Melanin Mayhem Podcast

In this week’s episode we are diving into one of the most disturbing stories this podcast has ever covered.Joshua Anderson terrorized a North Tulsa neighborhood in the mid-2000s with a relentless, unforgiving pattern of violence—assaults, robberies, shootings, and intimidation that left residents too afraid to speak out and essentially prisoners in their own homes. The violence reached unimaginable levels and what followed was a series of acts so cruel and depraved it shocks the senses.This episode explores how fear, silence, and unchecked violence allowed a man to control an entire neighborhood—and I'm going to tell you what finally brought their reign of terror to an end.Listener discretion strongly advised.Stay connected:www.melaninmayhempodcast.comFB: melaninmayhempodcastIG: @melaninmayhempodcastX: @melaninmayhempcYouTube: melaninmayhempodcast

Three women. Nine months. One garage on Hayden Avenue.In the summer of 2013, a stretch of road in East Cleveland was engulfed in a smell nobody wanted to name. What started as whispers of missing women turned into trash bags, flies, and a predator hiding in plain sight.But this isn’t just a story about a serial killer. It’s about what happens when warning signs get ignored, when entire neighborhoods normalize the abnormal, and when certain victims don’t trigger urgency.This week in Noir Nation, we’re unpacking Michael Madison — the crimes, the community, and the questions that still don’t sit right.

In 1920 Kentucky, a brutal crime shocked a quiet ruralcommunity — but the crime itself isn’t what made history. What happened after did.When Will Lockett was accused of the murder of a 10-year-oldgirl, outrage spread fast. A lynch mob formed. Thousands gathered. The entire town braced for blood. But instead of turning him over… the government did something almost unheard of in American history.They protected him.A brutal crime, a furious mob, and a government willing touse deadly force to protect one man. The unbelievable story of Will Lockett andthe Lexington riot.Stay connected:www.melaninmayhempodcast.comFB: melaninmayhempodcastIG: @melaninmayhempodcastX: @melaninmayhempcYouTube: melaninmayhempodcast

This week we’re talking about faith, flash, and felonies.Meet Lamor Miller-Whitehead — the designer-dripped preacher who built a brand on prosperity, power circles, and pulpit performance… until the feds came knocking.From mortgage fraud to fake financial documents, political name-dropping, and a church robbery that had the internet in shambles — this is the story of a man who blurred the line between prophet and profit.Because not everybody standing behind a pulpit is preaching salvation.Some are selling dreams.Stay connected:www.melaninmayhempodcast.comFB: melaninmayhempodcastIG: @melaninmayhempodcastX: @melaninmayhempcYouTube: melaninmayhempodcastEmail: melaninmayhempodcast@gmail.com

For nearly 30 years, women were being found dead on Milwaukee’s north side — and nobody saw the monster standing right in front of them.This week we are dragging a career criminal who was in and out of jail, in and out of police files… and somehow still walking free while women kept turning up dead around his mama’s house.He was violent.He was reckless.He was a known problem.And still — he slipped through every crack.From corrupt halfway houses and snitch deals to botched DNA swabs and wrongful convictions, this case is a masterclass in how the system failed everybody — especially Black women.The science finally spoke… but it was a day late and a dollar short.Press play and meet Walter Earl Ellis, the Milwaukee North Side Strangler.@melaninmayhempodcast@melaninmayhempcmelaninmayhempodcast@gmail.comGet your Melanin Mayhem Merch: www.melaninmayhempodcast.comGalantines eventhttps://www.eventbrite.com/e/1979458895843?aff=oddtdtcreator

In Virginia in the 80s, women were being attacked, little evidence was being left behind, and the wrong man was sitting in a prison cell.This week I bring you the unbelievable story of Timothy Wilson Spencer — a serial killer whose audacious crimes were eerily quiet, yet the impact was like a bomb going off in these bedroom communities of Arlington and Richmond. A story of investigatory missteps, false confessions, and new discoveries in science that finally blew the case wide open. This story has it all, so press play and let's get into it. @melaninmayhempodcast@melaninmayhempcmelaninmayhempodcast@gmail.comGet your Melanin Mayhem Merch and your copy of the e-guide From Case to Compelling:www.melaninmayhempodcast.com Galantines virtual event:https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1979458895843?aff=oddtdtcreator

