Over the years, I’ve come to realize – the way I navigate the world day to day, as a man, is very different from what a woman has to think about.
I mean, when I go out somewhere, like to the grocery store, or the bank, or whatever, the thought that someone might be secretly watching me never even enters my mind. If I happen to have an encounter with someone I don’t know, I don’t immediately get suspicious. In fact, I often actually look forward to having a meaningful conversation with a stranger.
But for women, it’s very different. If a man holds a door open for you, and you smile at him, that guy could suddenly think you could be his new girlfriend. Or, it might not even be an actual encounter – someone could be watching you and even following you without you even knowing it.
When Jami was 18 years old, she had an encounter like that. But this incident ended up with the creepy man inside her house.
This is a Flashback episode. Jami told this story on the podcast more than four years ago. So after you hear it today, we’ll have a brief update chat to see what she’s up to now. And we’ll find out that the most recent excitement in her life has nothing to do with podcasting or true crime.
If you’d like to contact Jami:
Instagram: @JamiOnAir
TikTok: @JamiOnAir
YouTube: @JamiOnAir
Jami’s website: Murderish.com
Full show notes and pictures for this episode are here:
https://WhatWasThatLike.com/193
Graphics for this episode by Bob Bretz. Transcription was done by James Lai.
Want to discuss this episode and other things with thousands of other WWTL listeners? Join our podcast Facebook group at WhatWasThatLike.com/facebook (many of the podcast guests are there as well)
Quince - Go to Quince.com/whatwas for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns!
AG1 - For a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro at drinkAG1.com/whatwas
Find the best deals on what you need at Dupe.com
Episode transcript (download transcript PDF):
Over the years, I’ve come to realize – the way I navigate the world day to day, as a man, is very different from what a woman has to think about.
I mean, when I go out somewhere, like to the grocery store, or the bank, or whatever, the thought that someone might be secretly watching me never even enters my mind. If I happen to have an encounter with someone I don’t know, I don’t immediately get suspicious. In fact, I often actually look forward to having a meaningful conversation with a stranger.
But for women, it’s very different. If a man holds a door open for you, and you smile at him, that guy could suddenly think you could be his new girlfriend. Or, it might not even be an actual encounter – someone could be watching you and even following you without you even knowing it.
When Jami was 18 years old, she had an encounter like that. But this incident ended up with the creepy man inside her house.
This is a Flashback episode. Jami told this story on the podcast more than four years ago. So after you hear it today, we’ll have a brief update chat to see what she’s up to now. And we’ll find out that the most recent excitement in her life has nothing to do with podcasting or true crime.
Scott
You were a teenager when this happened, right?
Jami
I was. I was a senior in high school at the time – 18 years old.
Scott
Okay. Where were you living?
Jami
So I was living in Redlands, California at that time, which is in southern California. It’s what’s known as the Inland Empire near San Bernardino, Riverside. I was living with my mom in an apartment, actually, in a nice part of town.
Scott
I understand that your parents had recently divorced. So, it was kind of a new situation with you and your mom being just by yourselves, right?
Jami
It was. It was the first place that she and I moved to when my mom and dad split up. We hadn’t been in the apartment for very long – I don’t know exactly how long. You’re right – it was a fairly new situation. I was going to high school – Redlands High School. My mom was working full time. She was a very busy career woman and she was also in law school at that time. Yeah, that was a fairly new situation for us.
Scott
In the area where you were – obviously, I’m in Florida and I haven’t ever been to that area – did you have any safety concerns at all about that area or that neighborhood?
Jami
Not at all. I mean, I never even thought about not being safe at all. In general, Redlands is a pretty safe town. There are bad parts, but the apartment was, sort of, on the south side of Redlands, near Loma Linda, which was a good area. It’s a very nice apartment complex and it’s very clean. I think a lot of, like, single professionals were living there at that time.
Scott
This happened at nighttime. It was around eight o’clock, so it was dark. Can you just take us through what happened that night?
Jami
Yeah. As you said, it was around 8 o’clock in the evening. I want to say that it was a weeknight. My mom reminded me later that it was my dad’s birthday, which would have been June 12 of 1996 – whatever day of the week that was. It was dark and my mom was in her room studying. I think she was studying for the bar exam at that time. I just remember it was a warm summer night. I remember going into her room and just, kind of, said, “Hey, Mom, I’m gonna run across the street.” I took my car to a grocery store. There was a Stater Brothers, literally, just right across the street. I said, “I’m gonna grab a few things”. She said, “Okay, see you later”. So I got in my car. I went to the store. I was there for maybe 15 minutes. My mom reminded me later of what I bought and she kind of made fun of me. I bought these stupid– at that time, there were these sort of wedge-like flip-flops that were made of, like, this foam material. I know that sounds awful, but this was the 90s and Stater Brothers sold them. So, I went across the street to go get those and who knows what else. Anyway, I was only there for a few minutes. I drove back to my apartment. I entered the apartment complex. I didn’t think about it until later – there was a car right behind me at that time. I could see the headlights but that could have just been anybody entering the apartment complex behind me.
Scott
Was this a gated community? Did you have to put a code in or you can walk right in?
Jami
I want to say that there was one of those sticks – kind of, like, those security arms that raise up after you put your code in. So, I had done that and I don’t remember if this person behind me rolled in without putting in a code, as we often do. He may have done that. So, I came in and the parking lot was very standard looking for an apartment. It’s a bunch of parking spaces – some of them are covered and some of them are not. When you rent an apartment at these apartments, maybe, you have 1 or 2 assigned spots that are covered that are, sort of, near your apartment. Before I pulled into our assigned parking spot, I went over to the community mailbox – it’s a mailbox that we all share. You put your key in and there are a bunch of mailboxes. So, I was checking my mail at the time. I just remember that there were headlights behind me. It was dark outside, and the headlights of the car were very bright, so it caught my attention. It was sort of distracting, so I turned around, and I noticed that it was a white-and-gold or white-and-beige 4-door Lexus. It was a very nice car. I just, sort of, looked because the lights were really bright and not for any other reason.
