Serial Napper | True Crime for the Chronically Tired

Serial Napper is true crime for the chronically tired. Hosted by Canadian podcaster Nikki Young, Serial Napper tells the stories of real crimes, disappearances and mysteries from around the world, with a focus on the people at the centre of them and the details that too often get lost along the way. Each episode digs into the full story: who these people were before they became names in headlines, what actually happened, how investigators pieced the case together, what unfolded inside the courtroom, and, when answers are still missing, the questions that remain. Nikki tells each story the way she'd tell it to you if you were sitting across the table from her: conversational, curious, occasionally sassy and with a little dark humour when the moment allows for it. The victims are always treated with respect. The absurd behaviour surrounding some of these cases? Considerably less so. Some episodes cover cases you've probably heard of, but go beyond the version that has been repeated for years. Others explore Canadian cases, international crimes, strange mysteries and lesser-known stories that deserve far more attention than they've received. At its heart, Serial Napper is about looking past the headline and asking what really happened. So dim the lights, get comfortable, and try not to have nightmares. This is Serial Napper.

  1. 1d ago

    The Story Behind the Interrogation: What Happened to Ryan Waller & Heather Quan?

    On Christmas night in 2006, Ryan Waller’s parents became worried when their 18-year-old son didn’t show up for dinner and stopped answering his phone. They drove to the Phoenix home he shared with his girlfriend, 21-year-old Heather Quan, but no one came to the door. When police entered the house, they found Heather dead from a gunshot wound and Ryan alive, badly injured and deeply confused. Ryan was taken to the police station, where detectives tried to figure out what had happened. He struggled to answer even the simplest questions. He couldn’t remember basic details about Heather. His story wandered into strange territory involving two men, “bow and arrows,” and a former roommate named Richie. To investigators, very little of it seemed to make sense. Until suddenly, it did. What followed was an investigation that would lead to two murder trials, a controversial interrogation, a years-long fight over Ryan’s medical treatment, and a change to Arizona law carrying Heather Quan’s name. Sources: https://unquestionablycriminal.medium.com/police-interrogate-a-dying-man-with-two-bullets-in-his-brain-accusing-him-of-murder-28644de1a899 https://law.justia.com/cases/arizona/court-of-appeals-division-one-unpublished/2013/1-ca-cr-08-0781.html https://www.maricopacountyattorney.org/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=185 https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/USCOURTS-azd-2_19-cv-03755/pdf/USCOURTS-azd-2_19-cv-03755-0.pdf  https://celebsuburb.com/what-happened-to-ryan-waller-the-untold-truth-about-his-death/#A_Few_Details_On_Ryan_Waller_Early_Life https://www.okaybliss.com/ryan-waller-story/  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZI8G0KOOtqk Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Story Behind the Interrogation: What Happened to Ryan Waller & Heather Quan?
  2. 5d ago

    The Deleted Emails: The Sharon Lopatka Story

    In October of 1996, 35-year-old Sharon Lopatka told her husband she was leaving their Maryland home for a short trip to visit friends in Georgia. But Sharon wasn't going to Georgia. She left her car near a Baltimore train station, boarded a train heading south, and left behind a disturbing goodbye letter for her husband. In it, Sharon seemed to acknowledge the possibility that she might never come home. When police began searching for her, the trail led somewhere that was still relatively unfamiliar territory for investigators in 1996: Sharon's computer. Behind the quiet life she shared with her husband was an extensive online world filled with different identities, private fantasies and increasingly disturbing conversations with strangers. One of those strangers called himself “Slowhand.” His real name was Robert Glass. For weeks, Sharon and Robert had exchanged messages about violence, torture and death. Then Sharon decided to leave the safety of the computer screen behind and meet him in person. What happened after she arrived in North Carolina would become the subject of a deeply unusual homicide case, one that raised questions about fantasy, consent, intent and whether someone can ever legally give another person permission to kill them. Sources: https://alchetron.com/Sharon-Lopatka-homicide  https://www.dailydot.com/society/internet-assisted-suicide-sharon-lopatka/  https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1996/10/30/slain-womans-e-mail-reveals-violent-intentions/d941faa0-4d6a-4aa5-9add-bfd1813e2f9b/  https://www.ranker.com/list/facts-about-sharon-lopatka/cat-mcauliffe  https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1997/03/12/hearing-in-sex-death/623b87a2-8d9c-4280-9fb4-1d301f2a6be2/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2000/01/28/murder-charge-dropped-in-96-internet-sex-case/0829f8da-802a-42be-a0e0-40c9c9b1b7c5 https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/11/03/to-pinpoint-a-suspect-md-police-put-together-pieces-of-an-electronic-puzzle/250e90b7-3610-42de-bb43-f1b2e62903bb/ Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Deleted Emails: The Sharon Lopatka Story
  3. Sep 8

