Today we take a deep dive into the harrowing stories that lie beneath the surface of the real estate world. Join us as we uncover the chilling and tragic tales of real estate agent homicides that have sent shockwaves through the industry. From promising properties to fatal encounters, we navigate the twists and turns that transformed routine showings into deadly traps. Tune in to explore the unsettling truths behind these real estate agent homicides, as we shed light on the risks and vulnerabilities faced by those who work in the realm of property transactions. * Listener discretion is advised as we dive into the true tales that reveal the dangerous underbelly of the industry.
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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 Did you know that 48 real estate professionals died while on the job in 2017.
0:39 And then in 2018, they did a poll and 9% of real estate agents said that they've been attacked or threatened at work.
0:48 More than 5% of them have had to use a gun to defend themselves.
0:54 It seems like they have a relatively safe job.
0:58 They don't work with machinery or anything like that.
1:01 There's no hazardous chemicals, no criminals involved.
1:05 So you think, but real estate agents really face a lot of danger at work.
1:13 This has always been a concern of mine because I have a lot of friends who are real estate agents.
1:20 I'm genuinely concerned about them and their safety because I do know that they work alone.
1:28 Most of them are independent contractors.
1:31 They spend their day out showing homes to people that they don't know, criminals can single them out, especially female agents that they feel like might be weak and might be more vulnerable to attacks.
1:47 And that makes me nervous just because I've heard so many stories of this happening again.
1:53 The people that they meet out in public are typically people that they don't know, and they meet them at a property, and they really don't know who they're dealing with.
2:03 They could be showing the home to somebody that has mental health problems or is addicted to drugs and alcohol could be under the influence.
2:13 The person could have been in prison.
2:15 They really don't know; they could have a weapon so these women could be sexually assaulted or even worse murdered and they can't really control where they go.
2:27 They're trying to sell homes, they're out in the community.
2:31 It could be in a quiet part of town or out in a rural area where maybe the property's been abandoned.
2:38 There could be squatters in the residence.
2:41 They really don't know what they're going to have to deal with and they are on real estate signs, their pictures are on billboards.
2:52 They have to advertise publicly to get business.
2:57 If a criminal is wanting to find somebody to rob or assault, then it would be easy for them to find out where the open houses are to go there.
3:11 Maybe even seeking out a specific realtor, not always, but they could be and then if there's no other cars there, then they know that that person is most likely there alone.
3:23 It's definitely a dangerous job.
3:27I just was thinking about all the different things that have happened to realtors on the job.
3:33 And it was concerning to me again because I do have a lot of friends that are in the business.
3:39 A lot of them carry pepper spray, some carry firearms, pocketknives, tasers, even clubs, women tend to prefer pepper spray and tasers just because they typically don't like to shoot somebody unless it's absolutely necessary.
3:57 If they can just slow them down, you know, at least if they can get away.
4:02 But there are also a lot of safety apps that you can put on your phone.
4:07 The best thing is to know if their brokerage has a policy for agent safety, you know what their limits are, maybe even self-defense classes, safety protocols, those types of things.
4:25 Just remember several cases in recent years where real estate agents were killed in homes where they had open houses and no one else was there when the perpetrator walked in and again, you know, they're there alone.
4:41 They're usually prepared for a crowd or at least a few people to come in and look at these homes.
4:47 They're typically dressed nicely, they have food out, they have drinks out are there by themselves.
4:54 Now in August of 2022 Koso Chantha Kamani was put to death for fatally stabbing a Dallas real estate agent 16 years ago.
5:05 Sarah Walker was 40 years old, and he fatally stabbed her back in July of 06.
5:13 He did receive lethal injection, but she was stabbed more than 30 times in a model home in McKinney during an open house.
5:23 I think they said exactly 33 times first though, he beat her with a wooden plant stand and then stabbed her before stealing her Rolex that she had just bought the day before and a silver ring that she had on.
5:39 His blood was found in the residence and under her fingernails, he had been on parole in Texas after serving time in North Carolina for aggravated kidnapping and robbery.
5:53 He did admit to being there at the house, but he said that he only went in to get a drink of water.
6:00 Now, she also had a bite mark on her neck and the killer attempted to wash himself in the sink.
6:10 Now, she had met some men on a dating website, and they were all contacted, and they volunteered their DNA, and they were all ruled out.