I noticed there was a man sitting in it – no big deal. I just thought this was somebody who probably lived at the apartment. I continued getting my mail, got back into my car, pulled around to the left just a little bit, and parked in my assigned parking spot. I was sitting in the driver’s seat, parking my car, turning the engine off, and gathering the mail, which I put in the passenger seat. I grabbed all the mail, looked out my window, my windshield, and I saw a man walking right in front of my car with both hands in his pockets. He was glaring into my windshield, looking at me, and it gave me a very weird feeling. I mean, it wasn’t one of those things where, “Oh, he’s just glancing over and looking at you and, then, he goes about his business.” He was glaring into the car and it was weird – it made me feel weird. I was a naive teenager. Nothing bad had really ever happened to me – nothing super traumatic in my life.
So I just gathered my mail. This was before cell phones were popular. Maybe cell phones existed, but I certainly didn’t have one. Maybe, if I did, I would have called somebody, or maybe not. So, I got out of my car and locked it. My car was parked in the assigned parking lot. So, directly in front of my car, if I’m looking out my windshield, I can see a sidewalk that is running horizontally to my car. He was walking on that sidewalk in front of my car. When I got out of my car, he was still walking. So, by the time I got out of my car, got onto that sidewalk, and started walking, he was now directly in front of me – he’s about 15 feet in front of me, not too far. He was continuing to walk with both hands in his pockets. I was behind him and I just, kind of, brushed off the glare and thought, “Okay, let me just walk to my apartment, no big deal”. So, he continued walking. Now, as you continue walking on the sidewalk, it comes to a bit of a fork or a Y – it looks like a Y – so, you can either continue walking straight, which is one part of the Y which is where he was going, or you can veer off to the left to the other part of the Y, which is where my apartment was.
So, he was walking straight. When I got to the section where I needed to turn left, he was still in front of me. I started walking left toward my apartment and I noticed that he had nowhere to go. If you continue walking straight on that sidewalk that he was walking on in front of me, eventually, you’re going to get to somebody’s apartment door. So, that’s what he did. He went and walked as far as he could and basically stopped on their doormat right in front of their door almost as if that’s where he was going the whole time. Maybe he knew these people. Or maybe, he lived there. Or maybe, he lived there exactly. I didn’t know the people who lived there, but I’d seen them coming in and out, and my first thought was, “I don’t think he knows those people.” I know that sounds so weird but, in my mind, I was like, “I don’t think he knows those people.”
He was standing at their door. Maybe, he’s going to knock. Maybe, he does know them. I continued veering to the left from where he was standing, facing their front door. To his left were about five or six-foot hedge-like bushes. In other words, he was standing at those people’s front door as I continued walking toward my apartment. Eventually, we were not able to see each other anymore because this hedge was a pretty tall hedge. So, I got to that point. I kept walking on the sidewalk toward my apartment. He was standing in front of that people’s door, and I could no longer see him. Something in my mind told me that I needed to turn around and see if he had backed up to where he could watch where I was going because if he would have stayed standing in front of these people’s front door, he would have not seen where I was going because the hedge was blocking. If he wanted to see where I was going, he would have to back up and come to where the head was no longer in his way. So, something in my mind made me feel very strongly that he was following me or that he wanted to see where I lived – just a red flag or gut instinct.
So, I did it – I turned around. Sure enough, he had walked away from the front door and he was standing there watching where I was going. He wasn’t walking. He wasn’t moving. He was just peering. He was just staring at me to see where I was going. Then, at that moment, when I thought, “Shit, something is going on. He doesn’t know those people. He was only standing at their door to wait for me to walk past. He came around the hedge and now he can see where I’m going.” I just got a chill through my body. So, at that point, I wanted to run to my apartment, go inside, and lock the door, but I didn’t want to alarm him and make him aware that I’m aware that he was watching me, so I walked really fast, but not so fast to where it looked funny to not raise any red flags to him. So, I walked really fast. I was scared as hell. Of course, it’s almost like a scary movie.
When I got to my apartment door, there were two locks – there’s a deadbolt and then there’s a lock on the doorknob. My mom’s a lock freak – she always locks every door. I mean, she does not leave a door unlocked ever no matter what time of day it is. So, I pulled up my key and started to unlock the deadbolt. Of course, it’s like a scary movie. It’s like, “Oh, gosh, it feels like it’s taking hours.” So, I got that one unlocked. I got the doorknob lock unlocked. I went into my apartment, shut the door really fast, locked the deadbolt, locked the other lock, stood there in my living room, and I was like, “Okay, I’m safe. Even if he is watching me or following me, he can no longer get me anymore.” Again, I was a naive teenager and nothing traumatic has ever happened. So, I didn’t think I was in danger anymore.
I thought, “I’m in my apartment. So, even if he is a weirdo, I’m good.” This is the part of the story where I look back and I just think, like, “Jami, what a dipshit. You should have done something. You should have said something but you didn’t.” I basically went straight down the hallway into my mom’s bedroom. She was still studying at her desk in her bedroom. I just started to tell her what I had gotten at the store. We just started having small talk. It was a summer night. It was warm out.
This is a rare occasion, but on this particular night, my mom had her bedroom window open, so the breeze would come through. My mom is also a privacy freak. She doesn’t like people looking in on her, especially when we lived in a bottom-floor apartment – there’s a sidewalk right outside her bedroom window. So, she had her blinds closed but the windows opened. I didn’t think about this at that time. I thought about this later that the man – from where he was standing to watch me walk into my apartment – would have been right outside my mom’s bedroom window. So, since it was open, he could hear everything that she and I were saying. I mean, I didn’t know this at the time. When I think about it later, he could hear everything we were saying. More importantly, he knew at that moment that I was not in my bedroom. He knew exactly where I was in my apartment. He knew that I was in my mom’s bedroom as she and I were just, kind of, making small talk. 3-5 minutes went by. My bedroom was right next to hers. It’s just a 2-bedroom 2-bathroom apartment. It’s not very big.
Scott
Plus, he could see that the light was on in your mom’s room and not in your room – right?
