EP140 - Last Dance: The Murder of Blake Chappell
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
Release Date: 10/08/2025
EP146 - Footprints in Blood: The 1993 Brutal Murder of Jeanie Childs
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
A woman living with a violent man is found in her bedroom, stabbed more than 60 times. Several suspects emerge over the course of a few months, the man she is living with not among them. It takes almost 30 years, but investigators confiscate a napkin in a trash can and believe they have the case solved. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content you won’t get anywhere else. Visit to contact investigative journalist and host M. William...
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EP145 - The Broken Ground Murders: Steven and Wendy Reid
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
A storybook romance. A life of giving back to the world in ways that change thousands of lives. You and your wife settle into life in New Hampshire, away from the chaos and evil of the world–or so you think. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content you won’t get anywhere else. Visit to contact investigative journalist and host M. William Phelps, get more information about the show, updates to cases, and more. And don't forget...
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EP144 - The Gravel Road Killer: Justice for Laura DeMueles
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
A young woman is murdered. Years go by without answers. Her sister begins searching for the murderer—and the experience sends her into a career in law enforcement and cold case work, as investigators close in on a savage killer. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content you won’t get anywhere else. Visit to contact investigative journalist and host M. William Phelps, get more information about the show, updates to cases, and more. ...
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SHORT CUTS: HALLOWEEN SPECIAL - The Harvard Body-Broker Butcher
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
HALLLOWEEN SPECIAL - The Harvard Body-Broker Butcher Body parts for sale! Not quite the advertisement you’d expect to see somewhere. But in the United States, under a strict set of guidelines, selling body parts is legal. Only in this case, a group of people take that business to an extreme beyond the macabre. Welcome to a bonus feature here on the Crossing the Line feed. I come across all sorts of stories while researching books, TV series, and my iHeartMedia podcast, Paper Ghosts, in addition to the ideas you send me. A lot of them grab hold of me emotionally—especially the...
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Paper Ghosts: The Texas Teen Murders - Season 5 Trailer
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
Season 5 of Paper Ghosts: The Texas Teen Murders takes you back to 1983, when two teenagers were found murdered, execution-style, on a quiet Texas hill. What followed was decades of rumors, false leads, and a case that law enforcement could never seem to close. Then a third teen is murdered and other questionable deaths of teens begin to surface. Now, veteran investigative journalist M. William Phelps reopens the file — uncovering new witnesses, hidden evidence, and a shocking web of deaths that may all be connected. Starting Nov. 5th wherever you get your favorite shows, over...
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EP143: We Are the Sin Eaters: The District Attorney Who Prosecuted the Golden State Killer Explains
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
You all know him as the Golden State Killer, Joseph DeAngelo, one of the most prolific serial criminal killers we have ever encountered. This week, my very special guest, Thien Ho, the man who prosecuted Deangelo, gives us the inside story of what went on behind the scenes with this monster--sharing never-before-heard details about the East Area Rapist, Vasilia Ransacker, Original Nightstalker, and GSK. Get Thien's new book about the case, The People vs. the Golden State Killer, . Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an...
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EP142 - Till Murder Do Us Part: The Tire, the Landlord, the Mastermind
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
A father of four, Jared Bridegan, drops off two of his children at his ex-wife’s house. Drives away. An hour later, a passerby finds the man dead in the middle of the road. As the investigation begins amid what seems to be a baffling homicide, an unlikely suspect is developed and the dominoes in a wild murder scheme begin to fall. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content you won’t get anywhere else. Visit to contact investigative...
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EP141 - Deadly Transaction: The Senseless Murder of Jojo Aragon
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
A young teenager is dropped off at a Denver, Colorado, park one summer afternoon and fails to return home. Witnesses step forward and claim social media holds the answer–an online video of what happened. Investigators search for a suspect—who happens to be right under their noses the entire time. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content you won’t get anywhere else. Visit to contact investigative journalist and host M. William Phelps,...
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EP140 - Last Dance: The Murder of Blake Chappell
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
Blake Chappell is seventeen years old, enjoying life on life’s terms. He has a beautiful girlfriend, loving siblings, and his sights are set on becoming a television news anchor or an attorney. But as Blake is walking to a friend’s house one early morning, he vanishes. Family and friends don’t believe the common law enforcement trope that another teen has run away from home. So the search begins. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other...
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EP139 - Who Killed Carina Saunders? A Gruesome True Crime
Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps
*Carina Saunders is a gifted student, passionate about opera, and doing the best she can to carve out a life in Oklahoma City after getting herself into a jam. After she turns up missing one day, her family set out to uncover the truth—while law enforcement takes a call for a gruesome discovery not far from where Carina was last seen. * I want to thank Michelle G for sending this one in. Sign up for your free Patreon account , where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content...
info_outlineBlake Chappell is seventeen years old, enjoying life on life’s terms. He has a beautiful girlfriend, loving siblings, and his sights are set on becoming a television news anchor or an attorney. But as Blake is walking to a friend’s house one early morning, he vanishes. Family and friends don’t believe the common law enforcement trope that another teen has run away from home. So the search begins.
Sign up for your free Patreon account here, where I’ll be streaming “live,” sending out newsletters, dropping an exclusive limited series podcast later in 2025, and posting other content you won’t get anywhere else.
Visit www.crossingtheline.biz to contact investigative journalist and host M. William Phelps, get more information about the show, updates to cases, and more.
And don't forget to subscribe to Phelps's #1 hit podcast PAPER GHOSTS, now in its fourth season, wherever you get your favorite shows.
M. William Phelps is the New York Times best-selling author of 46 nonfiction books and winner of the Excellence in (Investigative) Journalism Award from the Society of Professional Journalists. Phelps has written for numerous publications1, including the Providence Journal, Connecticut Magazine and Hartford Courant. Diversifying his talents, Phelps consulted on the first season of the hit Showtime cable television series Dexter and has executive produced and starred in over 350 hours of true crime television. All of which gives him a confluence of expertise and experience to bring to true crime fanatics.
Phelps grew up in East Hartford, Connecticut, and now splits his time between Tolland County and N. Stonington, CT. In July 2017, he published his definitive, 10-year project about Happy Face Killer, Keith Hunter Jesperson, DANGEROUS GROUND: My Friendship with a Serial Killer.
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