until early that September, David Wise got some good news.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
For Allen's murder, it was circumstantial evidence, but a lot of it. How she stood to get the life insurance payout, how Sandra lied about Allen having shady connections or a drug habit, her odd behavior after his death, not cooperating, her alibi wasn't rock solid either. The detectives hoped, altogether, it would be enough for a grand jury to indict Sandra.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
David notified the court and Detectives Pacheco and Mitchell.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
It would be presented to the grand jury in Oklahoma City that November, a different court than where the probate battle was playing out. Then in a bizarre turn of events, Sandra made a shocking move in the battle for Allen's cash.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
But the damage had already been done. $102,000 of the $220,000 had already gone. Paid towards debts, legal fees, and expenses that Allen had no idea she'd accrued.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
This is Carrie Huskinson. She's a private investigator who went to unbelievable lengths to trace Sandra's web of deception. By 1986, Huskinson told me she didn't have any allies. Not anymore.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Between being named a prime suspect in a murder and duking it out in probate court with her former mother-in-law?
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Back then, in the 80s, pre-internet, it was easier to start over, to head somewhere new and wipe your slate clean. If there's no Reddit, anonymous haters can't keep resurfacing the allegations against you. So Sandra truly could leave for California, put her blinkers on, and try a new scheme. One that didn't require walking down the aisle.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Sandra made a soft landing in another wealthy enclave, Belvedere, in Marin County. Here's veteran reporter Glenna Whitley again.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
It's a place where privilege meets paradise. Tucked just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco, Warren County feels like a world of its own, where rolling hills meet the Pacific, redwoods stretch toward the sky, and affluence is woven into the fabric of daily life.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The Bridewells, yeah, Sandra dropped Rarig when she got there, moved into a luxury apartment near the San Francisco Yacht Club. Ever since I heard she'd moved to California, I wondered about the timing. If you're facing an indictment, why put down roots when there's a possibility of jail time? Huskinson reminded me who we're dealing with here.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
This was the first Gloria had heard anything about that. Naturally, she was curious whether the FBI could make any bona fide progress on her son's murder case. Gloria told me their response was underwhelming. They didn't know anything more than what the Oklahoma City police had said. That's all the contact she ever had with them.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The guy's been in Dallas for one stinking day, and he's already got a total bombshell eager to lend him a hand.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
I reached out to the FBI to ask about Alan's murder. I asked them if they ever called in his widow Sandra for an interview. I asked whether they ever nailed down her whereabouts from the day Alan went missing to four days later when he was found. I asked what evidence they were able to unearth that Oklahoma police hadn't. There was a lot of back and forth after I first reached out.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Would I be able to get to the bottom of this mystery? Then, public affairs passed along final comment. The FBI's field office in Oklahoma were unable to help me, just like they were unable to help then. For her part, Gloria lost her nerve after Sandra went on the offensive. She hired a lawyer who made it clear that she should watch what she says about Sandra publicly. And that was it for Gloria.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The last of Alan's life insurance, the $118,000, went to Sandra. It was devastating. It really was. This wasn't about the money. The end of the probate battle signaled an end to the investigation into Alan altogether.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
When Alan was murdered in 1985, she didn't just lose him. She lost the future she had dreamed for him. And worst of all, she believed the person responsible walked away free. Sandra had the motive, the lies, and the payout, but no charges were ever filed.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Here, David Wise is talking about all law enforcement. I reached out to the Dallas Police Department to see what a spokesperson had to say about his allegations that they should have been more involved. David Wise alleged they had dropped the ball. The spokesperson from the Dallas PD had no comment. Sandra was officially free to start over without criminal charges. It seemed no one could stop her.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
They struck out that day. But in no time, Sandra pulled Alan into her world. He was 29, a tall, dashing redhead.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
That's the reporter, Glenna Whitley. She told me Sandra set quite the elaborate trap in Marin County.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Sandra acted like she didn't need their money, but that's exactly what she was after.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
an attorney who was recently separated from his wife, instantly captivated by Sandra. In August of 88, the two met at a dinner party in Sonoma County, wine country. She was beautiful but not flashy, sophisticated but not intimidating, just mysterious enough to make a man lean in, just tragic enough to make him want to help.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
As their relationship deepened, she confided in Dennis about temporary financial setbacks, delayed trust fund disbursements, and postponed real estate deals. Their affair was getting intense, and Dennis was moved by her plight, and he just wanted to help her. So he offered her a loan. Would $5,000 work? He actually takes out money on a credit card and gives it to her. She promised to pay him back.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Sandra spun stories like silk. There was always something subtle, desperate, always justified. Her son's college tuition, rent, airfare, hotel rooms, car repairs.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The requests grew more frequent and substantial. Dennis even racked up credit card debt for her. She promised to pay him back. She just needed a little money just to help her get through a rough patch. But here's the thing.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