Jami
Correct. Exactly. I think that’s another important thing where he could confirm, “Okay, she’s not in her bedroom. Not only do I hear her in her mom’s room but her mom’s light on. Her mom’s light is on but her bedroom light is not on.” As is the case with a lot of bottom-floor apartments, the only window I had in my bedroom was a sliding glass door with vertical blinds – I didn’t even have a regular window. It’s just a sliding glass door that, if you opened it and walked out, you would walk onto a little rectangular patio with a 3-4 foot tall wooden fence with a little hedge that surrounds the fence. So, it would be very easy for somebody to, sort of, hop over that hedge and be on our porch. Since it was summertime, when I left to go to the store, maybe, consciously or unconsciously, I had left my sliding glass door open just a little bit – maybe, like, a foot – but the screen and the vertical blinds were totally closed, so nobody could see in. I couldn’t see out, but the sliding glass door was cracked open about a foot or so.
Scott
Your mom being a lock freak, if she would have known that the sliding glass door was opened, would she have closed and locked it?
Jami
Absolutely. Just because she was in her room, she left her window open – that was fine. I wasn’t in my room and my window is a sliding glass door, so somebody could easily walk in. My mom would have totally closed that sucker and locked it had I left it open, but she didn’t know. She was preoccupied. So, when I was done talking to my mom in her bedroom – I have one or two bags of groceries in my hands – I went and walked into my bedroom. When you enter my bedroom, you would see the vertical blinds and the sliding glass door straight ahead. So when I went to walk into my bedroom, the first thing I noticed was that the vertical blinds were, sort of, swinging back and forth a little bit in the area where the door was open, where you would walk in, and it caught my attention.
Everything happened so fast. I didn’t really have time to react. Before you know it, all of a sudden, I see the top of somebody’s head coming through the sliding glass door. Within seconds, there is a man standing in front of me in my bedroom. I don’t know if I dropped the groceries or what. I didn’t remember what I told him at that time – my mom had to tell me later. When I saw him, I kind of took a step back and I said something like, “Who the fuck are you?!” I was just very shocked. I remember being angry and like, “How dare you?! Why are you in my bedroom?” The strange thing is that I startled him. He obviously was not expecting me to walk into my bedroom at that moment. I think, looking back on it now, he was trying to take advantage of that moment when I was talking to my mom in her bedroom. It was nighttime. I had a walk-in closet at that time. I had a daybed where there was a lot of room under the bed, where he could have laid, hid, and waited for me to go to bed. I think he was trying to take advantage of the fact that I wasn’t in my bedroom. He was going to sneak in and who knows what he was going to do afterward. I caught him. I mean, I walked in at the perfect moment. To this day, I think about where would he have been if I would have walked in even 5 seconds later. Would he have been in my closet? Would he have been hiding somewhere, caught me off guard, and attacked me?
Scott
That’s kind of the scariest part of the whole story. What could have happened if you hadn’t–
Jami
It terrifies me. I mean, I joke about it with friends now. I think and talk about it often. Obviously, I got out of this safely, but it is so terrifying to think how my fate would have been different if I walked in just a few seconds later. I don’t know if he would have waited for me to go to bed and then struck. I don’t know if he was just there to get something out of my underwear drawer. I just don’t. It’s very scary to think about. So, when I walked in, I kind of said something like, “Who the fuck are you?! Why are you in my room?!” He was very startled and caught off guard. He didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t planned for that. It was very obvious.
He kind of stuttered and said, “My c-cat. My cat ran into your bedroom and I’m just trying to get my cat.” This and that. He just totally made up a story on the spot. It was obvious. I just kind of yelled at him again. I said, “YOUR FUCKING CAT IS NOT IN MY ROOM! I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TAUGHT! GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!” Then, he said something – I don’t know what he said – and my reaction was, I said “EWWW”. My mom told me later that I said that. I think that I said that because I remember feeling at that moment, “GROSS! PERVERT! WHO ARE YOU?! GET OUT OF MY ROOM!” I don’t know what words were exchanged after that. I couldn’t tell how long he was in there – it was probably 30 to 60 seconds.
At that moment, he backed out. He left my room. He went back out the way he came in. Another part of the story, I think, that seems almost unbelievable is my mom was just in the other room. She could hear everything that was going on, but she thought I had a boyfriend at that time and he would come over often, and we were always very playful and joking with each other. She was preoccupied. She was studying. She could kind of hear something going on, but she thought I was just having playful banter with my boyfriend. I mean, at that time, you wouldn’t automatically assume that some bad guy was in your daughter’s bedroom. So, it took her a few seconds to realize “My daughter is in trouble.” At some point, she did realize, “Oh, shit. There is something going on. I can hear Jami’s voice or something.”
Well, my mom always packs a gun – my mom’s a little bit of a badass. She had a loaded gun on her desk, as she always did. So, she came running into my room with the gun in her hand. I said, “There was a man in here. He went that way.” So, she ran out my sliding glass door and jumped over the hedge, which he probably did to escape. She got the gun pointed and she was just looking around. It’s nighttime. She didn’t see him anywhere. I said that he probably ran that way toward the parking lot. I actually don’t remember if she chased him all the way to the parking lot. She must have done some running around to see if she could find him, but he was nowhere to be found. So, I was just shaking. My mom was shaking.
We called the police right away. I remember the police showed up. They took a report. They asked me the standard questions. “What does he look like? What did he look like? What did he say?” I’ve tried to get my hands on that report. I couldn’t remember exactly what they said. I called the Redlands PD. I want to say– I mean, it almost sounds like a movie, like it’s not real because they had some sort of flood or something with their system and there was no way to get that report. I actually still want to make a few more attempts. I feel like it’s probably still somewhere but I just didn’t talk to the right person. I remember them asking me specifically about his description. To this day, I remember very, very specific details about what he was wearing, what color his hair was, he was Caucasian, and all these things.
