False Accusations: Innocent People Slandered in the Nancy Guthrie Case and Idaho Murders

Hey guys, uh thanks so much for checking out my show.

Uh I really really appreciate it.

Please click to subscribe.

Uh it is now day 35 in the search for Nancy Guthrie.

Today is Saturday.

I’m obviously still in Tucson, Arizona.

I am actually outside the Pima County Sheriff’s Office right now.

These are all their their SWAT trucks.

Um might remember these from when we went on and saw those raids a couple of weeks ago.

Uh, in terms of updates on the case, uh, we’re still looking into the possible internet outage around the time that Nancy disappeared.

We know the FBI is aware of it.

They’ve been asking neighbors about it.

Uh, they will not officially comment to us about what they’ve learned.

Same with the Pima County Sheriff’s Office.

Uh, but there’s still a lot happening behind the scenes.

I know that.

Um, and I’m just trying to stay on top of it all.

In this episode though, I wanted to dive into an issue that I’ve seen with this case, but also with almost every big case that I’ve covered recently, and that is when innocent people uh who are not connected to a crime ended up getting end up getting dragged through the mud uh because people on the internet with with huge followings uh think that they’ve solved the case uh and think that it’s appropriate to um call out innocent people for crimes that they did not commit.

Uh so I’m going to get into examples of that happening in the Nancy Guthrie case, but I also want to dive into a situation with the Brian Cobberger case because it it’s all connected in a weird way.

And you guys might remember there was this Tik Tok psychic that decided that it was a professor from Idaho who was responsible for the Idaho murders despite there being absolutely no evidence and it being an insane theory.

Well, it turns out the professor took the Tik Tocker to um all the way up to federal court and there was a trial and this Tik Tocker now has to pay $10 million uh for essentially slandering this woman.

And it just got me thinking because we’ve seen similar situations unfolding here in Arizona and it’s just so irresponsible that I wanted to do an episode uh on it.

So, I’m going to get into all of it in this episode of Brian and Investigates.

All right.

Hey guys.

Yeah.

So, I’m at the um the sheriff’s office here in uh Puma County.

Uh and this is an episode something I’ve been wanting to talk about for a while.

Uh that I was just waiting for sort of the right moment when I had like some time and things weren’t really crazy.

Uh because this is something that has bothered me for quite some time covering crime.

uh when innocent people or people where there’s just no evidence um to prove that they are connected to a crime end up somehow getting thrown under the bus online and these things just take off uh they go viral and when there’s nothing really to back it up and I’ve kind of just like sat back and watched it happen a lot several times I mean you think back to like Idaho when I covered Brian Cobra Ber and I was there for months and throughout that process I mean people were accusing Ethan Chapen’s frat brothers of being involved and naming them and showing photos and then there was hoodie guy and I mean this isn’t just you know friends chatting at dinner or friends in a small online group just kicking around theories.

I mean, obviously people are going to do that and that, you know, that’s fine, but what bothers me is when when it when it’s people with a huge following um that that literally go viral.

Uh and you know, I’m sitting here covering the story thinking to myself, wait, what? Wait a minute.

Like, there’s no evidence that this person is connected.

We haven’t seen any, you know, facts to support this.

Um and sometimes I’m like, oh, maybe the person is, maybe they aren’t.

But, you know, maybe the person is, maybe they aren’t.

isn’t enough to report something.

Um, and I get that like a lot of people who discuss these cases online aren’t journalists and they’re just I think some people lose track that this is like real life and these are real people and real families.

Um, and it’s almost like a video game to them and they don’t have the same like journalistic standards as people who are, you know, covering these cases um, for like news organizations or for YouTube.

But I’m not, by the way, I’m not trying to call out like YouTubers.

I mean, I obviously this is my YouTube and I have Tik Tok and I like YouTube and I like Tik Tok and I like Twitter and I’m not like calling out like, hey, the journalists are better that are on TV and that do the, you know, are newspaper journalists.

Like, I don’t think that at all u at all.

So, that’s not what I’m trying to say.

I guess what I’m what I’m trying to say is it bothers me when I see people who I know because I’m covering the cases so closely there’s no evidence that they’re connected to the crime um being called out and I and I’ve seen behind the scenes what that does to families um and everybody moves on like with Idaho.

Uh, but those people, you still Google their names and these crazy theories um are out there, which I’m going to get to the Idaho Connection in a second.