In about three months, Dennis had loaned Sandra nearly $24,000. That's over $63,000 today. He starts to realize, wait a minute, what's going on here? Before Dennis could get an answer, or a promissory note signed for that matter, Sandra's explanations became vague. The woman who had once been warm, affectionate, and grateful now seemed distant.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Dennis' date might have ditched him and the bill, but he wasn't alone.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Here's Tom Finney on San Francisco's News Center 4.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
When the 45-year-old insurance executive learned he'd been duped by the Dallas damsel in distress, he took it to the press. Dennis Kuba, he wasn't as media friendly.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
He never responded to my calls or letters either. In the news segment, Tom Finney appears with his wife, also named Sandra. Today, both of the Finneys have passed away. But here's what his wife said at the time about Sandra.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Allen certainly wasn't in Oklahoma anymore. He was not used to anything like that kind of society. Usually, she relied on her potential suitors to wine and dine her. With Alan, she was something of a mama warbucks. Floor seats to Springsteen concerts, tickets to Mavericks games, a trip to Hawaii.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The couple had met Sandra at a dinner party. Unbeknownst to his wife, Sandra had called Mr. Finney asking for help. There was something she wanted to run by him. You guessed it. She needed money. Here's what Tom Finney said about it.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
I asked Whitley, who interviewed him in 1989, what Tom told her was his rationale for loaning money to this virtual stranger.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Sandra had an uncanny ability to make men do what she wanted them to. She weaponized sorrow with the precision of a seasoned predator.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
That amount didn't go unnoticed by his wife.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
He assured her that the two never had an affair. But she was livid he'd given away their money. Can you blame her? Mrs. Finney had Tom call Sandra up to recover the fund's stat. Here's Whitley recounting what Sandra had to say about that.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
And it turned out, of course, that Sandra didn't just ruin the lives of these men. Whitley found out she'd stolen from a stable of men, men who'd been left broken, and in some cases, their lives hollowed out like gutted fish. The ones who fought back found themselves ensnared in something even darker, an undeniable sense that Sandra wasn't just taking their money.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
She was taking their dignity, piece by piece.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
But Tom, he was willing to take Sandra to task. This is just speculation, but I've got a feeling his wife lit a fire under his ass.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Sandra didn't work and had three children. Yet her lifestyle didn't falter. She afforded her life by destroying other people's. Had this been Sandra's game all along? Did she manipulate men, then blackmail them? She certainly had a type. She'd target wealthy men, respected men, church-going types, men with something to lose.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
That's private investigator Carrie Huskinson again. She was hired by the wife of one of Sandra's later victims.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
After about five months of dating, he moved in with Sandra, got close to her children, integrated into her upscale life, as much as an unrefined jock from small-town Oklahoma could. And by December, they got married.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
In California, Sandra would pursue men, take up with them, and threaten to expose their dalliance. Men were Sandra's currency, their silence, her insurance. Between Dennis Kuba and Tom Finney, Sandra raked in over $90,000, and she didn't even have to marry either of them. Her past unknown to them until it wasn't.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Allen's murder hadn't made a headline beyond local news. But now, the cat was creeping out of the bag. On the next episode of Fatal Beauty, a Christian wife hires a tenacious private investigator.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
It turns out her husband had taken up with a mysterious brunette.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
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The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
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The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Their marriage didn't even last a year. By the 11th month, they'd separated, and Alan had fallen from his wife's good graces. He was found dead a month later, half-frozen, half-decomposed in his Bronco. We think she planned exactly what she did. As far as his mother's concerned, Sandra had blood on her hands.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
So as the murder investigation gained momentum, frustration built because Sandra proved elusive. Cops tried to pin her down as their main suspect in Allen's murder, but after the funeral, she'd slipped through their grasp like smoke. The deeper the Oklahoma City police dug, the more they realized Sandra was always one step ahead of them. From Sony Music Entertainment, this is Fatal Beauty.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Listen to all episodes of Fatal Beauty ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. Feed your true crime obsession. The Binge. Before we get started, I just want to let you know we do discuss suicide in this episode. So please, listen with care.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
I'm Cooper Moll. Episode 3, Dead End. Turns out almost as soon as the coroner zipped up the body bag in Oklahoma City, Sandra didn't just hire her own PI.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
That's the person a court officially puts in charge when someone passes away. They gather assets, pay off debts, and make sure whatever's left of the deceased goes to the right people, all according to state law. In Allen's case, a $220,000 life insurance policy was on the line. Here's John Leake, author of The Meaning of Malice again.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Oklahoma police detectives Pacheco and Mitchell decided it was time to pay the widow a visit in Dallas.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The detectives figured she might give them more time if she was on her own turf. But when they arrived at Sandra's front door, she barely gave them the time of day. In fact, she shut them down. Detective Pacheco tried to appeal to her better instincts. Help us help you. Help us find whoever murdered your beloved Allen. But Sandra, she didn't budge.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
From the moment Oklahoma City police detectives touched down in Big D, the investigation was looking like an uphill battle. They still had no physical evidence tying Sandra to Alan's death, just their suspicion and a trail of coincidences that seemed too eerie to ignore. Alan wasn't just going out to meet any estranged wife.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
