Menu
Sign In Search Podcasts Libraries Charts People & Topics Add Podcast API Blog Pricing
Podcast Image

Nobody Should Believe Me

S07 E02: What Happened to Knowellan Kelly?

02 Apr 2026

Transcription

Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?

4.165 - 16.2 Andrea Dunlop

True Story Media. Please note that this show discusses child abuse, which may be difficult for some listeners. For resources about abusive head trauma, go to shakenbaby.org.

0

19.083 - 20.104 Danica Crawford

So you know him well enough.

0

20.946 - 28.677 Unknown

Okay. Maybe I'm a bad mom for letting my boyfriend babysit my kids. I'm sorry. I apologize. It's my fault that Nolan is dead.

0

29.017 - 46.963 Danica Crawford

That is not what we are saying. Hey, no. It is the fact that we have baby Nolan. You are his mother. You are his caregiver. You are his voice. Somebody needs to stand up for Nolan.

0

48.327 - 61.915 Unknown

What do you want me to say? Yes, I think he did it. I think he's capable of it. I don't know that. I don't know him that well. Obviously, I don't. He's never shown any signs of being that type of person in front of me.

63.278 - 84.738 Andrea Dunlop

What happened to Nolan Kelly? This is a question that has lingered for a decade now. Jon Stewart, a man who'd been dating Nolan's mother Danica for five months at the time of his death, was originally charged with his murder. But Jon was never prosecuted, and neither was anyone else. This case is a tragedy, and there was a grave injustice here.

85.219 - 93.686 Andrea Dunlop

But much of the media coverage about this case has focused not on the fact that a baby was murdered and no one was held accountable, but on the alleged injustice done to John.

94.347 - 115.271 Andrea Dunlop

And this, too, was the focus of John's email to me last July, which began, "'Dear misguided wannabe journalist,' and detailed a litany of ways in which he felt he'd been victimized by Dr. Sally Smith and, in turn, by my reporting on the case." John is not one to mince words, as you'll hear, but I was intrigued by his email.

115.291 - 135.123 Andrea Dunlop

I'd mentioned his case only briefly on the show, but John was upset at my framing of Sally Smith, who he claimed had lied about his case. I try never to lose sight of the fact that I'm reporting on real people and their real lives on this show. And if I ever hear directly from someone I've talked about, I think I owe it to them to listen. And I was curious about this case.

Chapter 2: What happened to Knowellan Kelly?

288.516 - 309.669 Andrea Dunlop

If you're going to claim a doctor falsely accused you of abuse, that's a serious claim that has serious impact. Undermining public trust in doctors unnecessarily causes a myriad of problems that can escalate into a full-on public health crisis. Measles outbreaks, anyone? John was making some big claims about Dr. Sally Smith, and I was listening.

0

310.371 - 318.33 Andrea Dunlop

But I was also going to have some questions of my own.

0

Chapter 3: Who is Jon Stewart and what are the claims he makes?

319.07 - 337.939 Andrea Dunlop

People believe their eyes. That's something that is so central to this topic because we do believe the people that we love when they're telling us something. If we didn't, you could never make it through your day. I'm Andrea Dunlop, and this is Nobody Should Believe Me.

0

340.332 - 360.32 Andrea Dunlop

A reminder that if you want to listen to the first six episodes of Season 7 ad-free, you can do so by subscribing on Apple Podcasts or Patreon. You'll also get two bonus episodes a month as a subscriber. This month, Dr. Bex and I are sharing some big updates on Kowalski v. Johns Hopkins and re-watching Take Care of Maya so that you don't have to.

0

360.64 - 373.837 Andrea Dunlop

If financial support is not an option, we'd love it if you could rate and review the show wherever you're listening or share it with a friend or two. Or five, Nobody Should Believe Me is a proudly independent production. We're only here because of you. So thanks for listening.

0

374.918 - 399.304 Unknown

Jacqueline Furlan Smith, a 40-year-old former Canadian military trainer, moves to Costa Rica to follow her dreams, but in the summer of 2021, vanishes without a trace. How can a woman just go missing and us put out all that effort to find her and she's still missing? I'm David Ridgen, and this is Someone Knows Something, Season 10, The Jacqueline Furlan Smith Case.

0

399.886 - 403.718 Unknown

Available now on CBC Listen and wherever you get your podcasts.

410.38 - 424.721 Andrea Dunlop

Danica Crawford was a mother of four young children with a troubled history. Both she and her children's father, Chris Kelly, had struggled with addiction and been in and out of jail. Danica had a tumultuous but tight-knit relationship with her family of origin.

425.222 - 442.453 Andrea Dunlop

And at the time she met Jon Stewart, she was living with her father, Larry, in a house adjacent to her mother and a number of other family members. Her father, Larry, regularly helped out with her kids while she struggled to get clean. Things eventually fell apart between Danica and Chris after their youngest child, Nolan, was born in July of 2015.

