Hey y'all, it’s Julie with Pushing Up Lilies. This week, we’re covering a case that shook the small town of Henryetta, Oklahoma, and sent shockwaves across the country. On May 1st, 2023, Jesse McFadden murdered his wife, Holly Guess, her three children—Rylee Elizabeth Allen, Michael James Mayo, and Tiffany Dore Guess—as well as their two young friends, Ivy Webster and Brittany Brewer. What started as an innocent sleepover turned into a horrifying massacre. In this episode, we’ll unpack the disturbing details of the crime, discuss McFadden's criminal background, and examine how this monster was able to live among his victims undetected for so long. This heartbreaking case is a stark reminder of how dark secrets can hide beneath the surface of seemingly ordinary lives. Let’s honor the memory of these innocent lives while digging into the hard truths behind this unimaginable tragedy. * Listener discretion is advised.
CONNECT WITH JULIE MATTSON:
• Website: https://pushinguplilies.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pushinguplilies
0:06 Welcome to Pushing Up Lilies.
0:08 I'm your host, Julie Mattson.
0:10 Pushing Up Lilies is a weekly True crime podcast with spine tingling, unusual and terrifyingly true stories from my perspective as a forensic death investigator and a sexual assault nurse examiner.
0:24 Do I have some stories for you?
0:26 Are you ready?
0:31 Hey, guys, I'm coming to you this week from Miami.
0:34 I'm traveling here for my med spa.
0:37 There is a special training that I'm here for because I'm the owner of a med spa and I purchased some equipment that this company sales and I kind of love it because many don't know.
0:52 But before I went to nursing school, my passion was marketing.
0:57 I don't feel like I'm very good at it.
0:59 And back then, the internet really wasn't a thing.
1:03 I wasn't even faced with that challenge yet.
1:06 But what changed my mind is that as I started going through school and taking marketing and sales classes, I realized that I'm not really a very pushy person.
1:17 I don't like making people feel uncomfortable and everyone kept telling me that it was a really hard career field to get into that.
1:28 It was very competitive and even if you're good, you have to work in like downtown Dallas and it would be difficult finding a good job.
1:37 And so everyone kind of talked me out of it.
1:41 I shouldn't have listened.
1:43 But the cool thing is that now, even as a nurse owning the med spa and having a podcast, I'm getting to utilize all those marketing ideas that I used and I'm getting new ideas.
1:58 They were talking to us at the conference today and asked how many of us were in sales and literally none of us raised our hands cause we're like, we're all nurses and doctors and pas and nurse practitioners.
2:10 And they said you're wrong.
2:12 Every one of you are in sales.
2:15 That's true.
2:16 Even with the podcast, you know, trying to promote it and get more followers and get sponsors and sell merchandise and with the med spa sale, merchandise, sale services, get people in the door.
2:33 I think all of us are in some way salespeople, which I never really thought of myself that way until today.
2:40 But it's a great conference.
2:42 I have not been outside the hotel.
2:44 I've just heard rumors that Miami is not a super safe place and they're feeding us.
2:51 I really have no reason to get out and about and I don't like wandering around a big city by myself.
2:58 I came to this conference alone.
3:01 It was a lot just to get me to fly here and tackle the airport in an Uber by myself.
3:08 I would not really want to, not in a big city.
3:12 I 'm more comfortable in smaller places, but I wouldn't want to be out and about on my own, especially at night and not know where I was.
3:22 I'm not really comfortable with that.
3:24 I decided to stay in tonight and I am here for y'all.
3:30 There's a story that I wanted to cover this week, but I wanted to say first how many people still let their Children have sleepovers or go to sleepovers.
3:43 I know that back when I was a kid, we did it all the time.
3:48 Of course, again, a lot of things that exist now, a lot of the dangers that exist.
3:55 Now, I know they existed then a lot of them did, but we weren't aware of them.
4:01 But now even more so because of the internet and opportunities that people have, it has gotten easier for a child to become a victim.
4:15 And again, we never thought about it when we were younger.
4:18 I mean, first of all, I grew up in a small town, all of my friends', parents knew my parents and vice versa.
4:29 We just trusted each other.
4:30 I mean, we all knew what our friends’ parents did for a living.
4:36 We knew everything about their family, we knew their brothers and their sisters and sometimes even their cousins.
4:44 And I mean, it was crazy just how close we were, and it and it was great, but now there's so much more that can get in the way and I would be fearful if I was a parent of a younger child or even a teenager to let them spend the night with a friend.
5:05 But we had no fear back then.
5:07 Our parents trusted us.
5:09 Thank goodness.