    What Happened on the 25th Floor?: The Tragic Stories of Josh and Amber Hilberling

    On June 7th, 2011, a maintenance worker was repairing a broken window inside a 25th-floor apartment in Tulsa, Oklahoma, when he heard a couple arguing in the next room. Then came another crash. Within moments, 23-year-old Josh Hilberling was lying on the roof of a parking garage seventeen stories below. His heavily pregnant wife, 19-year-old Amber Hilberling, admitted almost immediately that she had pushed him. But she insisted she never meant for him to go through the window. What followed was a case involving allegations of domestic violence on both sides, a marriage that appeared to be coming to an end, Amber's changing account of the moments before Josh fell, and a startling discovery about the glass separating their apartment from a 25-story drop. Was Josh's death the result of an intentional act of violence? Self-defence with an unimaginable consequence? Or could more than one thing be true at the same time? Sources: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGW6Yw-ylMo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj7VpYZLtlE https://ninde.com/tribute/details/2111/Amber-Hilberling/obituary.html https://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/how-pregnant-killer-who-pushed-22157523 https://www.killerqueenspodcast.com/amber-hilberling/ https://okcfox.com/medical-examiner-releases-autopsy-report-for-amber-hilberling#:~:text=TULSA%2C%20Okla.,according%20to%20her%20autopsy%20report.  https://www.publicradiotulsa.org/local-regional/2013-03-09/tulsa-woman-rejects-plea-deal-in-husbands-high-rise-death https://www.claimsjournal.com/news/southcentral/2012/09/21/214026.htm https://www.kjrh.com/news/local-news/amber-hilberlings-estate-drops-lawsuit-against-oklahoma-department-of-corrections https://www.cbsnews.com/news/amber-hilberling-okla-woman-who-pushed-husband-out-of-high-rise-window-in-2011-found-guilty-of-second-degree-murder/ https://ninde.com/tribute/details/2111/Amber-Hilberling/obituary.html Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    What Happened on the 25th Floor?: The Tragic Stories of Josh and Amber Hilberling
  4. Sep 4

    The Lie That Became a Death Sentence: The Murder of Darren Kelly

    On the evening of October 20th, 2015, 42-year-old father and lorry driver Darren Kelly travelled to Pitsea, Essex, believing he was meeting a woman he'd been talking to online. But when Darren arrived, he wasn't met by one person. A group was already waiting nearby, some of them hiding out of sight. They believed Darren was guilty of something terrible, and they had decided to confront him themselves. Within minutes, Darren was running for his life. He was chased through the streets, beaten and stabbed six times before managing to reach a nearby block of flats and desperately buzz strangers for help. Darren died later that night. But when police began investigating the accusation that had made Darren a target, they discovered something deeply disturbing: the evidence didn't support it. What followed was a murder investigation involving an online vigilante campaign, a teenage girl determined to catch suspected predators, four defendants and a trial that left Darren's family questioning how only one person could ultimately be convicted. Sources: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/apr/12/teenage-vigilantes-killed-darren-kelly-mistaken-paedophile-court https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3595928/Family-man-stabbed-death-vigilantes-wrongly-thought-paedophile-blast-cruel-needless-murder.html https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/teenage-vigilantes-murdered-man-they-wrongly-thought-was-a-paedophile-a3223726.html  https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-essex-36321082 https://www.halsteadgazette.co.uk/news/south_essex_news/14500196.murderer-chris-carroll-20-is-handed-life-prison-sentence-and-will-serve-a-minimum-of-21-years-for-killing-darren-kelly-in-pitsea/ https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/14435379.eye-witness-describes-moment-darren-kelly-was-chased-down-and-stabbed-to-death-in-pitsea-street/ https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/daughter-innocent-dad-killed-paedophile-8281536  Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Lie That Became a Death Sentence: The Murder of Darren Kelly
  5. Sep 2