But just speaking specifically about Nancy Guthrie, there was this New York Times article about Dominic Evans, who is Tomaso’s bandmate.

Tomaso, of course, is Annie Guthri’s husband.

Um, and I’ve tried to talk to Dominic and I haven’t had much luck, but the New York Times was able to talk to him.

Um, and you know, there were all these theories online that he was somehow connected despite there being no evidence.

Um, and he told the New York Times, “I feel like someone’s taken my name.

I don’t know monetary clickbait to be relevant entertainment, but there are innocent people that get hurt.

” And like with him, he is a teacher.

Um, so think about like what these theories that get out there and and people posting things about him or someone like him, like what that can do to your career and to your life.

Um, according to the New York Times, Dominic’s connection to the Guthrie family dates back to 2007.

He joined a rock band.

It was called Early Black with Tomaso.

Um, after responding to a Craigslist ad, this is all according to the New York Times.

They started jamming regularly.

Uh, Dominic mentioned that he was married to the older sister uh of Savannah Guthrie that Tomaso had told him that.

Um, and he said he met Nancy Guthrie only once in 2011 when he brought his oldest son to hunt for Easter eggs at her home.

So that’s his sort of connection to Nancy Guthrie.

Uh but beyond that, like no one has seen any evidence that obviously that he’s connected to the crime, but these theories went went crazy online for a while to the point where even if you guys remember back on February 13th, I had the tip and I was, you know, basically there with the SWAT team when they raided that house.

Um which that uh person, Luke Daly, still hasn’t been arrested and we don’t know if there’s no evidence that he’s connected either.

But what’s interesting is at that same time there were a ton of other people over at Dominic’s house thinking that his house was going to get raided and he was apparently like so scared that he didn’t sleep at the house that night and there was never any I mean you know I’ve sort of I’ve got sources now here there was never any evidence behind the scenes that they were going to raid Dominic’s house or that he’s ever been connected to the crime.

So it’s just one example of this happening where sudd a couple of people online with big followings decide to call somebody out who they think is involved even there’s there’s no evidence of it and it spirals out of control and then everybody moves on.

Um but the truth is for these people who are victims of this like they they can’t move on.

Their their their name is now out there forever.

Um, and these posts live on forever.

And again, it’s just something that’s bothered me because I’ve seen it happen over and over again.

Um, and the example also back with Idaho, which is really what I want to dive into in this episode, is um, there was this professor uh, who this Tik Tok psychic from very early on was posting relentlessly about saying that she was responsible for the murders even though there was literally no evidence.

It was like the craziest theory ever there theory ever.

There was zero evidence that she was at all connected and and this Tik Tocker would not stop doing it.

Um the Tik Tocker’s name is Ashley Gillard uh and the Idaho professor’s name is Rebecca Scoffield and she just kept saying that Rebecca Scoffield was responsible and would not give up.

And the theory started to catch on with some people that were following this uh this Tik Tocker even though the theories literally made no sense.

Uh, and what’s interesting, and that’s what I wanted to focus this episode on, is this professor fought back, whereas a lot of people don’t.

They just try to move on with their lives.

But but this professor fought back and ended up taking this tick- tocker all the way to federal court where there was a trial that just ended uh last week where a jury ended up awarding the professor a $10 million $10 million judgment that the Tik Tocker now has to pay.

Now whether she has anywhere I mean there’s no way she’s going to be able to pay that.

I think it just sends a strong message um that you know there are um repercussions for for doing this and a lot of people kind of get away with it.

But this is an example where someone decided to fight back and um and and a federal jury ended up coming back with this $10 million judgment.

I’m joined now by Kevin Fixler uh from the Idaho Statesman.

It’s good to see you, Kevin.

uh thank you for coming back on uh my show.

I was super interested in talking to you just because you know I’ve been in um Arizona obviously covering um this case here with Nancy Guthrie and there’s already been the New York Times has done some reporting and I’ve just seen on my own there’s already been a lot of people here sort of you know inappropriately called out that have nothing to do with the case and you know with all the influencers and that kind of thing.

And you just finished covering this trial with this Tik Tocker Ashley Gillard.

Um, which it kind of relates to just sort of a bigger picture issue here happening, especially with like true crime crime coverage.

