Early True Crime

Selects

There’s no doubt that the explosion of podcasting as a mass medium can be traced, in large part, to the true crime genre. Listeners flock to serialized stories of scams, murders, cults, and the missing. But early true crime reporting often took the form of an hourloung documentary, allowing for a different type of immersion in story. With a condensed structure, the details of the crime cede time to the humanity of criminals, victims, and law enforcement. The pieces we’ve chosen for this collection represent different parts of the true crime landscape: victims, offenders, and law enforcement. They explore the ripple effects of crime, punishment, and rehabilitation and we hear from the people directly living in those outcomes. They transport us with tape capturing the sounds of lock up and death in prison, victims’ experience of rage and regret, and the intrigue of investigation and dogged pursuit. These works lay the foundation for shows like Ear Hustle and Criminal. And they also give rise to the serialized narrative we hear in Serial, Dirty John, and their progeny teasing out these stories by releasing them over time to create suspense and a dialogue in pop culture. These four works are beautiful and solemn, but they reflect a human fascination with crime, punishment, and judgment. Dave Isay’s early sound portraits of lifetime prisoners and execution teams are intense and satisfying. Samantha Broun and Jay Allison’s lookback to the ripple effect of a 20-year old crime offers a victim’s perspective we rarely hear. And by the 2015 release of KRCC’s protopodcast, you can hear a genre on the verge of erupting. A quick look at the podcast charts today will reveal the outcome.

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Episodes

  1. 09/07/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    The Gods Must Be Bewildered (2015)

    A retired investigator begins corresponding with a convicted murderer whose series of cryptic, poetic letters claimed to have killed dozens of people around the United States. We chose this protopodcast from 2015 because of the bridge it creates to the contemporary true crime landscape. The story is dripping in intrigue, and the work has all the trappings of the first podcast renaissance including two hosts that sound the same. In seriousness, the writing and performance experiments with tone and style in a way that reflects a transition from broadcast to podcast. Noel Black and Jake Brownell bring a darker, cooler quality to the writing and performance, and the story itself could easily span multiple episodes rather than its one-hour container. That container was KRCC’s Wish We Were Here, a magazine style broadcast/podcast unearthing stories about Colorado Springs. In the year after Serial, enterprising public radio stations adopted the podcast style to reach outside the broadcast range, create intellectual property, and energize an aging donor base. This episode of Wish We Were Here hits all of those notes. It is solid journalism, but also entertaining with a compelling story regardless of whether you’ve been to Colorado Springs. It’s a reflection of the dialogue between podcast and broadcast. And it’s also just a really good listen.

    56 min

  2. 09/07/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Witness to an Execution by Sound Portraits (2000)

    Narrated by Warden Jim Willett, Witness to an Execution creates a minute-by-minute account of carrying out an execution by lethal injection. We hear narration from warden Jim Willett, and the experience of members of the “tie down” team, press, chaplains, and others that have participated in executions at the Walls Unit in Huntsville, Texas. One voice is conspicuously missing, but it’s impossible not to hear it. The simplicity of this work allows it to contain layers of complex emotion. It is a tough listen, in part because it's a mirror. Witness to an Execution is a classic Dave Isay documentary - minimal narration and sound design, linear story, clear voices and overwhelming emotion. The style of the work reflects on the simplicity of the act. And in doing so, it leaves the complicated question of the death penalty as a giant pregnant pause looming around the whole piece. Witness to an Execution is a masterwork in using form and structure to speak beyond the tape, and it’s an unforgettable listen. Peabody Award (2000)

    23 min

  3. 09/07/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Tossing Away the Keys by Sound Portraits (1990)

    Calling this work sound-rich would be a gross understatement. It is also silence- and emotion-rich. It expertly uses the medium to take the listener somewhere they may never be and immerse them in that experience. Dave Isay’s work is unquestionably canonical and Tossing Away the Keys is a masterclass in audio documentary. Recorded in Angola Prison, the piece features voices of lifetime inmates wrestling with the idea that they may die inside. It is narrated by Wilbert Rideau, an incarcerated journalist guiding listeners through prison life and the lives of individual prisoners. The texture of the piece is compelling, with the harsh sounds of Angola Prison underpinning the range of emotions expressed by Rideau’s interviewees. While the piece does not turn away from the crimes of its sources, that is not what it’s about. Instead, we are privileged to hear stories of people living in extraordinary conditions and navigating the balance of hope and reality. Listeners don’t hear voices from outside the prison, and by the end, are steeped in the same walled reality of those inside. Sound Portraits - Isay’s production venture - sets this goal in their manifesto. “When we feel we’ve succeeded it’s because we’ve managed to expose – truthfully, respectfully – the hidden, forgotten, or under-heard voices of America.” That is exactly what Tossing Away the Keys does and why it remains deeply relevant thirty-five years after its initial release. It also speaks directly to contemporary podcasts like Ear Hustle. The relationship between host and producer is at the forefront of both projects as that team pioneers new and sonically exciting ways to amplify the voices of prisoners at San Quentin. With vibrant personality infused into Ear Hustle’s presentation and sound designs, listeners are given another way into the “hidden, forgotten [and] under-heard voices of America” that Dave Isay (and the whole team at Sound Portraits) aimed to present. Premiered April 29, 1990, on Weekend All Things Considered.