    A Trail of Tragedy: Stacey Castor and The Deaths Around Her

    When Stacey Castor called the police to her New York home in August 2005, she told them she was worried about her husband, David. He had locked himself inside their bedroom after an argument and hadn't shown up for work. When officers forced their way inside, they found David dead beside a glass containing a bright green liquid and an open container of antifreeze. At first, everything pointed toward suicide, but one detective wasn't convinced. As investigators began looking more closely at David's death, they discovered that Stacey had already lost one husband under unusual circumstances. Michael Wallace had died suddenly five years earlier at just 38 years old, after suffering from a mysterious illness that had never been fully explained. So investigators decided to take another look. What followed was an extraordinary investigation involving an exhumation, toxicology, a discarded turkey baster, a suspicious will, computer forensics and a typed letter that threatened to change everything police thought they knew about this family completely. And eventually, investigators began to wonder whether Stacey Castor was an extraordinarily unlucky woman who had experienced more tragedy than most...or whether tragedy wasn't following Stacey at all. It was being created around her. Sources: https://allthatsinteresting.com/stacey-castor https://forensicfiles.fandom.com/wiki/Stacey_Castor https://abcnews.go.com/US/timeline-black-widow-stacey-castors-shocking-crimes/story?id=60860538 https://www.syracuse.com/crime/2020/01/stacey-castor-on-lifetime-5-chilling-details-from-syracuses-2009-antifreeze-murder-trial.html https://cnycentral.com/news/local/did-stacey-castor-murder-her-own-father https://www.syracuse.com/crime/2016/05/stacey_castors_shrine_of_evil_murdered_husbands_son_wants_remains_moved.html https://law.justia.com/cases/new-york/appellate-division-fourth-department/2012/860-ka-09-00469.html https://www.nycourts.gov/reporter/3dseries/2014/2014_03386.htm SUICIDE NOTE: http://a.abcnews.go.com/images/2020/Suicide_Letter_scan0001_090422.pdf Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    A Trail of Tragedy: Stacey Castor and The Deaths Around Her
  6. Aug 29

    The Bathtub Sisters: The Murder of Linda Andersen

    In January 2003, two teenage sisters returned home from an evening out with friends and made a frantic call to 911. Their 43-year-old mother, Linda Andersen, was lying face-down in the bathtub. Linda struggled with alcoholism. She had been drinking heavily that night, and toxicology would reveal alcohol and medication in her system. To investigators, everything seemed to point toward a tragic accidental drowning. And for nearly a year, that's exactly what everyone believed. But Sandra and Beth, just 16 and 15 years old, hadn't discovered their mother dead that night. Linda was already dead when they left for dinner. Because her daughters had killed her. In this episode of Serial Napper, we examine the case that became known as the Bathtub Sisters: the deeply dysfunctional home Sandra and Beth described growing up in, Linda's struggle with addiction and domestic violence, the disturbing digital trail that ultimately exposed the murder, the controversial youth sentences that followed, and the complicated question of rehabilitation. Sources: https://toronto.citynews.ca/2014/04/09/from-murder-to-law-school-story-of-ontario-sisters-who-drowned-mom-now-a-movie/ https://globalnews.ca/news/7458803/bathtub-girl-exclusive-interview/  https://www.ranker.com/list/linda-andersen-facts/trilby-beresford https://web.archive.org/web/20150120034422/http://nicholasguindon.com/f/C_K_Ruling.PDF https://www.mississauga.com/news-story/3123956-man-who-aided-bathtub-girls-asks-for-more-time/  https://www.inquisitr.com/3407112/perfect-sisters-lifetime-to-air-true-story-of-deadly-sisters-who-drowned-drunk-mother-linda-andersen-in-bathtub/  https://ca.news.yahoo.com/mandel-bathtub-girl-killer-now-215249646.html https://www.citynews1130.com/2014/04/09/from-murder-to-law-school-story-of-ontario-sisters-who-drowned-mom-now-a-movie https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/portrait-of-a-drowning-in-real-time-on-msn/article740149/ https://www.scc-csc.ca/pdf/case-documents/34284/FM020_Respondent_Her-Majesty-the-Queen_Redacted.pdf Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Bathtub Sisters: The Murder of Linda Andersen
  7. Aug 25