And people will remember, I remembered the basics from this case cuz I knew that there was a professor from University of Idaho who was suing a Tik Tocker based on just ridiculous claims.

Remind me what, and you’ve covered the trial, so you know like the ins and outs of it all, but what did she do again? What What did this woman do? with this Tik Tocker.

So, it was a woman in Texas out of Houston and she had claimed uh through tarot card readings and her own psychic abilities that she had landed on a history professor and not only a history professor but the chair of the department at the University of Idaho uh Rebecca Scoffield and she believed that she was uh responsible for the four murders.

And this is before Brian Coberger had been arrested obviously or a suspect even identified.

And so this dates back to uh late November and and to early December where she was making these allegations and essentially that Rebecca Scoffield had been in a relationship with one of the four victims and that when that relationship ended and I should note that this woman uh is married and uh is heterosexual but had been in a relationship with one of the female students who uh who passed and when that relationship ended that she ordered the murders uh well the murderer of that student and then these other three were killed in the process.

Um over time that story evolved including with the arrest of Brian Cobberger and uh Ashley Gillard continued to say that through her readings uh she that they were tied together that Brian Coberger was involved or the ex-boyfriend of one of these students was involved.

But uh it continued for for not only months including after Cobberger’s arrest and even through the plea agreements and uh you know his conf confession essentially uh leading to his sentencing.

She continued to post over the years that uh still implicating Rebecca Scoffield with with no information beyond sort of her intuition.

Uh she was found to have been to have defamed the professor uh more than a year ago.

The judge in this federal civil suit said that she had defamed this professor on these two counts.

And so what this trial was about was the monetary damages, leaving that to a jury to determine.

So I mean, as much as we know about the case, like this is just a ridiculous claim.

I mean, there’s zero information connecting this professor to the murders at all.

Period.

But she just kept posting about it.

I mean, she didn’t she just kept going.

Yeah, I think she really believes this stuff.

Uh I think she believes that she truly has psychic abilities.

Uh she clear she claims to be cla cognizant is is the terminology she used.

I sat with her for about an hour and a half uh over a coffee uh even before the trial started.

So there was jury selection on Monday last week and then there was a 4-day trial uh as I said to determine monetary damages.

And uh before any of that really got underway though, I sat with her and I wanted to get to know her a little bit and understand from where she was coming, it was clear to me that she she does believe that she has these abilities and she really didn’t walk back the fact that she believed Rebecca Scoffield, the professor, was involved in this.

Uh in fact, there was kind of a I don’t know if it was a funny moment, but an interesting moment where she said, “Are you a guiltter?” And I said, “What do you mean?” And she said, “Do you believe that Brian Cobberger is guilty?” And that apparently is the terminology that goes around online.

And I said, ‘Well, if if what you mean is, do I believe Brian Coberger confessed to the murders and is now serving four consecutive life sentences with no chance of parole and waved all appeal rights uh in exchange for removing the death penalty, then the answer is yes.

I believe all of the evidence pointed to one particular individual.

And rather than being somebody who maybe they would put her in the camp, I think most people would of of sort of a conspiracy theorist, she was sort of positioning others as being those who believed in the guilt.

U you know, she she felt Brian Cobberger probably did that only to uh avoid the death penalty.

But uh yeah, I mean it was a it was a interesting situation to sit with her and learn her perspective and and she believes that she was able to stumble through her abilities and tarot card readings and oracle card readings for those who knows knows what those are.

But uh that she had learned information about the case and about the uh you know what happened that early morning before police even released it to the public.

And so she really leaned on that and saying, “Look, I got these other issues correct and and highlighted that during the trial to the jury.

” But of course, as as Rebecca Scoffield’s attorney pointed out at trial with uh direct examination of Ashley Gillard on the stand, she said, “You have no facts, nor have you ever had any facts to point to Rebecca Scoffield as being involved at all.

” Yeah.

Yeah.

And I mean, it’s one thing if you say you’re a psychic and you have these beliefs and maybe you like tell your friends or whatever, but it seems really different obviously that she was posting over and over again to TikTok and it became I mean I had heard about it.

It became somewhat of a thing that this woman was posting this.

Um does she have any regrets? I mean what was the final like judgment that now she’ll have to pay? Is it 10 million? That’s right.

So the the jury was there to determine monetary damages and there’s two types in a civil uh defamation suit.