6:22 She had recently divorced.
6:24 Her ex was looked at as well and DNA evidence ruled him out too.
6:30 Now, Sarah Walker worked for Dr Horton, and she was found on July 8th in the kitchen of this model home.
6:40 So a couple from Plano who came in to look at the house found her body and they noticed that there were signs of a struggle in the dining room and then they saw a pair of shoes and then a broken hair clip and a broken earring on the floor.
6:58 And then they followed the trail of blood from the dining room to the kitchen.
7:02 Now the bite mark on the back of her neck matched the pattern on Chantha Kai's teeth.
7:12 It was determined that it was him.
7:14 At that point.
7:15 She had several blunt force injuries to her head consistent with being hit by the plant stand.
7:22 And then she had bruises on her face and head and then a broken nose and several of her teeth were broken.
7:30 Also, she had a wound on her left arm and a broken fingernail.
7:36 And when they did her autopsy, they found that 10 of the stab wounds penetrated vital organs that would have been fatal immediately.
7:46 She wouldn't have really had a chance to survive.
7:50 Had he stabbed her less than 33 times because so many of the stab wounds were fatal because they penetrated those vital organs in cases like this really, the autopsy starts before the decedent even reaches the morgue.
8:09 The body at the scene is a very important part of the death investigation.
8:16 It's assumed not to be an official component of autopsy, but you know what it really is because it's so important as a death investigator, we would go to a scene like this.
8:29 And once the police had been there, we would take our own photos and then we try to get everything that seems to be important and pertinent.
8:40 We would take a picture of the inside of the sink with the blood.
8:45 And then the police would swab that for DNA, we would take a picture of where the body is.
8:54 Any signs of a struggle, the broken hair clip, the shoe, all the things, the blood trail that goes from the dining room to the kitchen.
9:04 What we need to do is get a good clear photo of the scene so that our doctors basically feel like they're there.
9:14 And then we would look at the body, examine the body, take photos, but also document any stab wounds that we see.
9:25 Of course, it's very important when there's a stab or a gunshot not to stick your finger in any stab wounds or defects caused by a gunshot.
9:35 It's very important to touch as little as possible, especially in a homicide case.
9:43 And if there's going to be any kind of trace evidence needed, then we're not going to touch the body at all.
9:49 Trace would consist of a team coming in prior to the autopsy to closely look over the body, to see if there are any hairs or any other forms of evidence that they can take off the body directly.
10:04 So of course, if we want to do trace, then we would not manipulate the body because we do not want to knock anything off or mess up that part of the investigation at all.
10:19 That's very important.
10:21 Essentially, we're going to typically at a scene like this document, the stab wounds that we see now, there may be a lot that we don't see again because we're not going to manipulate the body a lot and there's probably going to be a lot of blood.
10:37 Our job is not so much to be exact, but to make note that there are multiple stab wounds and make note of where they are.
10:49 Now, once they get the body to the morgue for autopsy, they're going to wash it off and then they'll be able to visualize all the stab wounds and they will take photos on autopsies.
11:01 They'll know there exactly how many stab wounds the person has.
11:06 It's just important for us to get all the information that we can at the scene, do interviews and all that kind of stuff.
11:14 These scenes are very important, and I have to say I have not worked a real estate agent, death in a model home or open house.
11:25 Thank goodness.
11:26 But there's another case back in 2014, this happened in September on September 26th, Beverly Carter was murdered while showing a home to a couple that she believed to be potential buyers.
11:43 Now she was 50 years old, and she left her home at around 5:30 in the evening she told her husband that she was going to go show a house in Scott Arkansas.
11:55 Now, at around nine, he hadn't heard from her yet.
11:59 She told him where she was going.
12:02 And so he went to that home address to check on her, the door was open, and her car was in the driveway and her purse was in the car, but she was not in the car or the house on September 28th, 2014, a warrant was issued for Aaron Lewis for the disappearance of Beverly.
12:25 Now there's not a lot of information on what led the police to him, but he was on parole and was to be on parole through 2017.
12:36 The same day that his warrant was issued, he was involved in a car accident.
12:42 His vehicle was traveling at a high rate of speed, and he ended up in a ditch, he went to a hospital, but he was discharged before he could be arrested after the warrant had been issued again, previously arrested for felony theft of property was on parole.