443.494 - 447.401 Andrea Dunlop

And when Nolan was almost a year old, Danica met Jon Stewart.

447.421 - 460.532 Danica Crawford

How did you meet Jon? I met Jon on Plenty of Fish. Okay. Is he the only guy you've met on Plenty of Fish? Mm-hmm. The only guy I've ever met off the internet. I was with my kid's father for eight years.

Chapter 4: What was the background of Danica Crawford and her family?

1921.013 - 1932.808 Unknown

Well, just from now until all the way back until Thanksgiving, it's been six times.

0

1933.228 - 1935.191 Danica Crawford

So it's not like it's every single day.

0

1935.211 - 1960.561 Unknown

No, it's not. My kids, the way we worked is I would sleep at his house, we would get up in the morning, go get my medicine, and then we sat at my dad's house all day, every single day. That's where we were all day, every single day. We never went back to his house because my son goes to school right down the road from my father and I wanted to be there before and after school.

0

1960.701 - 1974.156 Unknown

And you know, sometimes my dad would keep the kids. My youngest son, well not my youngest, but they spent the night at my dad's house multiple times throughout each week.

0

1979.823 - 1993.619 Andrea Dunlop

Larry would also later say that he thought Danica was more dependent on John than deeply in love. John had come on strong and quickly inserted himself into Danica's tenuous family situation. But according to John, he was helping her stay on the right track.

1994.159 - 2012.937 John Stewart

Danica was a good mother when she was sober. And that's when I was with her was when she was sober. I didn't know her when she was, you know, an addict. And she was very upright and upfront with me from the beginning. about all the trials and tribulations that she went through.

2014.118 - 2043.91 John Stewart

She let me know from the start that she had been clean since her son's birthday, December 1st, the previous year, and that she was working towards fixing her life. She had broken up with her boyfriend, who was the father of her four children. He was in prison at the time and she had broken up with him and she wanted to go on a different path in life. And she let me know all this.

2044.07 - 2071.715 John Stewart

And, you know, I went into this knowing this and, you know, I took her to get her medicine every day. We, she, you know, Larry says all the time in all of his interviews that Danica was a lazy piece of shit and all this other like heinous stuff about her. And maybe when she was an addict, yeah, sure. But when she was sober, she kept that house clean. She kept Larry's plate. She cooked for him.

2071.755 - 2092.98 John Stewart

She cooked for the kids. She took care of everything there. And she still came over to my place and we still took care, you know, helped each other take care of the kids at my place and everything like that. She was, you know, as far, and I don't know now, I haven't talked to her in, um, The last time that I talked to her was right after the case was dismissed.

Chapter 5: How did Danica and Jon meet and what was their relationship like?

2133.07 - 2133.211 Unknown

Mm-hmm.

0

2134.372 - 2136.894 Danica Crawford

So where were you getting that from?

0

2136.914 - 2137.715 Unknown

Different people.

0

2138.655 - 2142.619 Danica Crawford

From him? No. Never got a single thing from him?

0

2142.717 - 2154.802 Unknown

I think I got him to do it with me once and then he didn't want to do it again afterwards. What did he do with you? The ecstasy.

2154.822 - 2173.508 Danica Crawford

Ecstasy? So he did ecstasy with you once? Did he give you any pills of his? Obviously he's got pills for his back, right? And you did this ecstasy with him?

2173.528 - 2175.19 Unknown

Yeah.

2175.21 - 2181.338 Danica Crawford

Beyond that? The ecstasy before you met him? Yeah. So you were already doing it?

2181.639 - 2181.779 Unknown

Yeah.

Chapter 6: What were the dynamics between Danica, Jon, and her children?

2927.443 - 2949.177 Danica Crawford

And she says she's seen enough to be able to know. And she's only been with him 20 times. You even got to the point in your relationship, you talked about your relationship with him. And at a certain point, you said that the fairy tale kind of ended. And you kind of knew, but you had your plan. You had your plan coming up. And you know what? There's nothing wrong with that.

0

2950.051 - 2957.519 Danica Crawford

But obviously that fairy tale ended. Something started to happen to make that to change. You know, something had to change.

0

2957.539 - 2958.08 Unknown

I don't know.

0

2958.14 - 2962.284 Danica Crawford

We need you to. Somebody has to speak up.

0

2962.605 - 2967.33 Unknown

I don't know how emotional he is. He never showed any emotion to me.

2967.39 - 2972.736 Danica Crawford

How was he? Was he the quiet type of guy?

2972.756 - 2972.836 Unknown

Yes.

2972.856 - 2975.574 Danica Crawford

Who just like... You know, what the hell?

2976.516 - 2985.248 Unknown

I mean, he expressed verbally, you know, and they were like five minutes, you know what I mean? Five minutes of him going, oh, I don't like it, I don't think it's right, and then it would be over.

Comments

There are no comments yet.

Please log in to write the first comment.