There’s compensatory damages which is uh the root there to compensate meaning cover all of the medical expenses.

Rebecca Scoffield and her family had installed uh you know new security mechanisms including cameras and various things like that.

that they wanted her to pay for that and for sort of long-term medical care whether that was physical therapy related to uh you know various uh almost migraines.

I mean she was having headaches and continues to have them and other body and nerve problems she was associating or affiliating with uh you know the trauma she had gone through in being accused and almost becoming a pariah in her own community over uh suspicions of her involvement.

And then what you had were punitive damages and uh again the root there related to basically a penalty for having uh conducted yourself in this sort of way.

So the jury awarded uh $2.

5 million in compens compensatory damages and then an additional $7.

5 in punitive and that’s how we get to that $10 million which you know is Ashley Gillard worth 10 million or more dollars and I think the answer is absolutely no.

So, I don’t think they they landed on this verdict with the idea that much, if any, of that money will ever be awarded or handed over.

Uh, that’s up to attorneys to sort out.

But it’s really the the wrist slap and and sending a message I think to the rest of America that you cannot do this online and just uh selling someone’s name repeatedly and after cease and desist letters and request to stop and you know landing on a suspect the lone suspect and then moving through the judicial process and the adjudication and ultimately someone confessing and then being sentenced.

I mean, you cannot continue on and on and on to go after someone with again no provable facts.

So, did the professor try to make her stop? Because I mean, she went all the way to the I mean, a federal CA jury trial is a pretty big deal, but did she do a lot of things before that to try and just get her to stop? Yeah.

So she learned about this and she told the whole story from the stand uh talking about uh what she had experienced and uh explained that uh they sent a cease and desist letter shortly after Thanksgiving and trying to get this Tik Tocker to stop.

Uh basically you have no information.

This isn’t correct.

You know uh we assert you must give up on this.

And she didn’t.

And I I believe they sent that by email and that was ignored.

And then they had proof that she had received the second cease and desist because they sent it to her actual address.

And then Ashley Gillard then actually took that cease and desist and sort of um made light of it uh in future videos.

And so they obviously knew that she had received it.

Uh she had put it in one video on a toilet paper roll basically suggesting that’s what she thought of it and how she might treat it.

You can use your own imagination there.

That was played in court by the way.

So, I think that won some points with the what ultimately was a seven member jury uh who had to be unanimous in their decision.

So, they made those those attempts through, you know, I would call those legal means.

And then I believe it was on December 21st of 2022, shortly before Brian Cobberger was arrested on the 30th that they filed a uh formal defamation case in civil court in federal court.

Uh and this played out for for years.

I mean, as we saw, it outlasted the actual criminal case for Brian Coberger and was only just resolved this past Friday.

And so her defense was that she actually thinks this is true still.

Is that what you said? Yeah, she she pointed to certain facts that she asserted she got right beforehand could point to videos and uh you know tarot card readings had shown that what was being put out by police in the public which was as you recall pretty limited in early days about whether or not uh the two surviving roommates in the house were awake or asleep and she pointed out hey you know that was a detail I got right that uh they actually were up and we have obviously over time learned that that is the case that The two surviving roommates were up for certain periods of time, had heard various things.

Uh, you know, one of them, Dylan Mortonson, had come almost face to face with uh Brian Coberger, you know, feet from her door before she closed it and locked it and then ended up down in uh the first floor roommate Bethy’s uh her room.

So, she she pointed to those things.

She pointed to the fact that she believed herself to be clair cognizant that um you know her intentions were to advocate on behalf of the victims to ensure that justice was done that this was not malicious that uh she had no intent of going after the professor specifically but just that she wanted to put information out into the public.

That was the first thing.

The other thing that she showed the jury is that she actually did file a tip to the FBI tip line and asking that they they investigate.

Uh there was a this really interesting moment at the trial where uh Wendy Olsen who was the attorney for for Rebecca Scoffield and and Wendy Olsen is a former appointed presidentially appointed US attorney for the state of Idaho.

That was during the Obama administration.

So you know a heavy hitter here.

She was on uh she was at the podium and and uh direct examining Ashley Gillard sort of in this adversarial role and saying you have absolutely no proof nor have you ever had any facts.

And they had this sort of debate about whether or not that was what she needed in order to make these allegations.

And Ashley Gilard’s response was uh psychics don’t use facts, they use intuition.

