PODCAST · true crime
The Trial: USA
by The Crime Desk
Launched in the UK in 2022, The Trial is an award-winning, chart-topping podcast that goes behind the headlines of some of the biggest trials in the world. We take you into the courtroom, bringing you the detail as the evidence unfolds, examining key moments and carrying out exclusive interviews with detectives, victims, and experts. The Trial series occasionally uses actors and some voices generated by AI. Their words are taken as verbatim from the official court transcript. For ad-free listening to all of our shows, exclusive bonus episodes of The Trial every week, and complete access to our show archives, subscribe to The Crime Desk now. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
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Alex Murdaugh - The Battle Over Evidence
Alex Murdaugh’s latest pre-trial hearing became a battle over what evidence is allowed in court- and could shape the future of his trial. He was convicted of murdering his wife Maggie and youngest son Paul in 2023, but that conviction was overturned after it was found a court clerk had tampered...
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American Idol Alum Guilty of Murder - Life Without Parole
Caleb Flynn thought he could murder his wife, stage a break-in and convince police an intruder was responsible. But his own words and devices helped expose the lie. In this follow up episode looking at the American Idol Alum and former pastor accused of murder, we look at the conviction and...
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The Cornell 7 - Why Weren't There Charges?
Seven fraternity members have been accused of sexually assaulting a female student at Cornell University in 2024. But despite the alleged incident being reported nearly two years ago, no criminal charges were brought forward. Now, New York’s attorney general has taken over the Cornell fraternity...
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - “Where is the evidence?”
Eleven jurors favoured finding Lindsay Clancy not criminally responsible for killing her three children, but one juror believed she was guilty. Unable to reach a unanimous verdict, that deadlock caused a mistrial. Now, during hearings which could pave the way for a potential future retrial, her...
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American Idol Alum Accused of Murder
Former American Idol contestant and pastor Caleb Flynn is on trial in Ohio, accused of murdering his wife, Ashley, inside their family home in Tipp City while their two daughters slept nearby. Prosecutors allege Flynn staged the scene to look like a break-in following a long-running affair, while...
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The Murder of Tupac Shakur
For almost 30 years, the murder of Tupac Shakur remained one of America’s most infamous unsolved murders. Now, Duane “Keffe D” Davis has been convicted of orchestrating the fatal drive-by shooting. In this episode, Kayla and Marjorie reunite to retrace the entire case from the confrontation that...
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - Your Questions Answered
After five weeks of evidence and more than 38 hours of deliberations, the Lindsay Clancy trial ended without a verdict. Now, we answer some of the biggest questions raised by the case, by going back through all the trial testimony, on site court reporting, and insight from expert guests. Why...
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - Mistrial
After five weeks of evidence, 84 witnesses and over a week of deliberation, the trial of Lindsay Clancy has ended without a verdict. In this episode, we examine the jury deadlock, the dispute surrounding the lone holdout juror and the defence’s unsuccessful last ditch attempt to prevent a…
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - “we are unable to come to a unanimous decision”
After 21 days of testimony, more than 80 witnesses and over 300 exhibits, the jury in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial says it cannot reach a unanimous decision. As the judge sends jurors back to continue deliberating, crime correspondent Rachel Sharp reports from inside the courtroom on the tense...
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - The Jury Deliberates
After five weeks, 21 days of testimony and 84 witnesses, the fate of Lindsay Clancy is now in the hands of the jury. As deliberations begin, Crime Desk reporters Luke Kenton and Rachel Sharp examine the final evidence and the dramatic closing arguments. Was Clancy experiencing postpartum…
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - Did She Have Capacity?
Did Lindsay Clancy understand the wrongfulness of killing her three children, and could she control her actions? As the defence rests its case and the prosecution begins its rebuttal, we examine the opposing conclusions of both side’s psychiatric experts, battling in court over whether or not...
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - “She Was Begging for Help”
This week, Lindsay Clancy’s defence presented their case that she was suffering from postpartum psychosis when she killed her three children, and in their view, should not be criminally responsible for their deaths. We examine the testimony from her family, including testimony from her own mother...
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The Trial of Lindsay Clancy - Murder or Mental Illness?
On January 24th, 2023, Patrick Clancy left his home in Duxbury, Massachusetts, to collect food and medication for his wife Lindsay Clancy. But when he returned, their three children, five-year-old Cora, three-year-old Dawson, and eight-month-old Callan, were dead. Lindsay Clancy had strangled…
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Chris Watts Unmasked Pt.4 - Mind of a Murderer: How an Apparent Family Man Became a Monster
Murderer Chris Watts could have divorced his wife. He could have moved on to the bachelor existence he was hiding from her in the months before her 2018 death. Instead, he strangled her in their home and smothered their preschool-aged daughters Bella and Celeste. It defied logic and it was cruel...