When the police officer looked at me and said, “Okay, did he have any facial hair?” The oddest thing is I couldn’t say whether he had facial hair, although he was standing right in front of me for at least 30 seconds. He was standing 4-5 feet away from me. I just think I was in so much shock. I don’t know if it’s something that the brain does. Maybe I wasn’t trying to look at him. Maybe I was just in so much shock that I really didn’t clearly look at his face. It’s kind of hard to explain.
Scott
That would be a weird psychological phenomenon to explore. I mean, you said you could remember what he was wearing, but just not what his face looks like.
Jami
Absolutely, yeah. He was about 5’10” to 6 feet tall, a Caucasian man, had silver or gray short and clean-cut hair. He had a white nice polo-style collared shirt – I don’t know if it was short sleeve or long sleeve. He had nice khaki pants. He had dress shoes on. I worked in the corporate field for about 18 years of my life and I know how men dress when they have a professional job. I don’t know if he was an accountant. I don’t know if he was an attorney. Maybe he was a real estate broker. Maybe he worked at a bank. It almost looked like what a man would wear on a casual Friday at a business-type job. He was very well dressed. I remember, at that time, I would tell people, “He looked like the CEO of a bank. He probably had many people who reported to him at work.”
He truly looked like a professional. My theory is that he lives and works near that area. It’s a small town. I mean, Stater Brothers is not the type of place where somebody would just be driving through and stop there, but they live 45 minutes away. I’m almost positive that he lived or worked in the Redlands or Loma Linda area – probably very close to that grocery store. I think that he was probably working and decided to stop at the grocery store on his way home from work. I think that he saw me at the grocery store – this is what the police theorized – and decided at that moment to follow me home. I think that he was probably in the car behind me as I was pulling into my apartment complex. I think that he was in that Lexus when I was getting my mail. Again, it was a very nice car.
Scott
Was he the one that was glaring at you into your windshield?
Jami
Yes. That was the same guy. There were all these startling moments and all these red flags that I should have picked up on. I did pick up on them, but I ignored them. Maybe I’m a naive teenager or whatever. I just kept telling myself, “No, Jami. Bad things don’t happen to you. That just happens to people on the news.” You’re just a dumb teenager. If you’ve never been through anything really traumatic in your life, I guess, you would just, sort of, explain things away. You just think that bad things only happen to somebody on the news.
Scott
Are you an optimist by nature?
Jami
I am.
Scott
Okay. You don’t expect anything bad’s gonna happen too. It’s all gonna be good until proven otherwise.
Jami
That’s right. I think that I’ve shifted now. I host a true-crime podcast and I have really been into true crime for many, many years. I have a certain paranoia now. I have a certain distrust. The other day, I took a quick walk at work in the middle of the day in a nice area. There was a man walking behind me and I kept, sort of, turning to my side just to make sure that he wasn’t running up on me because I think of those things. Now, I do know that it is possible for you to be attacked and to be a victim of a crime. Back then, I trusted almost everybody. I thought everybody was my friend. I really didn’t think that anything bad would ever happen to me. It’s just interesting that there were so many red flags there. I got chills. My gut was telling me that something was wrong. When I got that feeling, I probably should have stayed in my car and drove around the street. Maybe, I should have gone back to Stater Brothers, called my mom, and said, “Hey, there’s a weird guy looking at me.” I guess, at that time, you don’t think of the worst.
Scott
No, you don’t. There’s something about intuition – in particular, female intuition. You can sense– I don’t know what it is. There’s nothing that you can probably quantify, medically or psychologically or anything, but I’ve been in situations like that with a female who was like, “Okay, this doesn’t feel right. We need to get out of here.” So, we did. Were you even able to sleep that night?
Jami
No, I slept. I didn’t want to sleep in my room. For some reason, I didn’t want to be near windows, so I slept on the floor in a hallway where there were 2 walls on either side of me. I just slept right there because I was so freaked out. I didn’t want to be in the apartment. I definitely didn’t want to be near windows for some reason. My mom and I were so freaked out that this guy knows where we live and he hasn’t been caught. So, we went to the apartment management office the very next day, and said, “Hey, we want to put up some flyers with a description of this man. He came into my daughter’s bedroom last night. We want to warn everybody.” Well, of course, the apartment complex didn’t like that because saying that a crime happened here is bad for sales for these apartments, so they wouldn’t let us put up the flyers. Well, that pissed my mom off. My mom is very feisty. Obviously, she’s very concerned about her daughter’s safety and her safety. She said, “We’ll just let you know we’re moving out. I know we have a few more months on our lease, but we’re going to break our lease.” I think the apartment complex manager tried to argue with her a little bit about that, but my mom was like, “Yeah, try me. We’re leaving.”
Scott
I like your mom. I don’t even know her but I like her.
Jami
I love her. The way I would describe her is that she’s a 5’2” little feisty pitbull. She’s awesome. She wasn’t having it and she said, “No, no, no. We’re moving out.” So, we did, of course. They never came after us for breaking our lease and moved. We still stayed in Redlands, but we moved to a house that is, kind of, a few miles away. To this day, this man that I know of has never been caught. The craziest thing that I always think of – besides what would have happened if I would have walked into my bedroom just a few seconds later – is that this man struck me as somebody’s husband, somebody’s boss, possibly somebody’s grandfather, a professional, probably somebody who’s well known in the community. That’s kind of the way that Redlands is – professionals. There are all these networking groups. Everybody knows everybody. My thought was, “I don’t know if this is the first time he has ever done this. I doubt it would be the last time because I think that somebody who has those urges, I think, will continue to do things like that.” It just struck me as so shocking that this man is in our community. He’s probably going to go to work the next day. He’s going to lay down in bed next to his wife. They have no idea that he follows young girls home and comes into their bedroom. I mean, he did not look like a creepy guy at all. I mean, he probably doesn’t even have a criminal record prior to that time and, maybe, still doesn’t.
Scott
That makes me think… BTK was a pretty well-respected guy too.