And that that was supposed to be part of uh her defense that, you know, I had the best of intentions here uh even if I was wrong.

You know, that she could be wrong, but this is what she was getting back in her readings and repeat readings.

By the way, she told me when I sat down with her that uh you know she had done uh dozens of of these readings before she ever went public and went on Tic Tac with these accusations.

Did she show any remorse for what she did to this professor’s life? You know, my sense was she didn’t really understand it.

Uh her defense was often that I didn’t do anything to her.

And I think she made that that point in her closing remarks or at least attempted to with the jury.

She was saying look she’s pointing to physical and mental health damage that I have done to her seeking monetary damages in response but she according to medical guidelines you cannot acquire post-traumatic stress syndrome directly from a video you cannot watch something online and then get PTSD which she has been diagnosed by her therapist with and so Ashley Gillard who told me that as a combat veteran herself I’ve not been able to independently verify that.

But my understanding is she served for uh four years in the US Army, had actually been she told me this, so I’m I’m sharing this with the public, uh that she had been in an IED explosion of a tank she was on uh in Iraq, and so had actually been diagnosed herself with PTSD.

So, she had this interesting familiarity with uh this this mental health issue.

And so she challenged Scoffield’s therapist specifically about her own diagnosis.

And she went through the medical guidelines step by step and said, “So she doesn’t qualify here, correct? That’s right.

She doesn’t qualify here.

Correct.

She doesn’t qualify.

” And so they had this like lengthy back and forth that really got uncomfortable.

And I think I could even sense in the jury.

It was it was it was just it was difficult to watch.

It was it was highly uncomfortable.

And it was until Ashley Gillard sort of got the responses she needed uh to sort of secure the win uh if you want to call it that.

I’ll put that in air quotes, I guess, the win that this therapist was acknowledging that she did not meet the medical guidelines that were being presented to her.

But she said, but you know, based on my 32 years of experience as a mental health counselor, I am diagnosing her with this.

She absolutely fits the criteria.

And so that became sort of something that the jury had to um had to figure through in order to determine whether or not there was direct correlation between the impacts of what Ashley Gillard had put out on TikTok repeatedly and other social media forums uh including to YouTube eventually and uh what the real damage was to Rebecca Scoffield and her family by the way.

I mean they corroborated her story and were cross-examined.

And I will actually note, Brian, I mean, this was such a unique case because Ashley Gillard chose to represent herself at trial, prosay, many know that as it created these very uncomfortable moments where the very first time that Rebecca Scofield and Ashley Gillard had ever talked was when Ashley Gillard was cross-examining Rebecca Scoffield on the stand.

So that was the communication.

And then later that led to her also cross-examining Scoffield’s best friend, Scoffield’s therapist, Scoffield’s husband, Scoffield’s mother.

And there were these really heated moments that were incredibly uncomfortable.

I’ve never seen anything like it.

And I don’t know if you have either.

Yeah.

So she was literally she didn’t have a lawyer and she was literally the one doing the the questioning of these victims of her victims essentially.

Yeah.

I mean again purported but I think the jury but the other thing that was really interesting was then she had to because she didn’t have another person representing her and she also didn’t have any witnesses except for herself.

She then had to both cross-examine herself sort of on the rebuttal phase of Scoffield’s attorney direct examining her and then when Ashley Gillard put on her own case, she called herself to the stand and basically did the same thing in this very odd Q&A format that the judge made a point to say.

He took, you know, he set aside to the jury like, I know this will seem very bizarre.

It’s not unique in a case like this under these types of circumstances.

you know, don’t hold it against the defendant who had to basically say question, is your name Ashley Gillard? Answer: Yes, my name is Ashley Gillard.

It I mean, it was very bizarre.

Yeah, it was very strange.

I’ve never seen anything like it.

I don’t know that I ever will again.

Has there ever been a case like this? Do you know a defamation case related to Yeah, related to a Tik Tocker and, you know, a big crime story? I mean, my coverage primarily focuses on Idaho, as you know.

I there there has to be precedent for something like this.

And I know that’s sort of your larger question about sort of the the scope and and the precedent this may set across the national landscape.

I think this sets the tone and also uh you know sends the message I mentioned as you know the jury verdict on this uh an extreme amount of money that she’s been ordered to pay.

Um I do hear she plans to appeal.

She did tell me that directly.