    26 min

  4. 09/07/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    A Life Sentence by Samantha Broun with Jay Allison (2016)

    To quote Jay Allison: “Some stories take a long time. This one is an hour long, and took two and a half years to produce, after twenty years of living with it.” And you can hear it in this piece. On the one hand, narrator Samantha Broun methodically takes the listener through the details of what happened to her mother, and the choices it sparked in her own life. Twenty years later, Broun revisits those experiences and considers how her choices rippled outward. We chose this piece because it picks up where contemporary true crime leaves off. Rather than just revisiting a cold case or unsolved crimes, A Life Sentence considers how a closed case impacts the broader criminal justice system and those incarcerated under it. Broun deftly navigates between her own journey for answers and resolution, and context that is good for the piece, or what she calls the “Producer Me” and the “Me Me.” You can hear this duality in her interviewing, and the resulting tape. It’s an expert work of memoir and documentary, starting with a deeply personal story and spinning it out into a story about politics, rehabilitation, and forgiveness. This piece also dovetails nicely with Dave Isay’s piece Tossing Away the Keys, about lifetime inmates at Angola Prison in Louisiana. Together, they reflect the individual humanity of incarcerated people in a way not usually afforded to violent criminals. More information about A Life Sentence here: https://transom.org/2016/a-life-sentence-victims-offenders-justice-and-my-mother/ ******* Original Series Credits: First and foremost, thank you to my mother for her extraordinary courage. I love you. I am also hugely grateful to Jay Allison for taking this on — me, this story, this amount of tape, this amount of emotion, this amount of time. All of it. Jay was the perfect guide for both Producer Me and Me Me. He seemed to know the exact right moments to swoop in and — as he says — provide me with oxygen when I was deep in the cave of working on this. Thank you to all the people I interviewed: Jeremy Brown, James Gilligan, Timothy Broun, Mark Singel, Ernest Preate, Martin Horn, Bobby Van Cura, Tyrone Werts, Tom Ridge, Charlotte McFadden, Dr. Julia Hall, John McCullough, Jo DeMarco, and Mark Safarik. Thanks to Nancy Rosenbaum for her sleuthing skills and Daniel Denvir for doing a huge favor for a stranger. Thanks to Melissa Allison, Sydney Lewis and Viki Merrick for all their support. Thanks to my father, Daniel Broun, for always asking how the work was going, and to John Wolanski for being my mother’s rock. And to Rob Rosenthal, thank you for keeping me honest and upright (literally). This piece is dedicated to Jeremy Brown, Sonia Rosenbaum, Robert Silk, Margaret Kierer, Dana Demarco; to their families; to the thousands of lifers who are behind bars in Pennsylvania without hope for a second chance; and to the Tombs Angel.

    55 min
  • 4 Episodes

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About

There’s no doubt that the explosion of podcasting as a mass medium can be traced, in large part, to the true crime genre. Listeners flock to serialized stories of scams, murders, cults, and the missing. But early true crime reporting often took the form of an hourloung documentary, allowing for a different type of immersion in story. With a condensed structure, the details of the crime cede time to the humanity of criminals, victims, and law enforcement. The pieces we’ve chosen for this collection represent different parts of the true crime landscape: victims, offenders, and law enforcement. They explore the ripple effects of crime, punishment, and rehabilitation and we hear from the people directly living in those outcomes. They transport us with tape capturing the sounds of lock up and death in prison, victims’ experience of rage and regret, and the intrigue of investigation and dogged pursuit. These works lay the foundation for shows like Ear Hustle and Criminal. And they also give rise to the serialized narrative we hear in Serial, Dirty John, and their progeny teasing out these stories by releasing them over time to create suspense and a dialogue in pop culture. These four works are beautiful and solemn, but they reflect a human fascination with crime, punishment, and judgment. Dave Isay’s early sound portraits of lifetime prisoners and execution teams are intense and satisfying. Samantha Broun and Jay Allison’s lookback to the ripple effect of a 20-year old crime offers a victim’s perspective we rarely hear. And by the 2015 release of KRCC’s protopodcast, you can hear a genre on the verge of erupting. A quick look at the podcast charts today will reveal the outcome.

Information

  • Channel
    Selects
  • Creator
    Selects
  • Years Active
    2k
  • Episodes
    4
  • Provider
    ROOM TONE SELECTS LLC

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