Jami
Yes. By the way, BTK is probably the serial killer that fascinates and scares me the most. Part of the reason is these guys are very well known in the community. BTK was very involved in his Church. His family had absolutely no idea. I think it’s the same for the guy that came into my room. I really trip out on the fact that people have no idea of his extracurricular activities. I’ve reached out in my Facebook group. I posted pictures because I still have family and friends in Redlands, and it is a small town. I still have his description. I would bet money that he lived in that area at that time. I know somebody knows him. I know what his car looked like. So, I feel like I have enough information to, maybe, say something as simple as, “Hey, did you have a friend, or know of anybody who had a friend, who had a dad who drove a Lexus that looked like this and worked a professional job back in 1996?” I had people comment before. There was one girl in my Facebook group who said, “Somebody had come into her house.” I tried to set up a time to talk to her to see if, maybe, it was the same guy. For some reason, we were never able to talk, but I’m very interested to find this guy. I wonder, “Is he in jail? Is he out in the community?” I don’t know.
Scott
Have you looked through mugshots? Do you think you would recognize him if you saw him in a mug shot?
Jami
I was just talking to my daughter about this the other day. I feel that if he were to walk by me and bumped shoulders with me, I would have no idea that it was him. Obviously, as I said, he is medium-built, Caucasian, and had silver hair at that time. I know all those things, but I could never look at his face right now and go, “Oh, that’s definitely him” because he looks like so many white men that I’ve come across in my life. So I don’t know. I could tell you who it wasn’t. I mean, maybe I could say, “Oh, no. That’s definitely not him.” I probably wouldn’t be able to pinpoint.
Scott
Of course, if you saw him now, his appearance would have changed as well.
Jami
Absolutely, yeah.
Scott
Since that time, have you ever been in a situation where your gut told you something and you still ignored it?
Jami
Hmm, good question. Not that I can recall. I’ve been pretty hyper-aware since then, especially after becoming a mom. At the age when this happened to me, I didn’t want to offend anybody. I think, as a female, you want to please everybody and you don’t really want to offend anybody. But I’m 41 now and I have 3 kids. I could give two shits about being rude to somebody if I think that they’re being inappropriate or if they’re walking behind me and making me feel awkward. I would have no problem now just turning around and waiting for him to walk in front of me. So, I don’t have somebody behind me watching where I’m going, but I can’t think of a time that I ignored my gut since then. I’ve learned a big, big lesson from that incident.
Scott
Do you have security cameras in your home?
Jami
We do. And dogs. I keep the lights on when my husband’s out of town. I keep the backlight on with the front lights on. I think that lights are a really good deterrent. I think dogs help.
Scott
Close those patio doors…
Jami
Oh, I’m a lock freak. I not only lock them, but we put a stick in the sliding glass door too. You would definitely have a certain paranoia if something like this happens to you, and I think it’s healthy. My family makes fun of me sometimes because my daughter was like, “Mom, stop.” When my daughter – she’s 17 – takes Ubers, I always make her give me a screenshot of what the person looks like, their name, and their license plate number. That’s not to say that that will stop them from committing a crime against her but, at least, I have that information. I always tell her, “Drew, when you get in the car, just say something casually like, ‘Oh, yeah. My mom and dad monitor everywhere I go’ just to make them aware that we know you’re in the Uber with him, that you screenshotted a picture of him, and sent it to your mom.” She was like, “Oh, I’m not going to do that. That’s weird.” But I was like, “Well, just put them nicely on notice that we know who they are.”
Scott
Right. You can do that without being rude or offensive, just so they are aware. If he is listening right now, what would you say to him?
Jami
Gosh, so many things. I would say, “What were your intentions that night? Do you have a family? What would your family think of you following a girl home and coming into her bedroom? Try that again, motherfucker, and I’ll kill you.” Excuse my language.
Scott
I think he would be aware of that and would go for an easier target next time.
Jami
I hope so. Well, I mean, I hope he doesn’t go for any target. Yeah, I still get angry thinking about it because it’s just such a violation, honestly.
Scott
Well, this story you just told so wonderfully was a topic of a true-crime podcast episode. It’s not just any podcast – it’s your podcast. It’s called “Murderish”. Can you tell us about your show?
Jami
Yeah. I did tell this story on my podcast called “Murderish” and it was funny. It’s called, “A Stranger In My Bedroom”. At the time I recorded it, I was very new at podcasting. I had run out of material. I was running behind on a story that I was researching, so I thought, “Oh, let me just tell this story on the podcast. Nobody’s going to like it. It’s going to be my worst episode. It doesn’t end in murders. Nobody’s going to be interested.” I recorded it just because I was simply out of material but wanted to put out an episode. To this day, it’s my most downloaded episode, I think. I guess people are interested in hearing, maybe, like, a first-hand account of something like this that happens. But yeah, I started podcasting. I started “Murderish” just over, probably, like, two and a half years. I’ve always been somebody who is very fascinated by true crime. Ever since I was a preteen, I was reading books about serial killers and following court cases on TV with my mom because she’s also always been very into it.
I started listening to podcasts because I had a really horrible commute here in LA for many years. So, one of my co-workers said, “Jami, why don’t you listen to podcasts in your car?” I had no clue what a podcast was. He told me to listen to this podcast called “Serial”. Of course, I did and I loved it. I became obsessed and I started just binging podcast after podcast. I love telling stories. I love talking about true crime. What really launched my podcast – or was, sort of, the catalyst – was I was chosen to be a juror on a first-degree murder trial out here in Los Angeles County for a murder that happened out here where I live. So, I ended up being the jury foreman. The trial was a little over two weeks. It was a fascinating, very sad, and exhausting experience, but I wanted to tell that story. So, that ended up being my first episode. I opened up “Murderish” with the Arvizu murder with my experience as a juror, and it has just gone from there.
Today, I kind of tell people that, on the podcast, I give listeners a 3D look into fascinating murder cases. I always start with the town where it happened. I talk about the victim, the perpetrator, and their backgrounds. I talk about how the victims and perpetrators worlds collided, how they came to know each other details of the crime, what happened, why it happened, what was the motive, and the investigation. Then, I sort of walk you through the trial, the verdict, the sentence, and then anything that has happened after the trial. The episodes are about an hour-long each time. I try to go really deep to give people all the details that I would want to hear if I were listening to a true-crime podcast.