So, I guess we’ll see where things wind up, but um I’m not familiar with another case like this.

Certainly, there are defamation cases that have resulted in large, uh amounts of money.

In fact, actually, Scoffield’s attorney, Wendy Olsen, I mentioned she has quite a quite a career background.

Uh she represented a um a drag dancer out of North Idaho who had been accused of various things that were untrue in a defamation case and also won quite a bit of money.

I think it was $1.

1 million.

Uh I think that was two years ago here in Idaho.

But that’s completely different and not really I mean I think there were some social media elements to that, but not like this.

I mean the the the Moscow murders, as we both know, was such a high-profile case and for these accusations to go on and on and on.

I I’ve never heard of anything quite like this.

Yeah.

And it wasn’t just her.

I mean, there were a lot of Tik Tockers with big followings that were calling people out.

I remember some of like the frat guys, hoodie guy.

I mean, people really had their names drugged through the mud.

Um, and and I’m seeing it happen again now with the Nancy Guthrie case.

There was that New York Times article about the bandmate.

And there’s been other people, too.

I mean, I just interviewed one of the the people who have been detained who were never arrested.

You know, everybody now is trying to say that they were involved when there’s really no evidence of that.

Um, I mean, do you do you think this case could send a message out that this is not okay? I mean, $10 million is a pretty, you know, it’s a big number.

It’s a huge number.

I don’t know if it’s unprecedented in Idaho.

We we have seen with uh Ammon Bundy, who’s kind of a right-wing type, uh who uh ended up in a different type of uh civil suit and order to pay $52.

5 million for damages to a local hospital group.

But that’s kind of, you know, unrelated.

I think with regards to defamation, this if it didn’t set a record and in Idaho in particular, uh you know, it has to be close.

And I do think that um I’m seeing I follow social media, you know, post things like that and I’m seeing in the conversations around the stories that I wrote related to this uh oneweek trial last week that many are sort of hashtagging or or ating uh various people who have been involved or accused of engaging in defamation about things like uh the Charlie Kirk shooting and uh maybe the Guthrie case here that you’re on.

I think we’re starting to see that there is a belief that there’s sort of um you know a path that if it wasn’t known before that this this definitely lets them know that these are things you can pursue.

I will say I think what’s interesting when we’ve seen sort of this collision of uh you know the online sleuth world and you know even if it’s best of intentions to help law enforcement solve a case I think we’re seeing that sort of in the face of uh you know liel law you know slander spoken uh and and people trying to figure these things out and help direct law enforcement.

But um you know as journalists we know that we can’t just report something without attribution or citing court records or you know a law enforcement source said that this person is a person of interest or a suspect or uh you know and even then we have to be very careful with the words.

We can’t say that Brian Cobberger murdered four students.

We have to say that during his arrest that he was arrested on sus uh uh um you know he was suspected of it.

So, um I I think we’re seeing this sort of uh you know the the unprofessional side of that world just for lack of training.

I I’m not trying to be judgmental here, but I think it is the training that we receive as journalists and we have editors and uh producers and people who make sure to doublech checkck our work to ensure that we’re not creating defamation and liable potential uh in the things we write and say that get get published.

And on social media, those layers, they sort of are eliminated.

You know, we’re all in media, but they’re on social media versus more traditional media, and they sort of run these risks.

The last thing I’ll say about this is outside of Ashley Gillard, who puts her name and face on her accounts, I think we see a lot of these accusations and suspicions that get bandied about online, but a lot of it’s done by people who are anonymous.

And if there was a mistake made here by Ashley Gillard, it’s that she didn’t hide her name or face.

maybe to her credit that she really believed these things, but they were obviously defamatory.

A judge ruled they were defamatory under the law in Idaho and under federal court guidelines and she’s paying a huge price as a result.

And the thing is these things live on forever on the internet.

Like even if you know hopefully there’ll be an arrest in the Nancy Guthrie case, there was an arrest in a you know conviction in the uh Brian Coberger case.

you know, he admitted to it, but still, if you Google these people, these things come up and it sort of just lives out there forever.

Uh, and it’s really unfair.

That was Ashley Scoffield or excuse me, Rebecca Scoffield’s uh perspective, too.