Noir Nation… this one is WILD. We’re going back in time for a dusty and disgusting tale of brick-to-the-dome brutality, creepy break-ins, and press coverage so racist you’ll want to fight the newspaper. Robert Nixon was a young cat committing grown-man crimes—and the system wasted no time making sure he didn’t live long enough to become anything else.But here’s the twist: the deeper you dig, the uglier it gets. Add to that sensationalized press coverage, racist tropes, shaky evidence, and a system that loved a convenient villain.How many of these brick crimes were truly his… and how many were just easy to pin on him? @melaninmayhempodcast@melaninmayhempcmelaninmayhempodcast@gmail.comGet your Melanin Mayhem Merch: ⁠Shop Melanin Mayhem Podcast⁠Galentines eventhttps://www.eventbrite.com/e/1979458895843?aff=oddtdtcreator

This week on Melanin Mayhem, we’re dragging James Edward Swann Jr., aka the “Shotgun Stalker.” In 1993, DC had a real-life nightmare rolling through two very different neighborhoods in the metro area and baby—this case is equal parts terrifying and infuriating. Random victims. A hunting ground that he never switched up. And a police response that’ll have you yelling at your speaker. Press play and let me tell you all about the shotgun shenanigans of it all.@melaninmayhempodcast@melaninmayhempcmelaninmayhempodcast@gmail.comGet your Melanin Mayhem Merch: www.melaninmayhempodcast.comTickets to the Galentines live virtual show:https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1979458895843?aff=oddtdtcreator

It’s been a year of audacity, diabolical behavior, and pure mayhem — and now it’s time to run it back.In this 2025 Year-End Review, your favorite country girl counts down the Top 10 Melanin Mayhem Podcast episodes of the year, based on listener engagement and the sheer what-the-hell-did-I-just-listen-to factor.From serial offenders and scandalous lovers to insurance schemes, courtroom chaos, and crimes that left communities reeling, this episode revisits the cases that shook Noir Nation in 2025. And did I mention I made a video for this episode??Whether you’ve been rocking with the mayhem all year or you’re new to these streets, this countdown is both a greatest-hits replay and a reminder of why Black true crime stories deserve to be told with depth, nuance, and respect.Lock in, revisit the madness, and see if your favorite episode made the list.Welcome to the mayhem.@melaninmayhempodcast@melaninmayhempcmelaninmayhempodcast@gmail.comGet your Melanin Mayhem Merch: ⁠Shop Melanin Mayhem Podcast⁠

This isn’t about glorifying a killer—this is about the women he tried to erase and the system that helped him do it. In Quiet Carnage, I'm closing out The Samuel Little Files by confronting the part America avoids: the deadliest violence is often the violence nobody treats like an emergency. We’re talking unchecked movement across state lines, cold cases that lost urgency the moment Sam died, and the reality that “Jane Doe” is somebody’s daughter whether the world respected her or not. This week I wrap this series with reflections on how a killer traveled the U.S. like a rolling stone, how “women on the margins” became a loophole in the system, and how the machinery of justice failed so consistently it might as well have been policy. Sam is gone—but the conditions that made him possible? Still here.Tap in, Noir Nation—then meet me in the discussion group, because we need to talk.@melaninmayhempodcast@melaninmayhempcmelaninmayhempodcast@gmail.comGet your Melanin Mayhem Merch: Shop Melanin Mayhem PodcastLink to the FBI website for Samuel Little:Samuel Little: Confessions of a Killer — FBI

This chapter isn’t about Samuel Little. It’s about the women whose voices were stolen long before their lives were taken.In Part 3 of The Samuel Little Files, we shift the focus where it always should’ve been—on the victims the system ignored, dismissed, and failed to protect.Many of these women lived on the margins, and because of that, their disappearances didn’t raise alarms. Their names weren’t shouted from headlines. In many cases their names were never even known. Their cases weren’t pursued with urgency because in many cases nobody knew they were missing. And Samuel Little not only counted on that silence, he capitalized on it.This episode honors the lives lost. In this episode we say her name, as much as we can. This episode brings to light how apathy and bias allowed a predator to move freely, and asks the uncomfortable question: how many voices were lost because no one was listening?