Scott
I know about your show, but I’ve only recently discovered it, so I haven’t really listened to too many episodes. What’s one of your favorite episodes that you’ve covered?
Jami
Oh, man. Well, it’s sort of weird to say it’s my favorite episode. It’s my worst episode because it’s the case that haunts me to this day. It’s a case that I always swore that I would never cover because, to be honest, whenever it would come on the news, I would change the channel selfishly because it was so horrific and so sad that I didn’t want to dive into the details. I knew enough that it broke my heart. That’s the Gabriel Fernandez case. I decided to cover it. I think I had a listener who reached out and just said, “Hey, you should cover this case”. I was kind of resistant to it, but I finally did, and it is the absolute worst murder case I have ever come across in my life. He was a young boy who was actually murdered by his own mother and her boyfriend out in Palmdale, California, which is not far from where I live. It’s a horrific, very, very sad case. I have very loyal listeners who listened to every episode, and that’s one of the episodes that they say they couldn’t listen to. So, I would just say it’s my favorite episode because it’s, sort of, the case that is closest to my heart, that would make me think about the victim most often because it’s just so horrific.
Scott
It is pretty intense.
Jami
It is.
Scott
I have loyal listeners too. There’s one episode of my podcast that some people are unable to listen to, and that’s about a man who ate his own foot and experimented with cannibalism, but it’s not as bad as you might think. I mean, he’s a very intelligent, well-spoken man. Well, you just gotta listen to it.
Jami
Okay. When you first said that, I thought, “Okay, he did it to save himself.”
Scott
No, there was no survival.
Jami
Oh my gosh.
Scott
It’s not one of those stories. It’s called “Shiny Ate His Own Foot”. So, I have some listeners who listen to all my shows, but some of them would say, “Oh, I just can’t do that one.”
Jami
It’s the one episode. Wow. It wasn’t even that he was, like, super hungry. He just was experimenting for some odd reason.
Scott
Yeah, it was odd. That’s for sure. With a group of about 10 friends.
Jami
Oh, my God. It wasn’t even just one who was interested in eating themselves. That’s interesting.
Scott
Yeah. How did you come up with the name “Murderish”. I love that name, by the way, because as soon as you hear it, you know what this thing is about but, yet, it’s not really a word. So, you really have a monopoly on that word. How did you think of that?
Jami
Thank you. I love the name of your show as well. It tells you exactly what you’re getting into. I don’t know if it’s a Southern California thing that we would speak very casually – there’s a lot of slang – or if it’s just something that I do a lot, but I tend to put an “-ish” on the end of a lot of words when I’m speaking to friends. I might say, “Oh, yeah, I’ll be at dinner at 10ish”, or “Yeah, that movie was good-ish”. There’s just sort of an “-ish” that I throw on the end of words in my everyday vocabulary. As I was getting ready to launch the podcast, I kept thinking in my head, “It’s not that I’m a murderer. I’m just somebody who is interested in learning about the psychology of murderers, the details of these murders, and why they happen.” So, I kept circling around in my brain. It just came to me and I just said, “Well, I’m not a murderer. I’m just ‘murderish’.” So, now, that’s kind of my slogan that I say at the end of every episode – “Listen, listening to this podcast doesn’t make you a murderer, it just means you’re ‘murderish’, meaning you like to learn about murder cases and you’d like to watch True Crime TV.” It’s fun because I have a Facebook group with a lot of listeners in there. We chat, say funny things, and share funny posts – I call them “ishers”. They use the word often too, and they’ll say, “Oh, yeah. Don’t worry. I’m not gonna murder anybody. I’m just murderish. Don’t be afraid of me.” and it’s a lot of fun. That’s kind of how I came up with the name. It was sort of random, I guess.
Scott
You are so good at branding. That is incredible. I mean, especially when you say the line, “If you like this, it’s not because you’re a murderer, you’re just murderish.” It’s like you’re giving people permission to enjoy hearing these stories even though they’re so horrific. Maybe they should feel guilty about enjoying these stories, but you’re saying, “Oh, it’s okay. You’re just murderish.”
Jami
Which is smarter-ish.
Scott
Awesome. So how can people find your show and contact you if they want to?
Jami
Yeah. I just built out a website – finally, after two and a half years – so they can check out the show and a little bit more about me. They can actually listen to the show at murderish.com. They can find me on all podcast listening apps. I’m on Spotify, iHeartRadio, Google Play, Apple podcasts, you name it. They can find me on social media. I’m on Twitter at murderishpod. I’m on Instagram and I have a really fun Facebook discussion group. So, if you just go to Facebook and search for “Murderish podcast discussion group”, you’ll find it. Just hit join, answer a couple of questions, and we’ll have a lot of fun in there.
Scott
All right. Well, I’m sure we’ll send a few listeners your way because even though “What Was That Like” is not really a true-crime show, some of the episodes that we deal with are true-crime by nature. So I know there’s a lot of crossover in that audience. So, I look forward to hearing that. Thanks so much for sharing your creepy story.
Jami
Thanks so much for letting me tell it. I really appreciate it, Scott. It’s been fun.
Scott
Jami, welcome back!
Jami
Thanks so much for having me, Scott. It’s been a while.
Scott
It has been a while. And you know what? I love having podcasters on because I never have to worry about good sound. You have high-quality sound for sure. Obviously, as I mentioned, you’re a podcaster. People just heard the story of when you were a teenager and walked into your bedroom and found someone standing there who had followed you home. Tell us about your podcast – I think everybody already knows you host Murderish – and how’s that going and what else do you have going on?
Jami
Yeah. Murderish is going strong. I release episodes every Monday. I launched Murderish back in 2017 and have been going at it, gosh, what is that, seven years? It’s my full-time gig now, so I quit my corporate gig. I had been doing that for 20 years – commuting, the whole bit – and I quit that, I want to say, 4-5 years ago, maybe going on five. Then, I’ve been a full-time podcaster since then. So Murderish is going really strong.