I mean, this has damaged her career.

this has hurt her potential to um kind of in that publisher parish uh demands of academia and upward mobility and uh you know growth of her career and with her reputation with her colleagues and uh you know she’s Harvard educated has a master’s and PhD and has worked her whole life uh you know toward that goal and her family has made grave sacrifices for that purpose for her career and that she was damaged u you know uh irreversibly And anytime, I mean, here we are, we’re still even talking about it.

Rebecca Scoffield, her name will always be attached to this.

And that was the point they were trying to make.

They had an expert in PR and a background in journalism who actually had taught at the University of Idaho and was retired who pointed out it takes 25 to 40 years for something like this to shake from someone’s reputation and their name.

And we know in the internet age that you say the wrong thing on TV or uh you know the wrong thing gets attached to you forever.

Uh you know it never goes away.

I mean I just saw the headline today that Justin Timberlake is suing to prevent the release of video of his DWI that that this will damage his career forever.

And it’s interesting because that’s a public document and we all know what the allegation is tied to that case.

But he says if this thing gets out this will damage me forever.

So even he’s quite quite aware that u you know people will associate him with that forever.

And we think about the Mark Sanchez case, the former NFL player who uh you know was alleged to have stabbed this trucker uh in some sort of incident while he was uh you know under suspicion of being on drugs and that’s the allegations.

I mean this has tarnished his life and his career forever.

I think he was fired from his uh commentating job and he’s just trying to recover so he can avoid uh the legal ramifications.

I mean, these things stay with people forever, particularly if you’re a celebrity or if someone spotlights you as potentially involved in something you weren’t and sort of builds this if it’s not fame, it’s sort of infamy attached to who you are forever.

Do you know was Gillard’s TikTok, I don’t know if it came out in the case, was it monetized? Like is this something she was making money off of? So Wendy Olsen asked her that specifically whether or not she had made earnings on her Tik Tok account, which by the way I should add her account was banned in July of 2023.

So she does have a new account on Tik Tok with many fewer followers and much less uh you know noteworthiness.

I guess I would say people are still sort of following it to see what she’ll say next.

Uh and she has been on but she said on the stand so under oath that she said she never made any money off of this.

Uh I I did actually put it out to the public through um I’ll call it X.

I know we many know it as Twitter still, but uh I asked people I said, you know, I’m I’m not on TikTok.

I guess I’m a a viewer of it in some regards when I need to for work purposes, but I’m trying to understand like can you monetize? Can you earn make money? And it seemed to me people were saying if you sort of corner the market on uh you know both a following and and going live, there are potential benefits financially.

But Ashley Gillard said she never made any money on it.

And I think that surprised Wendy Olsen because I think she was thinking, “Hey, we’re going after sort of the proceeds you received to some extent.

” And then to be told again under oath on the stand like, “Well, I never made any money on this.

” So, yeah.

just cuz it seems to me like people who have crazy theories about cases and name people, you know, it’s almost like the crazier the theory, the more clicks you’ll get versus just sticking to the facts and the truth and being patient and waiting to see how things play out.

So that’s why I was wondering just because that seems to be an issue that I see and it almost gets rewarded to a certain extent like you’ll get more clicks if you’re like you know you have the the craziest idea of what happened and you name somebody that no one else is and people will be interested in click but you’re really just like ruining that person’s life essentially.

Yeah.

As Scoffield’s attorneys pointed out that Ashley Gillard was was hashtagging all future videos that she made in this lineup, this series of videos that more than a hundred videos that she would hashtag it with Rebecca Scofieldy.

Ashley Gillard’s perspective was and her assertion was, well, I only made a handful of videos about Rebecca Scoffield.

You know, they were about solving this crime.

She had branded herself as this psychic who does tarot and oracle card readings to help solve mysterious murders and crimes.

She kept hashtagging them all in her name.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I I didn’t verify that to be clear, but this was the assertion in court, so I I trust it’s true, but that that was part of it.

And so, you know, Scoffield’s attorneys said, “Well, I mean, these were all about Rebecca Scoffield.

” And Gillard’s response was, “Well, no, they weren’t.

I only made, you know, a dozen or more that were specifically about Rebecca Scoffield.

” But I think by continuing to hashtag it, especially with hashtags probably Idaho 4, Brian Coberger, you know, these types of things, Moscow murders, I think it it obviously drew the direct correlation and and people continue to uh digest this information according to Scofield’s attorneys millions of times.