13:00 September 30th.
13:02 Two days later, Beverly's body was found in a shallow grave at a concrete company.
13:09 Now he admitted to kidnapping her, but he wouldn't tell anybody where her body was because he denied killing her.
13:16 Then he kind of claimed to be having an affair with her and having known her previously, which rightly so upset her family quite a bit on October 30th Aaron Lewis's wife was arrested and charged with capital murder and kidnapping.
13:36 She was 41-year-old Crystal Lowery, and she faced the same charges as her husband.
13:42 And on March 4th, several months later, Lewis decides he's going to represent himself in court and dismisses his attorney.
13:51 But that doesn't last very long because in June, he ends up appointing another attorney.
13:57 Now Crystal Lowery Lewis's wife pled guilty, and she was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
14:04 The couple apparently had lured Carter to this rural home, and they were going to try to demand ransom from her husband.
14:14 But when that failed and they, I guess had decided not to do it.
14:18 He killed her by wrapping her head in duct tape.
14:22 Lowry took the stand for the prosecution and Carter was supposedly chosen because they thought that she was rich.
14:32 They thought that she made a lot of money because she was a very well-known successful real estate agent.
14:39 This couple was planning on trying to get $100,000 worth of ransom from Carter's husband and then split it.
14:49 Now essentially Lewis was found guilty of murder and kidnapping after one hour of deliberations and he received life in prison.
14:59 He got life in prison.
15:01 His wife got 30 years and he is in Gould Arkansas at Varner Super Max, which is a prison there.
15:11 This couple was just planning to rob her because they felt like she probably had a lot of money because she was successful.
15:18 The scary thing is a lot of different people can be involved.
15:23 Now, on New Year's Eve in 2019, 2 men lured Monique Baugh and she was 28 years old to a fake house showing.
15:32 I mean, they pretended to be interested in this home and of course she went there thinking that she had a potential buyer and they abducted her, they had a U haul there.
15:43 They put her in a U haul and her body was later found in an alleyway in Minneapolis, Cedric.
15:50 Barry and Barry Davis were both 42-year-olds who were given life in prison for their role in her kidnapping and murder.
15:59 The medical examiner determined that she was shot at point blank range.
16:04 They shot her twice in the torso and once in the face.
16:10 Shot three times and her wrists were bound by duct tape.
16:14 Her keys were stolen and then they had entered her home and shot her boyfriend in front of their Children.
16:22 Now he survived, but apparently he had flaunted some cash on social media.
16:30 And so that was basically what they were after was the cash that they thought that ball had.
16:39 When Barry was arrested, he had a walkie talkie, a black ski mask, duct tape and heroin in his car.
16:48 He was definitely up to no good.
16:50 I mean, when the police pull somebody over, if they've got duct tape and a ski mask and trash bags and all that kind of stuff.
16:56 Like they definitely don't look like a good guy just driving around town.
17:00 Now, Elsa Segura was a 29-year-old, and she was convicted in September of aiding and abetting first degree murder.
17:09 Now that carries a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole, she used the name Lisa Pelosky and called Ba to set up the Phony house showing.
17:22 She definitely took a very big part in what played out.
17:27 Had she not done that?
17:29 This eventual kidnapping, torture and execution would not have taken place.
17:37 Lyndon Wiggins, a 37-year-old has also been convicted.
17:42 This is Segura's boyfriend, and he apparently had a business dispute with Bob's boyfriend related to a music label partnership.
17:53 Bob's boyfriend was actually a rapper.
17:56 There were issues between Segura's boyfriend and Am Bough's boyfriend causing cigar to arrange for this fake showing.
18:07 And then these other two men were going to kidnap torture and execute her.
18:14 In 2021 in Florida, there was a real estate agent sitting in the driveway of a home waiting to show it to someone when she was shot multiple times.
18:28 This happened like at around 12 30 in the afternoon, Sarah Trost who was a 40-year-old real estate agent was sitting in the driver's seat of her Jeep parked in front of a home.
18:39 Raymond Reese, who's 51 was arrested, apparently had previously been evicted from the same home and thought the realtor was the owner of the house and so ambushed her while she was basically sitting in her car.
18:58 You hate to be paranoid.
18:59 But at the same time, you want to kind of be realistic about what the dangers are with your job.