What’s cool is that I’ve kind of turned the Murderish feed into sort of two or maybe three podcasts in one – or about to be three, I should say. I started this new true crime TV club. It’s called the Serial Streamers. We call ourselves the Serial Streamers because I realized that everybody who’s like me is out there watching all these true crime documentaries on Netflix, Hulu, wherever, but they don’t always have somebody close to them to talk about it with. Not everybody’s partner or best friend or coworkers are as into true crime content as they are, and I was kind of facing that problem as well. So I started this true crime TV club called the Serial Streamers where I go and watch a popular or viral true crime documentary and then I hop on the microphone and I also film it for YouTube as well and I do sort of like, I call it a CliffsNotes version of the documentary. I recap it.
But what’s cool and different from Murderish is, in Murderish, I get straight to the facts of the true crime case. There are no opinions. There’s no laughter, no banter, no nothing. It’s just straight to the facts. Whereas the serial streamers TV club, when you hear those episodes on the Murderish podcast feed, it’s just me being my authentic self, as if you and I were at a bar having a drink talking about this wild documentary that we just can’t get over.
Scott
Lots of speculation, probably.
Jami
Yeah, a lot of theories, a lot of speculation, a lot of hot takes, and a lot of judge. If I was with a girlfriend at a bar going, “Oh my gosh, this guy, can you believe him?” So it’s so much fun and you get those Serial Streamers episodes every now and then. If you’re listening to Murderish, you’ll see them and they’re called Serial Streamers, and then the name of the documentary. And then we’re talking about doing another segment on the Murderish feed coming up, which we’re not really sure. We’re kind of conceptualizing it now because that’s where all my listeners are – in the Murderish podcast feed. I’ve built it up for over 7-plus years. So, it’s just kind of easy to sort of start a new– it’s not a new podcast, but it’s a new segment within the Murderish feed if you want. So this is kind of like something for everybody.
Scott
And you’ve also got a whole other podcast too, right? Dirty Money Moves.
Jami
Yes. Dirty Money Moves is kind of my baby because, back in 2017, when I was working at my corporate gig at a commercial bank in downtown Los Angeles, very long story short, I met a very wealthy heiress and she was also the CEO of a true crime TV production company based in Los Angeles. I found her very intriguing. I met her one time when she brought us homemade pies and she looked rich. She looked the part. She secured a 15 million loan from the bank I was working for. I didn’t have anything to do with this loan, but my very close colleague did. When the loan closed and funded and when the first payment came due, she was nowhere to be found. She was on a plane to another country. We didn’t know it at the time.
Scott
So the bank got scammed.
Jami
The bank got scammed out of 15 million by a phony Hollywood heiress named Mary Carole McDonnell. So I left the bank. My whole entire team and very good friends got fired for bringing her in as a client, even though they had nothing to do with it. The FBI had questioned them and tried to find out if they were in on it. They were not. They all got fired. So I was miserable. So that is what prompted me to just leave my corporate gig altogether. I had been doing it for almost 20 years. I had planned to retire doing what I was doing and that’s when I said, “You know what? I think I’m going to give this podcast thing all my heart and soul.” And I’m so glad that I did.
When I left the bank, I couldn’t stop thinking about this Hollywood, phony Hollywood heiress. I just knew there was more to the story. So again, very long story short, I started a podcast called Dirty Money Moves for women in white-collar crime. The very first season details my months-long investigation into this woman and what we found out about her was absolutely jaw-dropping and wild. The story was in fact much bigger than I had ever imagined. So that was season one. Then we covered a new scam story in season two who was an adoption scammer. Now, we just launched season three about a lady who is– Dirty Money Moves is all women, female scammers – that’s what the show is about – and we do a deep dive investigation into all of them. We just launched season three and we’re diving into a female scammer named Tracii Hutsona. This is only one of her scams but she was able to scam about a million dollars out of Joumana Kidd. Joumana Kidd is an actress and former wife of Jason Kidd, an NBA basketball player.
Scott
You got some interesting stuff going on over there.
Jami
I do. It’s fun.
Scott
That does sound good. Okay. So I had seen on your Instagram that you had an appearance on TMZ. What was that about?
Jami
So that was so random. I, along with nine other cast mates, just got done filming basically a test TV show for TMZ. It was really fun. We filmed it at the TMZ studios here in Los Angeles – in Playa Vista to be exact – and we filmed it right there in the same TMZ studio that everybody’s used to seeing on TV when they’re talking about celebrity gossip and pop culture. You kind of see Harvey Levin standing behind that pony wall with his water cup and then he’s talking to all the people on TMZ. That was the exact same setup for the TMZ show that I was a part of, which was called Strange and Suspicious. We had the same exact format, but we were talking about true crime cases and just, like, strange and suspicious things like UFO sightings, the Loch Ness monster, time slippage, and all these crazy topics. That was a lot of fun and it just came up randomly.
I was literally sitting on the couch early summer with my husband having coffee in the morning and my phone rang from this random Los Angeles number at 7.45 in the morning and I didn’t know who it was, so I didn’t answer. Left it alone all day. Then, I went to listen to my voicemail. I really don’t ever listen to voicemails, which is hilarious, So I’m like, “Let me just see–” Because it was an LA number, so I’m like, “Ah, maybe it’s somebody I know.” And it was Harvey Levin. He just said, “Hey Jami, we found you through your podcast and your social media. We really like you to be participating in this new show, Strange and Suspicious.” That’s kind of how it all started. I hopped on board and it was such a wonderful experience.
Scott
That’s a phone call you want to return, right?
Jami
Yeah. And I did. And to be honest with you, I’m such a skeptical person. Maybe this is just my true crime brain, maybe it’s in my DNA, but I was like, “What in the AI BS is this? This cannot be real.” I thought that it sounded like Harvey Levin, but I’m like, “This is AI.”
Scott
Yeah. You can’t trust anything now.
Jami
Yeah, you can’t. And of course, I investigate scam artists, so I’m like, “What kind of scam AI scam is this?” But I called back and sure enough, it was Harvey.
Scott
It was going to work for you either way, either it was legitimate or you got another scam story for your show. Very good point.
Jami
Yeah. Either way, this is going to work out very well for me.