5:11 I mean, they really weren't aware that I was at my friend's house jumping off of the roof of her second story home onto her trampoline and risking breaking my neck.
5:22 They didn't know that they didn't know when she had parties in the upstairs of her barn and there were boys there and we were teenagers, and they didn't know there was a party, and they never really checked up on us because they felt like they trusted our friends’ parents.
5:41 They felt like we were safe.
5:43 But I mean, we did do things wrong, luckily, we all survived it, but we never really feared that anything bad would happen to us, especially at the hands of our friends', parents are relatives.
5:59 This story is going to be a little bit surprising.
6:03 And I have to say that when I was a sexual assault nurse examiner, and I was going to local hospitals to do exams on Children in the middle of the night.
6:18 Many times I would get a call from a police department to meet them there with a child, sometimes a teenager, but sometimes younger who had been assaulted by a friend's dad, a friend's uncle, a friend's brother, someone who was at a friend's house as teenagers.
6:43 I mean, it could have even been someone of the opposite sex that came over to visit and parents weren't aware of what was going on and had a lot of kids over there and maybe weren't able to watch them all well enough.
6:57 But there were just a lot of people that came into the e that had been assaulted by family members of friends that they were spending the night with and the fears that parents have to deal with.
7:13 Now don't only include sexual assault, but they also include drugs and alcohol.
7:21 And I mean, those were existent back when I was younger too, but gun safety has become a big issue and bullying.
7:30 You know, many times you hear stories of people who were invited to parties just so they could be bullied or just so they could be made fun of and that fear of lack of supervision is scary because even though you think, you know someone's parents and you think you trust them, you also have to trust that your child is telling you the truth.
7:54 When they say the parents are home, the parents didn't go out.
7:57 There's no one of the opposite sex coming over.
8:01 There's so many things that come into play, there always have been bad things that could happen.
8:07 But again, I feel like the risks are higher these days with the internet and social media.
8:13 You know, there's also your friends', siblings, you know the opposite sex.
8:18 Again, the brothers, the cousins who were overspending the night, the uncles who were living with the friends because they didn't have a place to stay, or they were in the middle of divorce or something.
8:31 We all know that most sexual abuse comes from people that, you know, oftentimes when it happens, it is simply a matter of opportunity, somebody is put in a house where someone there is vulnerable and it happens, it may not always be premeditated, but it is definitely a matter of opportunity.
8:56 In many cases, a good thing to think about too is if your child is invited to a friend's house and doesn't want to go there very well, could be a reason.
9:07 I mean, you don't really have to drill them on why they don't want to go because you don't want to pressure them because they're very well may be a reason he or she may have had an experience there that made them uncomfortable, and they don't want to be put in that situation again.
9:26 Sadly, the world has changed, and it is no longer a safe place for Children.
9:31 And sometimes it's not a safe place for adults.
9:34 But one example is, remember the Polly Klaus story, the 12-year-old girl who was assaulted and murdered after being taken from her home during a slumber party.
9:43 And that was back in 93 that was before the internet.
9:47 Again, bad things did happen when this happens to a child or even an adult.
9:53It definitely casts a shadow on everything that follows in regard to future relationships and marriage and stress and anxiety and just the ability to deal with those things.
10:07 It could lead to a history of drug abuse and alcoholism.
10:12 Kids may start running away.
10:14 I mean, there are so many things that can happen because of sexual abuse or sexual assault, and we may not find out until years later that someone had been assaulted when they were younger, they hid it for a long time.
10:31 And that's always a possibility.
10:35 And that's the reason I guess because when I worked as a sexual assault nurse, I saw this a lot and it was disheartening because the Children never asked for that.
10:46 They thought they were going to have a good time, go spend the night with a friend, hang out, have a sleepover, eat popcorn, watch a movie.
10:54 All those fun things that I did when I was younger, but then something happens and somebody's there that shouldn't be or even that should be and does something that they shouldn't.
11:07 On Monday May 1st, 2023, authorities arrived at a rental property and determined that Jesse McFadden had murdered his wife, his wife was Holly guess she was 35 but he also murdered her three Children, Riley Elizabeth Allen who was 17, Michael James Mayo.
11:31 Who was 15 and Tiffany do guess who was 13.
11:37 Tiffany also had two friends spending the night staying over Ivy Webster who was 14 and Britney Brewer who was 15 and those two had come over for a sleepover with Tiffany.
11:52 Jesse McFadden murdered them.
11:55 All these murders occurred at McFadden’s home, which was in Henrietta, Oklahoma, they rented a house there.
12:04 On the last weekend of April 2023 Ivy and Britney received invitations to come over to Tiffany's and they were going to go to the mall and spend the night.