America’s deadliest secret was exposed in 2012. It all started with a traffic stop in Kentucky which led to a cheek swab in California. This DNA sample would link what looked like an unassuming senior citizen to being a serial killer. They knew they were prosecuting a killer; they had no clue they would be uncovering the most prolific serial killer the US had ever seen.In Part 2 of The Samuel Little Files, I am going to walk you into the interrogation room where the man that had lived in the shadows, keeping the lowest of the low profiles, finally started talking and drawing revealing decades of murders hidden in plain sight.

You've asked and now it is my pleasure to give yall what you want. Your favorite country girl is bringing you the story of the killing-est killer to ever kill- Samuel Little. In order to do it justice I am bringing you a four-part series on America's most prolific killer past or present. In this episode we go back to the beginning and learn how it this killer came to be. From the red clay of Georgia to the sunny skies of the city of angels. I am spilling all the tea on the most audacious one of them all. Tickets for the live BTCC show: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1947314021659?aff=oddtdtcreator

This week we’re headed to St. Petersburg, Florida for a story that proves once again—that some people should never be given second chances. A teenager with a violent past grows into a full-blown menace the moment he hits the free world, leaving a trail of mayhem that went unnoticed for far too long. From vanished women to cold cases that refused to stay buried, this episode digs into how one man slipped through every crack in the system…and how many lives were destroyed because of it. Tap in, Noir Nation and let me know what you think of this week's Melanin Mayhem maker Mr. Tony Ables. Tickets for the virtual BTCC show: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1947314021659?aff=oddtdtcreator

In 1911, a family was slaughtered in their sleep in Lafayette, Louisiana. By 1912, a young woman named Clementine Barnabet had been branded the Voodoo Murderess — accused of killing at least fifteen people and a part of a blood stained cult called the Church of Sacrifice.But separating fact from fiction is tricky. Was Clementine the OG serial killer or was she caught up in the South’s obsession with fear, faith, and a Black woman they needed to see as a monster?For tickets to Season's Slayings:https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1947314021659?aff=oddtdtcreator

In 1978, the city of Columbus, Georgia was shooketh.Headlines screamed about a serial killer targeting the elderbuns and all the while another monster was hiding in plain sight a melanated baddie with delusions of grandeur. For months, our mayhem maker terrorized the city, murdering women near Fort Benning and sending letters to police pretending to be something he was not. His twisted deception played the city and the cops like a poker chip. Come take a ride with me as I break down the story of William Henry Hance and the Forces of Evil that never was.

Orlando in the 80s was all sunshine, theme parks, and vacation dreams… until it wasn’t. Tourists were flying in for fun in the sun, but someone waiting in the shadows turned paradise into panic. A teenage terrorist with a taste for mayhem was using a popular tourist strip as his personal hunting ground, and his crimes would leave Orlando shooketh. This week, we head to the Sunshine State to unravel the story of Isaac Green that the travel brochures never mentioned.

This week I am headed to Springfield, Massachusetts to bring you the story of a disgusting doped up demon that was disconnecting black women like he worked for the power company. Alfred Gaynor was not only chasing a fix — he was chasing victims. Women overlooked and under investigated by police, all raped and killed by a dope smoking killer who thought his crimes would disappear like the crack smoke.You know how I bring it, and this story is a whole ass mess, so get comfortable and let's spill all this tea on Alfred's shenanigans.

This week, Noir Nation, we’re headed to Tampa, Florida, where the Seminole Heights neighborhood was under siege in late 2017. For 51 days, residents were shooketh because of a serial killer whose random, unprovoked attacks left four people dead and an entire community terrified. The man behind the violence? Someone no one ever would have thought could or would be behind it all- a young man named Howell Emanuel Donaldson III.From the fear on the streets to the jailhouse drama, this case is a chilling reminder that sometimes the predator is the boy next door.

Noir Nation have you ever seen somebody get caught with their hand in the cookie jar… then burn down the whole damn kitchen? This week’s Melanin Mayhem maker turned a petty hustle into pure carnage and went from “caught slipping” to “counting bodies” in minutes. This week we're going to Connecticut, and I've got a crazy story of how one man made the leap from misdemeanor theft to felony murder to busting hell wide open. I’ll walk you through how it all went down to become one of the worst workplace massacres you’ve probably never heard of committed by a melanated baddie named Omar Thornton.