Scott
Okay. So if people want to follow you and see what’s going on, I know you’re on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, as well as your regular podcasts, and your username on all of those is JamiOnAir, and we’ll have links to all that in the episode notes for this as well. Unrelated to podcasting, what else new has happened in your life recently?
Jami
I should have mentioned this first because this is the absolute biggest news to ever hit my life besides the birth of my three children. I just became a grandma for the first time.
Scott
That is amazing.
Jami
Yes. I’m just over the moon. I’m almost at a loss for words for how much I instantly loved this baby girl. It’s just like everything that everybody tells you it is but you just don’t know it until you experience it. And yeah, my oldest son Skylar and his fiance, they had a little girl named Novi and she’s super healthy. Super freaking cute. I know I’m biased, but she’s adorable.
Scott
Anybody that comes within three feet of you are going to see pictures.
Jami
Oh my God. I am that annoying person. It used to be my kids and then now they don’t want me to show a picture. They’re like, “Oh mom, stop showing pictures.” So then it’s my dogs. Well, now it’s my grand baby.
Scott
It must be difficult having the new baby close by and yet you still have to keep working at home, right?
Jami
It is such torture. I know that my son’s fiance is home on maternity leave, so I know she’s at that house just with the baby, and then I’m like, “I have to be there. I have to be there. Screw work. I’ve got to go see my–” So yeah, I feel very spoiled and lucky that she is sort of at my disposal, if you will. Like, I can go see her whenever I want.
Scott
And it’s good for them. They’ve got a ready-made babysitter whenever they want.
Jami
Rockstar grandma right here. Yeah. I got it. I’ve had three kids. I know what I’m doing.
Scott
You know how to do it, obviously. All right. Well, Jami, it’s great talking with you again. And again, we’ll have all these links in the show notes. We see each other at conferences sometimes. I’m sure I’ll see you probably sometime before too long.
Jami
Yeah, I hope so. It’s really nice to see you again, Scott. Thanks for having me on.
Scott
Jami is such a fun person, and I love the fact that she is enjoying being a grandma now. You can see a picture of her, and get the links to all of her socials, at the episode notes – WhatWasThatLike.com/193.
You might already know – in the podcast Facebook group we have a new question every Tuesday. The question for this past Tuesday is a pretty serious one: What’s the most difficult thing you’ve ever had to tell someone? Does something come to mind for you with that question? Come on over and let us know – WhatWasThatLike.com/facebook.
You know, sometimes people ask me if I’m on Instagram. And the answer is yes! More than 20k followers there currently. And you can scroll down my feed, and what you’ll see is the cover art for every episode – all 193 of them so far. It’s a pretty cool visual. My Instagram account is wwtl_podcast.
Graphics for this episode were created by Bob Bretz. Full episode transcription was created by James Lai.
And now – the Listener Story. It’s just a 5-10 minute story, sent in by a listener. You can record your own story on your phone in a quiet environment, and email it to me – Scott@WhatWasThatLike.com.
This week’s Listener Story is kind of in alignment with Jami’s story – an encounter with a stranger who could have been dangerous.
Stay safe, and I’ll see you back here next week on Tuesday and Friday!
(Listener Story)
In my early 20s, I lived in a small town in Utah. It was a very rural town, mostly farmland. My husband and I were both going to school at a university in the town nearby. I was going to school part time, but I was working full time at a treatment facility for people with eating disorders. This facility was a residential facility and it was In the town that I lived in, which was very small, very remote, but the facility was at a house that was up in the foothills where there were no other homes nearby, kind of up in the mountains.
One day, I was at work and I was a cook there. My co-worker who was coming to cook for dinner – I had just cooked breakfast and lunch – she had just arrived and told me that when she was driving up to work that day. She had passed by a man who was hitchhiking on the side of the road and she said she just drove right past him and ignored him as young women should do. She just mentioned this to me as a strange thing that happened while she was driving there. Then, I left to head home. I had to drive back on this same road that she’d come upon which, to be clear, was a very strange location for someone to be hitchhiking because there’s really nothing here nearby. If you’re driving up this road, you’re going straight into nothing except for this treatment facility or just to go on a hike, maybe in the mountains. So it seemed an odd place for someone to be hitchhiking.
Anyway, I’d kind of forgotten that she said this until I was driving down the road and I saw a man hitchhiking when I was driving up to him. He was actually kneeling on the side of the road. This man was an older man – I would guess probably in his sixties. When he saw me approaching in my vehicle, he stood up – he had in his hand a large rifle – and he walked into the middle of the road and was waving his hands and holding his rifle. He had a look of distress on his face and I was just compelled to stop. In retrospect, I recognize that this is obviously an unsafe situation for a young woman to put herself in but, in my heart, just by the look on this man’s face, I could tell he was highly distressed. So I stopped and I rolled down my window a little bit. I was still a bit apprehensive and he told me he needed a ride and that he had actually been hunting up in the mountains with his family and he got lost. So I said, “Okay, where do you need a ride to?” So he got in my car with his gun in the front seat and kind of collapsed honestly onto the seat of my car. He told me that he had a family member who lived not too far away in this small town and that he would direct me to where he needed to go. So I said, “Okay.” And I began driving and following his directions.
I could tell that, yes, he definitely needed help. He was physically exhausted, I could tell. I drove him to where he needed to go, to this home. When we arrived at this home, it looked like there was no one there. He got out and he said, “I’ll call someone, I’ll get the garage code, I’ll get inside, but thank you.” And I left and I drove to my home. I just feel like this situation could have ended pretty terribly and it was definitely an unsafe situation to put myself in, but something really just compelled me to pick this man up. I’m sure that he was very grateful that I did and I’m sure also, in retrospect for him, he recognizes that he probably looked a little bit frightening carrying his gun and asking for a ride from a young woman who was by herself but I think he was so overwhelmed by his own situation that he didn’t even consider that. I’ve never seen this man again but, ultimately, I am glad that I stopped to pick him up because he was not a dangerous person and he truly did need help, but I would never ever recommend doing the same thing to anyone else.