True Crime Podcast Podcast

In college, Sara taught seminars instructing other young women on how to not get murdered: avoid parking lots after midnight, don’t stop for strangers, carry mace. Now she’s a devoted true crime podcast listener, one of the many women who make up nearly 75% of the genre’s fan base.  Grace and Kyleigh delve into true crime podcasting’s glaring gender divide. Why are so many women — including domestic violence survivors — seeking out this content? What does this have to do with the historical origins of true crime? Why do we get so freaked out in parking lots? Media experts Dr. Ian Punnett and Dr. Kelli Boling sit down with the hosts to try and shed some light on these mysteries.  “Who listens to true crime podcasts in the US?” Pew Research Center, 2023 “Toward a Theory of True Crime Narratives,” Ian Punnett, 2018 “I survived domestic violence. Now I’m drawn to True Crime Podcasts.” NYT, 2017 “Domestic Violence Survivors in True Crime Podcast Audiences,” Kelli S. Boling, Journal of Mass Communications and Society, 2022 “Fundamentally Different Stories That Matter: True Crime Podcasts and the Domestic Violence Survivors in Their Audiences,” Kelli S. Boling, University of South Carolina, 2020 “‘I’m Not a Journalist…:’ Journalistic Ethics in True Crime Podcast Production,” Kelli S. Boling, 2022. Audio and Podcasting Fact Sheet, Pew Research Center, 2015  “A Profile of the Top-Ranked Podcasts in the US,” Pew Research Center, 2023 “Top Podcasts 2023,” Forbes, 2023 artwork: alexandre p. manko

It’s Idaho, 2022. Four college students are murdered in their home after a night out. It’s Indiana, 2014. Two kids go for a walk in the woods and disappear. It’s Italy, 2007. An American girl named Amanda Knox goes to study abroad and almost never comes home.  What happens when a crime becomes a viral sensation? Kyleigh McPeek and Grace Carroll team up to investigate how modern true crime media has forever altered three killings. Working with journalists, lawyers, creators, fans and victims, they set out to discover how the meteoric rise of the true crime podcast might be insidiously changing our culture, our legal system, and even our conception of truth itself.  “A Timeline of the Night of the Idaho Murders,” NYT, 2022 “Police rule out Idaho professor,” NBC News, 2022 “Criminology Student Is Charged in 4 University of Idaho Killings,” NYT, 2022 “The Moscow murders,” Vox, Today: Explained, 2022 “How the Delphi, Indiana, murders became ‘true crime’,” Vox, 2023  “Where is the knife?” Reddit post “Man accused of leaking evidence in Delphi murders,” FOX 59, 2024 “Blood Money — Pt. 1,” Labyrinths with Amanda Knox, 2023 “Italian Jury Convicts US Student of Murder,” NYT, 2009 “Timeline: Meredith Kercher murder case,” CNN, 2016 “Amanda Knox defends moment she was seen kissing boyfriend,” Daily Mail, 2013 “Amanda Knox acquitted of 2007 murder,” NYT, 2015 “Italy must pay damages to Amanda Knox in 2007 case,” NYT, 2019 artwork: alexandre p. manko

In the last decade, something strange has happened to the way we talk about crime. The meteoric rise of the true crime podcast seems to be changing the shape of our culture, our understanding of criminal justice, and even our conception of truth itself. Why do some podcasts help solve murder cases while others seem to be slowly corroding the sanctity of the American legal system? In the first season of this series, students and journalists Kyleigh McPeek and Grace Carroll spend a year investigating the murky underbelly of the true crime podcasting industry… …and now, they’ve made a podcast about it.  Episode 1 of the True Crime Podcast Podcast arrives September 8th, 2024.  artwork: alexandre p. manko