12:15 Now, Jesse McFadden picked Britney up at noon and the plan was to take the girls shopping at the mall and to main event, which is kind of like a game store, kind of like Dave and Buster's and Kids games, family entertainment center and that was in Tulsa.
12:35 Ivy had Snapchatted her mother throughout the night.
12:39 The next morning, Ivy and Britney's parents received messages from their daughters that they were heading to McFadden’s family property in McAlester Oklahoma.
12:51 But on Monday, the girl's parents knew something was very wrong when none of the kids, Britney, Ivy, Tiffany Michael or Riley were on the school bus as it drove by sometime between Saturday night and Monday McFadden shot his wife and her three Children and the two teenage friends in the head before killing himself.
13:19 Now the bodies were found spread out around the property near where the McFadden’s lived and each of them had gunshot wounds to the head anywhere between 1 to 3 each.
13:35 Now, some were near the creek, and some were in the wooded area on this property near the McFadden home.
13:43 Deputies went to the home on the morning of May 1st and found the door open.
13:49 There was a broken cell phone, four spent shell casings live ammunition, two computer towers, two flash drives, a nine-millimeter pistol, a blanket for glasses, a plastic bag, sunglasses, a flashlight, a cigarette and medication.
14:13 Now, the Oklahoma State Bureau of investigation took over the case on May 6th because there were reports or complaints that evidence had been left behind in the home.
14:26 The autopsies of these six mass murder victims confirm that they were all shot in the head.
14:33 And two of them, Ivy and Britney, the friends of Tiffany's had injuries consistent with sexual assault.
14:43 Now, the wife had gunshot wounds to the head but also arm and leg abrasions, abrasions were also found on her three Children a little bit about Jesse McFadden.
14:59 He had a troubled history with the law.
15:02 Long before this happened.
15:05 He was born in Kansas.
15:06 He dropped out of school after ninth grade, and he was living in McAllister when he started getting in trouble the first time it was for being in possession of a beer underage.
15:20 In 2002, he admitted to stealing over $80,000 from his grandfather at which time he plead guilty to a felony grand larceny in a dwelling house.
15:33 And in 2003, he was caught twice driving while his license was suspended.
15:40 Now, in 2003, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison after pleading no contest to raping a 17-year-old girl at knife point.
15:51 So this guy had been in prison, ok?
15:54 He went in 2003; he was sentenced to 20 years.
15:59 Technically, he wouldn't have gotten out until 2023.
16:04 While in prison in 2013, McFadden was caught with a cell phone after a woman reported that he'd been texting her for three months.
16:16 Now, he was caught again with a cell phone in 2016 and was later charged in 2017 with sex crimes based on material found on that phone.
16:28 One felony count of sexting with a minor and a second felony count of possessing juvenile pornography.
16:36 Now, despite his misconduct, he was released on October the 30th of 2020.
16:43 He had only served 85% of his sentence and he completed his sentence under department of Corrections calculations that gave him credit for some things that he had done like good behavior and also credit for time spent in jail.
17:03 Let's think about this.
17:04 This guy had gotten in trouble twice for contraband cell phone, possessing juvenile pornography and sexting a minor while he's in prison.
17:14 But he gets out early on good behavior.
17:19 Something's wrong with this picture.
17:21 Upon release from state prison, McFadden was arrested and placed into the Muskogee County jail for the 2017 sex case.
17:34 He was released shortly after that on $25,000 bond, he'd been in trouble, right several times was in jail, got in trouble while he was in jail but was released early for good behavior.
17:49 And as soon as he got out, he got arrested again for a 2017 sex case, but again posted $25,000 bond and was released.
18:01 He remained free, and he remained released over the next five years because the case was delayed repeatedly.
18:11 He was supposed to appear in court on child pornography charges on May 1st and this is the day that his victims', bodies were found.
18:22 Family members are the victims have worked with Representative Scott Fetgatter of Okmulgee to have House Bill 3992, which is called Knights law passed which would require people convicted of certain child sex crimes to serve 100% of their sentence.
18:43 Now, in this Henryetta case in 2023 Jesse McFadden was out of prison when he murdered his wife and Children and their friends who came over for this sleepover, he moved the bodies out to this field.
19:00 When they found the shell casings and the weapon at the house, they knew that… I mean, and it didn't mention blood, but I'm sure there was that too because heads bleed a lot.
19:12 I'm sure that he had moved them out from the home where he originally killed them and move them out near this creek and in this rural field and the bodies were near McFadden’s home in Henrietta, which is literally about six, a population of about 6000 and it's about 90 miles east of Oklahoma City.