    The Cheerleader’s Secret: Laken Snelling's Story

    When I first covered the case of Laken Snelling, it was a Patreon-exclusive, and one of the biggest questions surrounding the case remained unanswered: what really happened to her newborn baby in the hours after she secretly gave birth? Now, we finally have an answer. In August 2025, 21-year-old University of Kentucky student and STUNT athlete Laken Snelling gave birth alone inside her off-campus bedroom while her roommates were just feet away. They later told investigators they had heard loud crashing and thudding noises coming from her room in the early morning hours. By the next morning, Laken had left the house. Her suspicious roommates entered her bedroom and discovered evidence of childbirth. Inside her closet, they found her newborn son wrapped in a towel and concealed inside a trash bag. Laken initially gave investigators an explanation for what happened after the birth. But an autopsy would later determine that the baby had been born alive and died from asphyxia by undetermined means. Laken was eventually indicted for first-degree manslaughter, along with abuse of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence and concealing the birth of an infant. For months, the question remained: was her baby's death the result of a catastrophic accident, or had something else happened inside that bedroom? Then, on August 21, 2026, Laken walked into court and changed her plea. Sources: https://www.wkyt.com/2026/03/13/laken-snelling-case-file-reveals-snapchat-warrant-roommate-accounts/ https://www.kentucky.com/news/local/crime/article312308957.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/laken-snelling-5-things-know-210515476.html  https://www.lex18.com/news/covering-kentucky/court-records-reveal-laken-snellings-roommates-were-suspicious-about-her-pregnancy https://www.kentucky.com/news/local/crime/article315012906.html  https://www.kentucky.com/news/local/crime/article315014043.html  https://www.the-messenger.com/news/article_483939ec-f175-5fc9-8f16-8f7af6862ed3.html  https://www.wwnytv.com/2026/08/24/former-university-kentucky-student-admits-ending-her-newborns-life-pleads-guilty/\ Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Cheerleader’s Secret: Laken Snelling's Story
  8. Aug 21

    The Child Star Who Vanished: What Happened to Joe Pichler?

    In January 2006, 18-year-old Joe Pichler seemingly vanished from Bremerton, Washington. Joe had grown up in front of the camera, appearing in movies and television shows including The Fan, Varsity Blues, Beethoven’s 3rd and Beethoven’s 4th. After stepping away from Hollywood as a teenager, he returned home, graduated high school and began building an ordinary life while planning his eventual return to acting. Then, during the early morning hours of January 5th, Joe made his final known phone call. Days later, his silver Toyota Corolla was found abandoned near the Port Washington Narrows. Inside were two pages of emotional writing that police initially interpreted as pointing toward suicide. But the writings never explicitly said Joe intended to end his life. His family disputed the suicide theory from the beginning, raising concerns about how Joe’s car and apartment were initially handled and questioning whether potentially important evidence had been missed. Police themselves would soon become less convinced that suicide explained his disappearance and continued investigating other possibilities. More than twenty years later, there has been no confirmed sighting of Joe, no financial or government activity known to establish that he started a new life, and his remains have never been found. So what happened after Joe’s final phone call? Anyone with information regarding Joe’s disappearance is asked to contact the Bremerton Police Department at 360-473-5228 or the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678). Sources: https://allthatsinteresting.com/joe-pichler https://www.ladbible.com/news/child-actor-from-beethoven-missing-since-2006-20220601 http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?s=5bb93ec13cd41535139045de83024223&t=61494 https://archive.kitsapsun.com/news/local/nation-watching-pichler-search-ep-424313295-359562221.html https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/20060717/missing17m/former-child-actor-missing-for-6-months  https://www.seattlepi.com/seattlenews/article/former-child-actor-missing-1192897.php https://charleyproject.org/case/joseph-david-wolfgang-pichler Follow me here: ► YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@SerialNapper/ ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/serialnappernik/ ► Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/SerialNapper/ ► TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@serialnappernik  *Go Ad-Free on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SerialNapper * Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    The Child Star Who Vanished: What Happened to Joe Pichler?
4.6
out of 5
172 Ratings

About

Serial Napper is true crime for the chronically tired. Hosted by Canadian podcaster Nikki Young, Serial Napper tells the stories of real crimes, disappearances and mysteries from around the world, with a focus on the people at the centre of them and the details that too often get lost along the way. Each episode digs into the full story: who these people were before they became names in headlines, what actually happened, how investigators pieced the case together, what unfolded inside the courtroom, and, when answers are still missing, the questions that remain. Nikki tells each story the way she'd tell it to you if you were sitting across the table from her: conversational, curious, occasionally sassy and with a little dark humour when the moment allows for it. The victims are always treated with respect. The absurd behaviour surrounding some of these cases? Considerably less so. Some episodes cover cases you've probably heard of, but go beyond the version that has been repeated for years. Others explore Canadian cases, international crimes, strange mysteries and lesser-known stories that deserve far more attention than they've received. At its heart, Serial Napper is about looking past the headline and asking what really happened. So dim the lights, get comfortable, and try not to have nightmares. This is Serial Napper.

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