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Chris Watts Unmasked Pt.3 - Delusions and Denials: The Disgraceful ‘Good Guy’ Act
Chris Watts lives in another reality. In his mind, he’s a good man. He charms people with a friendly demeanor and is liked by fellow prison inmates. As part of that, he claims to be deeply religious and has tried to blame his unspeakable crimes on other people or spiritual forces. Watts strangled...
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Chris Watts Unmasked Pt.2 - Romance and Bible Study: The Prison Life of a Family Annihilator
The murders made him famous. Then came a tidal wave of female admiration. Chris Watts has a flourishing love life behind bars at the Dodge Correctional Facility in Wisconsin in spite of the unspeakable acts he committed against his family in 2018. He’s serving multiple life sentences for the...
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Chris Watts Unmasked Pt.1 - Sex, Secrets and Lies: How Watts Betrayed Wife Before Killings
The life that Chris and Shannan Watts had was slipping away. The doting wife and mom fought to keep her family together. The couple was expecting another child — a son, Nico — and they had two happy and energetic little girls already. As Shannan tried to keep her family together, her anxiety and...
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Melissa Barthelemy's Sister On Long Wait to Face ‘Repulsive Monster’ In Court
Melissa Barthelemy went missing in 2009 when her doting kid sister Amanda Funderburg was just 15. Amid a desperate search, Amanda began getting calls from Melissa's phone. The teen hoped it was good sign — that Melissa resurfaced or that someone had information. Instead, it was the first of a...
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'I Don't Think He Knows How To Be Sorry': A Sit Down With Gilgo Victim's Family
Rex Heuermann’s victims got a measure of justice last month, but the pain and the questions linger for their families. The deranged former architect spent decades murdering sex workers and callously dumping their brutalized remains around Gilgo Beach, Long Island. Heuermann, 62, was sentenced…
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How Alex Murdaugh's Second Murder Trial Is Shaping Up
It’s another chance for Alex Murdaugh to try to prove he did not callously gun down his wife and youngest son. Murdaugh was previously convicted of fatally shooting Maggie and Paul Murdaugh in a desolate area of his family’s sprawling South Carolina property. The wealthy Lowcountry lawyer got a...
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Chainsaw, Body Bag And Inflatable Pool: How D4vd's Alleged Murder Materials And Other Evidence May Play Into Key Hearing
They were materials that prosecutors say were procured for a sole purpose: murder. In this episode, we’re joined by the Daily Mail’s West Coast News Editor Marjorie Hernandez to discuss the upcoming preliminary hearing in the Los Angeles district attorney’s case against singer D4VD, or David...
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Top Cop Who Revamped Gilgo Beach 'Demon' Probe Reflects On Rex Heurmann And Cracking The Case
“A demon that walks among us.” That’s what former Suffolk County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison said about Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heurmann during an announcement of the elusive suspect’s arrest in 2023. Harrison worked on numerous headline-grabbing investigations over a 30-year career...
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Karmelo Anthony Trial Deep-Dive: Part 2
Karmelo Anthony’s lethal force against Austin Metcalf during a 2025 teenage track meet scuffle was not justified. That was the finding of the Texas jury in Anthony’s case last week. The same panel sentenced the 19-year-old to 35 years in prison for murder. Yet the conviction remains a topic of...
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Karmelo Anthony Trial Deep-Dive: Part 1
Karmelo Anthony’s murder trial happened in Texas but the case has triggered strong reactions from observers around the country. The 19-year-old’s legal team argued self-defense but witnesses told the jury that Anthony was never in danger. He was simply being asked to leave a private area…
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‘Cults’ and Cold Cases: A 2026 CrimeCon Recap
Cartisha Morgan came to CrimeCon in the hopes of bringing attention to the case of her missing daughter and young grandchild, a toddler when she vanished. Morgan believes her daughter Ma’Kayla Wickerson bought into the teachings of a group that police have called a cult before disappearing with…
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Kaylee Goncalves’s Parents On Treating Killers 'Like The Animals That They Are'
We share in this episode an in-depth conversation with the parents of Kaylee Concalves at CrimeCon 2026 in Las Vegas where they promoted the “Murder Has a Name” foundation started in their daughter’s honor to help other families find answers with the help of advanced DNA technology. Steve and...