19:38 Now, what in the world were they thinking at the Joseph Harp Correctional Center in Lexington when they let this guy go early on good behavior when he committed felonies while he was in prison.
19:51 And then when he got rearrested after he was released, he was able to post bond, and his trial was suspended for a period of five years, and he was allowed to go home and live with other Children under the same roof.
20:07 And not only was he released despite these serious charges pending against him, but his bail was set relatively low considering what he had done what he had done in the past and also the crimes that he committed while he was in jail.
20:24 Now McFadden had vowed not to return to prison in a series of messages with the teenagers that he was texting while he was behind bars in the text messages.
20:36 He said that his great life was crumbling, and he blamed the teenager for the latest set of charges against him that could put him back in prison for decades.
20:47 Now, these solicitation convictions could mean a 10-year sentence and the pornography charge could mean 20 years behind bars and he texted the girl now it's all gone.
21:02 I told you I wouldn't go back.
21:04 This is all on you for continuing this.
21:07 Basically blaming the 16-year-old girl that he was sexting while he was in prison for causing him to get in trouble while he was there and get arrested again after he was released.
21:20 And relatives of the victims, as you can imagine, were in disbelief by his early release, especially again because of the seriousness of these new charges against him.
21:33 Now his wife Holly guess was 35 at the time of her death, Riley Allen was 17.
21:40 Michael Mayo was 15.
21:42 Tiffany Guess was 13.
21:44 And again, we talked about the other victims, Ivy Webster who was 14 and Britney Brewer who was 16.
21:51 Now, Ivy Webster's dad allowed Ivy to sleep over, not really knowing anything about the man's past.
21:58 And again, this is why I highly encourage you if you have young Children.
22:03 No, the parents of the Children that you're sending your Children to.
22:09 You have to know.
22:11 I mean, nowadays we have access to a list of sex offenders in our area but go over there and visit, talk to him.
22:21 I mean, I'm sure if this dad had done research, he would have found this information and probably could have shared it with other people to avoid them sending their Children over there.
22:36 This guy, I mean, if it's a town of 6000, I have a hard time believing that not everyone knew, and he had to have been registered as a sex offender.
22:45 I mean, this wasn't that long ago.
22:46 I know that that had to be in place.
22:50 But in that state, registered sex offenders are allowed to live with their own Children and stepchildren as long as the Children or stepchildren were not victims of the offender.
23:07 To me, that is the craziest thing I've ever heard because I can tell you that in Texas, it is way different.
23:14 I mean, we take sexual abuse of a child and crimes against Children very seriously in absolutely no way would child protective services allowed this man to go back home with a bunch of teenagers when he was accused of sexually assaulting a teenager, whether they're related or not.
23:38 This infuriates me that this was allowed because these Children and his wife would not be dead if they had.
23:50 Number one, kept him behind bars where he belonged.
23:54 And number two, if that law didn't exist, allowing him to be released and go back home with all these teenagers.
24:04 Now, when he was first arrested, when he first sexually assaulted the 17-year-old and got the 20-year sentence, he had tied a 17-year old's hands and feet to bedposts, cut her shirt off and raped her at knifepoint and threatened to use the knife on her if she did not shut up McFadden and Holly Guess married in May of 2022.
24:30 What she knew of his record wasn't very clear because again, they'd only been married a year when the murders happened, but her family didn't even know that he had a criminal history until a few months prior to this happening.
24:47 Now, Holly was a 35-year-old doting parent who worked from home selling life insurance reports say she was a great mother and loved her Children.
24:58 I'm not quite sure how the two met, but McFadden moved in with her and her three Children after they moved to Henrietta in 2021 and then got married in 2022.
25:11 His wife was born in El Paso, Texas and then the family moved around a lot.
25:17 Now her mother had seen her on the night of April 27th when she went with her to watch a concert that one of her Children was in.
25:28 Riley was 17.
25:30 She was said to be very artistic, and she wanted to be an artist and a doctor so she could help people.
25:39 She had very high aspirations, Michael Mayo who was 15, played football and ran track and cross country.
25:47 He was very athletic.
25:49 Tiffany who was 13, also ran cross country.
25:53 She was a 7th grader, and she was in choir and had just tried out for the cheerleading squad.
26:02 They called her to thesaurus because whenever she got mad, she would growl at people.
26:07 That was her nickname Ivy Webster again was a friend of Tiffany's and was a great kid who loved animals, and she also loved softball.
26:18 Britney Brewer again was another of Tiffany's friends who aspired to be a teacher or a veterinarian.
26:25 Now, Britney was selected to be Miss Henrietta coming up in July of last year for the Miss National Miss pageant in Tulsa.