19:05 But I talked to some realtor friends of mine, and they said that the things that they try to keep in mind are how important it is to be sure that someone knows where you're at.
19:18 Like either your real estate broker or your spouse or somebody that you trust.
19:23 That if something happens to you, they know where to go to find you or where to start.
19:28 Also, they said that it's important not to reveal too much personal information.
19:36 You obviously wouldn't want to tell a random person that you're showing a house to where you live, anything about your family, where you spend your vacation.
19:49 And you also want to be careful with social media because you know, now you can look up anybody, I mean, we even find next of kin sometimes for deceased family members by looking them up on Facebook and you can learn a lot about people.
20:06 People can look you up, they can see the city you live in.
20:09 They can see where you work.
20:10 They can see pictures of your kids, your grandkids, they can learn a lot about.
20:15 You learn your habits.
20:17 I'm not saying don't get on social media because I'm very active on social media because that's how I advertise.
20:27 I also own another business.
20:29 It's very important for businesses to be on social media.
20:35 And so especially real estate agents, they're going to have a following because that's where they get their businesses, word of mouth.
20:42 And so it's important for them to have a following on social media, but you can’t control who sees your posts.
20:50 They told me it's also important to not leave your phone lying somewhere in the house while you're showing it to be sure that it's with you just to increase your chances of being able to call and get help if needed.
21:08 Because of course, if you're in the bedroom or upstairs and you left your phone in the kitchen, it's not going to do you a lot of good.
21:15 It's also important to report anybody suspicious or anybody that makes you uncomfortable.
21:25 And that's just because you want to raise the awareness of the other realtors who may run into the same person.
21:34 It's just important if somebody seems suspicious or does something a little out of line or says something that makes you feel uncomfortable that you report that.
21:44 I think one thing too is if it's an upscale neighborhood, a lot of realtors may think that it can't happen there because it's a well to do area and there wouldn't be any criminals there.
22:01 But criminals work in all neighborhoods at all hours of the night.
22:05 Not to make anybody paranoid.
22:08 But my husband thought of this subject as a podcast and I think he had heard something about a realtor being attacked and he's like, how often does that happen?
22:18 I was like, I can remember several instances in Texas specifically where realtors were killed, all jobs are dangerous in their own way.
22:29 Again, I'm sure there have been many, many other murders.
22:33 But you know, the thing is when I was looking at the pictures, all these women are beautiful, like they're all drop dead gorgeous.
22:41 I mean, they absolutely, I mean, they have their pictures on billboards and their pictures on the signs and can be target for anybody.
22:52 I mean, anybody can really.
22:54 I think it's very important just to be aware of your surroundings all the time no matter what your job is and just always pay attention to what's going on around you.
23:06 And of course, this is not just women, this can easily, easily happen to men too.
23:12 Women are not the only targets.
23:15 I think that they just think that maybe they would be less able to defend themselves.
23:21 They might be easier to overtake.
23:24 But of course, that's not always true.
23:26 And we know that I think anybody in the real estate field just should be super careful.
23:32 Again, I'm sure they're well aware of the dangers because they know what's happened because all this has been in the news.
23:39 It's scary because you don't really think about that job having risks.
23:43 But again, every job has risks of their own kind.
23:48 It has been super-hot in Texas.
23:51 Over the past week we did have our little county fair and rodeo here.
23:57 I think they said Saturday was the hottest day of the week.
24:02 So it was pretty much miserable.
24:04 Hopefully everyone is enjoying some decent weather in your area wherever you may be.
24:11 Tune in next week.
24:13 And we are going to talk about deaths and crime that occurs in the prison system.
24:19 I am trying to reach out to a couple of prison nurses to maybe get some interviews to see what their job is like on a daily basis.
24:28 To me that's always seemed like it would be interesting to see what goes on behind closed doors.
24:36 I know that it's a super stressful job.
24:38 I can only imagine.
24:40 I feel like I would be worried and concerned all the time and constantly watching my back.
24:44 Hopefully, I will be able to reach them in the next couple of days.
24:48 We can get some interviews but stay tuned next week.
24:51 Like I said, we're going to be talking about prison deaths and dangers in the prison system.
24:58 Thank you so much for joining me today on Pushing up Lilies.
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25:12 Thanks again for spending your time with me and be sure to visit me at PushingUpLilies.com for merchandise and past episodes.