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Prosecutor Speaks on Death Sentence for 7-year-old Athena Strand’s Killer
James Stainton spent years working to bring Tanner Horner to justice for abusing and killing a beloved child before callously discarding her remains in rural Texas on November 30, 2022. On this episode, Stainton shares with The Trial: USA’s Kayla Brantley what it was like to shoulder the task of...
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Murdaugh Wife And Son Murder Verdict Tossed Out: What Went Wrong And What’s Coming
The latest development in the Alex Murdaugh story was a ruling by the highest court in South Carolina reversing his conviction for the 2022 murder of his wife and son. An elected county court clerk was accused of tampering with the jury process by hinting to sitting panelists that Murdaugh was...
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Killer Is Sentenced To Lethal Injection In Texas For Killing First-Grader
Justice for a joyful little girl who was abducted outside her rural Texas home and murdered by a stranger driving a delivery truck. MaryAnn Martinez, the Daily Mail’s Texas bureau chief, was in the courtroom as a jury sealed the fate of 7-year-old Athena Strand’s killer, Tanner Horner. Athena, a...
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Lively vs. Baldoni: The Real Reason the Feuding Stars Settled
After two years of legal mudslinging between “Gossip Girl” actress Blake Lively and actor-director Justin Baldoni, a civil trial was set to unfold in New York. The “It Ends With Us” co-stars instead capped their bitter dispute with a settlement deal that ended an ugly and costly two-year public...
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I Was At The White House Dinner With Kash Patel - Then The Shooting Started
Shots rang out at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner — just yards from the President of the United States. At one table sat FBI Director Kash Patel. On this episode of The Trial: USA, Kayla Brantley and Daily Mail Associate Editor Wills take you inside the room as the shooting unfolded —...
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D4vd Charged With Murder: A Career Worth Killing For?
A rising music star is now facing one of the most serious charges in the US justice system. D4vd (real name David Anthony Burke) has been charged with the murder of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez. Prosecutors allege the two were in a relationship - and claim he killed her to protect his...
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Guilty: Our Inside Account of the Gilgo Beach Killer’s Confession
After decades of silence, the man accused of the Gilgo Beach murders has finally spoken — and what he said inside that courtroom stunned everyone. Rex Heuermann has pleaded guilty to killing eight women, bringing a chilling chapter in one of America’s most notorious serial killer cases closer to…
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The Ted Bundy Murder That Took 50 Years to Prove
A 17-year-old girl disappears on Halloween. And for more than half a century - no definitive answers. In 1974, Laura Ann Aime vanished after leaving a party in Utah. Weeks later, her body was found in the mountains. Investigators long suspected Ted Bundy - and before his execution in 1989, he…
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Is Rex Heuermann going to plead guilty to the Gilgo Beach Murders?
For more than a decade, the murders at Gilgo Beach haunted Long Island - a string of victims, discovered along a remote stretch of coastline, with no arrests and few answers. Until 2023. Rex Heuermann, a Manhattan architect, was charged with the murders of seven women - accused of carrying out…
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Suburban Mom Accused in 15-Year Cold Case Killing of Realtor
For nearly 15 years, the murder of Iowa realtor Ashley Okland remained unsolved. Shot twice in broad daylight inside a model home she was showing, the 27-year-old’s killing shocked her community - but left investigators with no clear suspects or motive. Now, over a decade later - there’s been a...
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Farrah Fawcett’s Son in Court Over Bloody LA Crime Spree
In this episode of The Trial: USA, we take you inside the case of Redmond O’Neal, son of Hollywood icon Farrah Fawcett, whose long history of addiction, mental illness, and arrests has culminated in a shocking series of alleged violent attacks across Los Angeles. Prosecutors say O’Neal carried…
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Inside the Degrading ‘Playbook’ of Abuse That Sealed the Alexander Brothers’ Fate
A Manhattan jury has found luxury real estate brothers Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander guilty on all counts in a sweeping sex-trafficking case prosecutors say spanned more than a decade. Jurors heard testimony from 11 women who accused the brothers of drugging and raping them - with one victim...
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The ‘Moscow Mule Murder’: Inside the Trial of Kouri Richins
On this week's episode of The Trial USA, we bring you up to date on the trial of former real estate agent Kouri Richins. She’s accused of murdering her millionaire husband, Eric Richins, with a fentanyl-laced Moscow Mule, before publishing an illustrated children's book about coping with grief.…
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Kurt Cobain: Suicide or Homicide? The New Forensic Claims
In 1994, Kurt Cobain was found dead in a room above the garage of his Seattle home. Authorities ruled that he had died from a self-inflicted shotgun wound to the head. The case was closed as a suicide. But for more than 30 years, questions have lingered. Now, a new independent team of forensic...