26:35 These kids had huge aspirations and would have been super successful in life, had they not been exposed to this animal?
26:45 Yes, his mother was notified of the murders on Facebook.
26:51 Now, the nine-millimeter weapon that was used was purchased by Holly in January of 2022.
27:00 And of course, he turns the gun on himself.
27:03 He decides he's going to kill everybody in the home, take them all out to this field near the creek and then shoot himself because he did not, like he said, he texted the teenager and said, I'm not going to go back to prison.
27:17 I mean, this whole story is just infuriating to me because we've talked many times about how people are put in prison and let out early and then they strike again and end up killing somebody.
27:34 This guy obviously wasn't well behaved if he'd gotten in trouble twice while he was in prison.
27:41 I just have a lot of questions.
27:42 I have a lot of questions about the prison system?
27:45 Like why in the world would they let him out?
27:49 Don't understand that.
27:51 I don't understand and I'm not blaming at all, but I don't understand the parents not making sure that they knew these people because in a town of 6000, you would think that it would be easy to find out the background of someone who had been in prison for so long and had reoffended while he was there, posted bond and remained free for five years awaiting another trial.
28:22 So the takeaway from this is, please, please, please.
28:28 And, and I worry about my granddaughter, and I know that my daughter is super protective of her, and you don't want to make your kids paranoid.
28:36 I mean, by any means, but you want to protect them and make sure that they are aware of their surroundings.
28:46 You just want to make sure that you shield them just enough without overprotecting them because we all know what happens when we do that.
28:54 They try even harder to sneak out, take it from somebody who did that.
28:59 My parents were very strict, and it made me sneakier because I knew that they were capable of catching me.
29:08 And so, I would find ways not to get caught moral of the story really with this.
29:14 And there are a lot of stories again that resemble this one case, like I said, that I have worked in the past, that very much resemble this one.
29:23 And luckily, did not end up in murder but always, always make sure, you know, whose house your Children go to, if you choose to be one that allows them to spend the night.
29:36 I've heard of some parents saying that.
29:40 Ok, I think this is weird but y'all tell me what you think that they had a parent sleepover where the families all stayed over to me.
29:48 That's kind of weird.
29:49 I don't think that would have flown at all back in the day or they go over with the kids to let the kids, you know, do whatever it is, kids do and then they leave at midnight, they're not allowed to stay overnight.
30:05 They just say midnight's curfew, we're all going home.
30:10 You're not spending the night now that doesn't necessarily solve the potential for problems.
30:16 But I think the goal for these particular parents who mentioned this as an alternative, the goal was for the parents to actually stay there to actually stay there all night with them or to actually go over there, hang out with the parents and then everybody leaves at midnight.
30:34 I know that I never liked having friends at my house because my parents were strict, and I knew that we wouldn't be able to have the fun at my house that we had at their house all the time and it wasn't really because I was doing anything wrong.
30:50 I just didn't want to be that closely monitored.
30:53 So that's normal teenage thinking.
30:56 Anyway.
30:57 I just know, just because of the way times are changing, and I'd like to hear what y'all have to say about it.
31:03 How has the world, I mean, just the way things are affected where you let your Children go and when you let them go, I don't know if I could handle it these days having a teenager.
31:20 It's rough.
31:21 I'm sure I'd like to hear your input on that.
31:25 I will be leaving Miami tomorrow.
31:29 I am happy to say that I did get a few new podcast followers while I was here.
31:35 I didn't really bring the conversation up because my true crime podcast and my world of aesthetics don't necessarily go together all the time.
31:44 But I have a sleeve, and it has my death investigation badge as well as a dead body with blood spatter on it and crime scene tape and all kinds of things on my arm.
31:58 And it is definitely a conversation starter and that's how the conversation got started about the podcast.
32:03 I think I gained 10 or 15 new subscribers last night, which was amazing.
32:09 And that’s what's cool about networking is I get to network a little bit of everything.
32:15 So see, I am a salesperson anyway, I hope y'all have a great week and I look forward to talking to y'all next week.
32:23 I have a story that you'll find really interesting.
32:27 Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel, brains, body bags and bedside manner, and then also share, share my podcast and have your friends subscribe.
32:39 It's available on all the different platforms and be sure to check out my Patreon at the different memberships.
32:47 Look forward to seeing y'all next week and have a great one.
32:50 Bye y'all.
32:52 Thank you so much for joining me today on Pushing Up Lilies.
32:55 If you like this podcast and would like to share with others, please do me a quick favor and leave a review on Apple podcast.
33:03 This helps to make the podcast more visible to the public.
33:06 Thanks again for spending your time with me and be sure to visit me at PushingUpLilies.com for merchandise and past episodes.