I wonder if it’s like almost criminal in a sense, like almost like stalking when you just won’t let something go and you’re calling someone out like that publicly, you know? Yeah.

I I mean I I guess it’s not really stalking, but it just I don’t know.

It’s terrible.

Well, this became part of Ashley Gilard’s uh defense.

She said, “I never threatened you directly.

You have no proof.

You have no video footage of me actually making a physical threat toward you.

It never happened.

” She tried to say these things were all in your mind.

And I mean, mental health, you know, it got into this again this damages issue of like, well, what was the physical threat versus the mental health uh threat? Was this something you created in your own mind? And these were questions she was posing to, as I said, Scoffield’s husband, Scoffield’s therapist, Scoffield’s uh mother, and and it got very contentious and heated at points.

And it was uh it was very surreal to see the I mean, they say in court, right, and this is more about criminal stuff, but uh you know, you’re the opportunity to face your accuser.

And in this civil case, I mean, that was literally what happened.

They for the very first time ever connected in in this case.

I mean they were sitting next to each other not far apart just before uh jury selection when I walked in and I was like well that’s clearly Ashley Gillard and you know standing next to her is Wendy Olsen the attorney for Rebecca Scoffield who was seated just you know right next door.

I mean it was it was it was like I said surreal is the best way I can describe it.

It was very bizarre.

Yeah what a bizarre case.

Um, well, like I said, I just personally hope it covers it sends a message just with all the true crime stuff that I’ve sort of witnessed happen.

Um, thank you so much, Kevin, for taking the time to talk with me.

Yeah.

And just to let people know, you know, I I know that the criminal case in in Cobberger and and the Moscow murders is is resolved.

I mean, that happened in July of 23 uh excuse me, July 23rd of 20 25 now.

But, um, I continue to monitor this case.

Uh, I’ve got some some good stories coming up.

Uh, not anything I can totally share about right now and I’ve got a longerterm project as well.

So, uh, that’s something I hope to talk to your audience and others more about down the road, but I continue to track this case and all sort of, you know, these these tendrils just like this case that were left unresolved and uh, you know, still interesting to our Idaho audience and and certainly I think to our national audience.

I saw there was a ton of interest in this case and I think I was the only one covering it gave to GAVL.

So, um I I look forward to sharing more in the future.

Yeah, you’re the man.

Everybody else moves on, but then you’ll have the you’ll have the scoop.

So, all right.

Yeah, you’re still there.

Thank you.

All right, man.

I appreciate Kevin for taking the time to talk with me.

Kevin is uh become a friend of mine because we obviously covered the Idaho murders together.

He’s with the Idaho Statesman.

Um and so we, you know, got to know each other pretty well just covering everything that has to do with Brian Cobberger.

So, uh, I thought it would just be interesting to dive into what happened with with that trial in Boise.

Just to me, it all feels so relevant in light of everything happening with Nancy Guthrie on social media.

And again, I just want to say like I’m not calling out uh just like internet sleuths in general.

I have a ton of friends who consider themselves internet sleuths.

And I’m not calling out Tik Tockers.

I love Tik Tok.

I have Tik Tok.

And I’m not calling out YouTubers.

I have YouTube.

And there there’s like so much great content and so many people who genuinely care about these stories and work really really hard.

And I don’t just think like traditional media is, you know, is uh are the responsible ones.

In fact, many times they’re not.

So that that’s not the point I’m trying to make.

I guess the point I wanted to make with this episode though is like before you start sharing these photos of people where there’s no real evidence connecting them to a crime.

Uh just think about it because you really have an impact on their life forever.

You have an impact on their kids’ lives.

And it’s one thing if you’re, you know, with your friends just kind of like chatting about a case and throwing around ideas or whatever, but it’s another thing to start posting about it and really um dragging these people through the mud when in the end most of the time they end up having nothing to do with the case.

So that’s about it.

Hopefully I didn’t sound too preachy because I’m really not trying to sound preachy at all.

It’s just it’s something that’s kind of been like weighing on me for a while.

And then this Tik Tok verdict in Idaho I just thought was really interesting when you kind of connect it back to everything that’s been happening.

So I appreciate you guys so much for following along.

Um again, day 35.

I’ll I’ll stay on top of everything.

Um and hopefully, you know, hopefully we’ll get some kind of answer soon with what happened to to Nancy Guthrie.

Um all right, I’ll talk to you guys later.