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Inside the trial so vile people have been crying inside the courtroom
This week on The Trial: USA, we take you inside a Manhattan courtroom where the sex trafficking trial of Tal, Oren and Alon Alexander has entered its third week - and testimony has left people in tears. Once high-flying real estate brokers to the rich and famous, the brothers now face federal...
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Nancy Guthrie abduction: A former homicide detective explains what's happening behind the scenes
The search for 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie escalates. Just hours after Savannah Guthrie issued a public plea, the FBI released disturbing doorbell footage showing a masked, armed suspect disabling Nancy’s camera the night she disappeared. Overnight, a man detained near the Mexican border in...
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The Mysterious Disappearance of Nancy Guthrie
In this episode of The Trial USA, we bring you everything we know so far about the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of Savannah Guthrie, who police say was abducted from her home in the middle of the night. Investigators have confirmed forced entry and blood at the scene…
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Ellen Greenberg: Fifteen Years of Questions
In this special episode of The Trial: USA, we examine one of the most hotly contested death investigations in recent history - the case of Ellen Greenberg. Ellen was a 27-year-old teacher from Philadelphia who was found dead in her apartment in 2011, having suffered twenty stab wounds - many to…
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The Sex-Trafficking Trial Rocking the World of Luxury Real-Estate
This week on The Trial: USA, we break down the explosive case against luxury real-estate powerbrokers the Alexander Brothers. Once known for closing multimillion-dollar deals for A-list clients, the siblings are now facing serious criminal charges that threaten to bring their empire crashing…
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A Husband, the Nanny, and a 911 Call: The Trial That Has America Hooked
A chilling 911 call. A secret affair. And a murder trial now dominating headlines across America. This week on The Trial: USA, we break down the latest developments in the murder case against Brendan Banfield, accused of killing his wife and staging an elaborate cover-up with the family’s former...
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The Maduro Case: Power, Prosecution, and a President in Chains
The Trial: USA breaks down the criminal cases dominating American courtrooms — and the national conversation. In this episode, we focus on the capture and prosecution of former Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, following a covert U.S. operation that stunned the world. We explain how the…
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Exclusive! Connecting the Unsolved: The Black Dahlia and Zodiac Killer Cases
In this episode of 'The Trial USA,' senior reporter Josh Boswell shares groundbreaking findings that potentially link two of America's most infamous cold cases: The Black Dahlia and the Zodiac Killer. A cold case investigator claims to have cracked the Zodiac's cipher and identified a prime…
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America in shock at Rob Reiner murder and Brown University killer found dead
In Los Angeles, Nick Reiner, the son of filmmaker Rob Reiner, has appeared in court accused of killing both of his parents inside their Brentwood home. Prosecutors are laying out what they say was a brutal attack, as investigators examine warning signs, family dynamics, and whether the death...
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Brian Walshe: When Your Search History Becomes Evidence
The Trial: USA is back! In this first episode of our new weekly show, we dive into the Brian Walshe murder trial, the most closely watched courtroom battle in the United States right now. Walshe is accused of killing his wife, Ana Walshe, before dismembering her body and disposing of her remains....
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Launched in the UK in 2022, The Trial is an award-winning, chart-topping podcast that goes behind the headlines of some of the biggest trials in the world. We take you into the courtroom, bringing you the detail as the evidence unfolds, examining key moments and carrying out exclusive interviews with detectives, victims, and experts.
The Trial series occasionally uses actors and some voices generated by AI. Their words are taken as verbatim from the official court transcript.
For ad-free listening to all of our shows, exclusive bonus episodes of The Trial every week, and complete access to our show archives, subscribe to The Crime Desk now.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
HOSTED BY
The Crime Desk
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does The Trial: USA have?
The Trial: USA currently has 115 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is The Trial: USA about?
Launched in the UK in 2022, The Trial is an award-winning, chart-topping podcast that goes behind the headlines of some of the biggest trials in the world. We take you into the courtroom, bringing you the detail as the evidence unfolds, examining key moments and carrying out exclusive interviews...
How often does The Trial: USA release new episodes?
The Trial: USA publishes regularly with 115 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to The Trial: USA?
You can listen to The Trial: USA on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts The Trial: USA?
The Trial: USA is created and hosted by The Crime Desk.
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