He was meeting a woman who in 1982 was the last known contact of another person found shot in the head. And seven years before, Sandra was the last person to see her first husband, also found shot in the head.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
I tried to get the detectives who pursued this case to talk to me. Detective Pacheco, well, let's just say his wife hung up on me more than once. Ron Mitchell never shied away from talking to the press about Alan's murder, but he passed away before I got the chance. Leak's been generous sharing what Detective Mitchell told him in interviews, so he filled us in on this part of the investigation.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Detectives decided to see if any of what Sandra had told them about Alan in that awkward interview before his funeral was true. The drugs, the gambling, the shady company.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
What they learned only strengthened their belief that Allen's death was no random tragedy.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Sandra's so-called tips were not checking out. Next, investigators tried to nail down Sandra's movements the night Alan disappeared. Her alibi was simple. She showed up at the storage unit in Garland at 5.15 p.m., waited around for Alan for an hour, but he didn't show. So she decided to get on with her evening.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Friends corroborated they'd seen her for dinner and a movie, that she wasn't in for the night till late, around 1.45 a.m., That didn't mean she was innocent, though. Because the detectives' running theory was, if Sandra did kill Alan, it was before she would have met the Franks.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Here's what I wonder. I've shoot over this case with a few reporters now. Some folks who have been in this thing for almost as long as I've been alive. They've all shared some viable theories of what could have gone down during the time Sandra was unaccounted for. Maybe she killed him, left him at the storage unit or even her own garage, went to dinner, then came back for his body.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Alan was found near an airport. When she got home that night, she could have driven him to Oklahoma City late at night, then hopped on a short flight back to Dallas. Or she might have had Alan stored somewhere in Dallas for a few days. She could have driven to Oklahoma City that Sunday or Monday even. After all, Alan's body was found four days after he disappeared.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
So let's talk about Alan and Sandra. I've already told you how their story ends, but let me tell you how their romance started. Dallas in the early summer was alive, buzzing with energy. On the street, people moved through the heat like slow currents in a vast sunlit tide. Alan Rarig was new to town. His athleticism, once his greatest asset, hadn't gotten him a professional contract.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Nailing Sandra down on the timing thing would have been a lot easier if she had just cooperated. Instead, she got her PI, Bill Deere, on the case. Remember Sandra had asked him to find out who had really done this before Alan's body had been found? Her private investigator is trying to clear her name, so he made a request he thought would help.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
That's Whitley again. On December 23rd, Sandra and Bill Deer paid a visit to the polygraph examiner's office. Sandra brought her friend Susan for moral support. She hung back in the parking lot. She comes out and she's crying and she says, I failed it. Polygraphs aren't always accurate. So a week later, they tried again.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
A polygraph translates every spike in your pulse into suspicion, inked onto a cold, unfeeling graph. Feeling a polygraph is like watching a trap you didn't know you were in suddenly snap shut. And it had pinned down Sandra again. Two questions in particular vexed her. Do you know who was responsible for the murder of Alan Rarig? Did you kill Alan Rarig?
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Look, these days, a polygraph is considered by many a pseudoscience. You'd be hard-pressed to find a judge willing to vouch they're legit. But back in the 80s, Bill Deere, Sandra's PI, gave them credence.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
The second failure landed with the weight of a gavel. He dropped Sandra as a client.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
1986 arrived, and still no breaks in Alan's murder case. But every so often, his mother Gloria would find out something unsettling. Around this time, a friend of Alan's, a guy named Bill Dodd, forwarded her a letter. Alan had sent it to him not long after he and Sandra tied the knot.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
This was all new to Gloria. Why wouldn't he have told her she was going to be a grandma? And what happened to her grandchild? Gloria called up Phil, Alan's friend in Dallas, to see what he knew. Here's what she said he told her. Just a year earlier, before the newlyweds could pick a baby name or the color they'd paint the nursery, Sandra made a frantic call to Alan.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Phil and Alan happened to be together that night, actually. The two had just returned from a basketball game.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
But he hoped to finally hit his stride here in Dallas, beneath a sky so blue it looks painted. He'd landed a job, thanks to an old buddy. But the place to live still needed securing.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
She had been pregnant with twins. Two babies gone. Gingers, just like their dad. Devastation hit Alan. In the short time he'd known he was going to become a father, he'd let himself dream of tucking his kid into bed, teaching him to read. And now he'd lost two babies? And he grieved over that. In the days following the miscarriage, Allen was met with armloads of support.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
When Gloria recounted this tragedy to me, I had some questions. At the risk of sounding insensitive so early in her pregnancy, how would the twins have red hair? You can't see hair on an ultrasound until the end of the second trimester. Gloria loves Alan and remembers him fondly. But let's just say, when I asked her about this discrepancy, she didn't mince words.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
Alan took the miscarriage for what it was, a tragedy. But Gloria was skeptical. It was summer by the time Gloria found out the truth about Sandra's miscarriage.
The Binge Cases: Baby Broker
Fatal Beauty | 3. Dead End
If she didn't have a uterus... She couldn't have been pregnant. Gloria was speechless. Her son, who'd hoped to be a father one day, had married a woman who couldn't have any more kids and never told him. A woman who'd lied about being pregnant with twins, lied about having miscarried. It's just unbelievable.