Murder at the Lululemon

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Early in the morning of March twelfth, twenty eleven, the Lululemon store in

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Bethesda, Maryland was about to open. The manager arrived at the front door,

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ready to open the shop for the
day, when she noticed that the

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door had been left unlocked. Looking
through the window, she realized this wasn't

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just a situation where an employee had
failed to lock up the previous night.

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Clothing had been torn off the racks
and thrown across the shop floor, and

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some of the Mannikins had been knocked
over. Now believing that there had been

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a break in, the manager approached
a nearby man and asked him to look

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inside. The man followed the trail
of bloody footprints to a hallway out the

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back, where he saw a woman
lying face down in a pool of her

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own blood. It was Jana Murray, one of the store's employees. It

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was clear that she had been the
victim of some kind of violent attack and

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had died several hours before. Another
employee, Brittany Norwood, was located in

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the bathroom, lying on the floor. Her face was covered in blood and

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somebody had tied her wrists and ankles
with zip ties. When the police arrived

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on the scene, they were able
to speak with Brittany and find out more

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details about what happened. She told
them that she and Jana had been rostered

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on a closing shift the previous night. The two women had closed up like

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they usually would, but after they
left, Brittany realized that she had left

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her wallet inside the store. She
called Jana, who had the keys,

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and asked to be let back inside. The store's alarm system records confirmed the

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timeline showing that the door had been
unlocked again just after ten pm. Shortly

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after the door was unlocked, Brittany
told the police that two unidentified men wearing

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ski masks had followed her and Jana
back inside the store. The men quickly

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overpowered the two women, violently attacking
and then sexually assaulting both of them.

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For investigators, there were some things
about Britney's story that just didn't make sense.

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Jana's injuries were consistent with the kind
of vicious attack that Brittany had described.

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She had received more than three hundred
thirty wounds on her body, which

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had come from a minimum of five
weapons. Police couldn't think of any reason

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why a pair of violent attackers would
carry out such a brutal attack on one

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employee, while leaving the other one
with only a few cuts and bruises.

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Despite Brittany's insistence that she and Jana
had been raped by the men, there

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was no forensic evidence suggesting that either
of them had been sexually assaulted. The

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only sign that rape had taken place
was a hole that had been deliberately cut

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into Jana's pants, as if somebody
had been trying to make the police believe

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that the crime had been sexually motivated. Even though there were a significant number

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of bloody footprints inside the store,
none of them led to any of the

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store's exits. In fact, there
was no sign that the attackers had left

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the store at all. Even more
strangely, while one of the bloody footprints

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had come from a pair of men's
sneakers which had been taken off and abandoned

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inside the store, the other set
of footprints weren't made with men's shoes.

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In fact, the other footprints belonged
to one of the victims. Brittany nor

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would investigators searched for anybody who had
been close to the Lululemen's store that night,

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hoping that a witness would be able
to confirm whether the two masked assailants

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had even existed. They spoke to
two employees at the neighboring Apple store who

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had heard a loud argument coming from
inside the Lululemen's store at around the same

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time the supposed attack had taken place. However, both the employee and the

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manager insisted that they had not heard
any male voices. In fact, the

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altercation had sounded like it was between
two women. One of the women had

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been saying, quote, talk to
me, don't do this, talk to

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me, what's going on. Then
there had been the sounds of screaming and

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loud banging noises, which sounded as
if someone was being hit. After that,

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a quieter voice said, God help
me, Please help me. At

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the time, the Apple's store manager
hadn't thought the argument was anything serious,

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believing it was quote just drama.
In the early hours of the investigation,

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the police had been treating Britain as
if she were one of the victims of

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the attack, but the more information
they discovered, the more they began to

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believe that she was not a victim
at all. When Brittany had been found,

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she had been lying on the bathroom
floor, supposedly drifting in and out

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of consciousness since the attack, she
didn't have any serious head injuries that could

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have led to her losing consciousness.
In fact, the one wound that was

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found on her forehead suggested her story
was a lie. A forensic expert analyzed

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the pattern of the blood from the
forehead cut, confirming that it had dripped

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downwards in a straight line, showing
that Brittany had actually spent most of the

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night standing or sitting up instead of
lying on the floor. The police located

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Jana's car, which was parked three
blocks away outside of a farmer's market.

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They found a significant amount of blood
inside the car, which belonged to two

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people, Jana and Britney. Because
Jane's injuries were so severe it was impossible

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for her to have driven the car
after the attack, the only person who

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could have left the blood inside the
car was Brittany. When she was confronted

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with this evidence, Brittany eventually told
the police that she had been forced to

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move Jana's car by the two attackers, who had told her that if she

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didn't return to the store within ten
minutes, she would be killed. This

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was just another detail which didn't make
any sense. To the investigators, why

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would the attackers insist on Jane's carr
being moved, and if they wanted it

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to be moved, why didn't one
of them leave the store and drive it.

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Brittany didn't have any answers, and
she also didn't have a credible explanation

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for returning to the store after she
had been sent to move the car.

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She told the police that she was
too scared to make a run for it

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because she knew that the two men
knew where she lived. She believed that

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if she had just driven Jane's car
to safety, the men would have hunted

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her down and killed her. One
week after Jane's death, Brittany Norwood was

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arrested for her co worker murder.
The masked men who had broken into the

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store had never existed. Instead,
Jana had died after a petty argument with

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Britney. Before leaving the store that
evening, Brittany and Jana had followed the

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usual security procedures at the store,
including both women checking the other one's bag

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for any Lululemon merchandise. While searching
Britney's bag, Jana found a pair of

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Lulu Limon pants which had not been
paid for. Believing that her coworker was

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trying to steal the pants. Jana
placed a phone call to the manager,

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who said that she'd deal with the
potential theft the following day. Then,

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Jana received a phone call from Brittany
asking her to unlock the store so that

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she could go back in and get
her wallet. Jana agreed, and when

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she arrived at the store, Brittany
attacked her using a hammer, a knife,

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a metal bar, box cutters,
and a wrnch to inflict hundreds of

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injuries. She hit Jana in the
head so hard that her spine was broken

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and her skull was shattered. Once
Jana was dead, Brittany then decided to

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stage the crime scene, hoping that
the police would believe Jana had been killed

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in a robbery. She put on
a men's size fourteen sneakers to leave blood

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trails around the store, through clothing
and cleaning supplies around the store, and

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knocked over the Mannikins to make it
appear as if the store had been ransacked.

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Finally, Brittany tried to make herself
look like a victim, but she

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couldn't quite bring herself to injure herself
as extensively as she'd injured Jana. Instead,

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she used a knife to cut her
own forehead and then used zip ties

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to bind her wrists and ankles.
On the twenty seventh of January twenty twelve,

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Brittany was found guilty of her co
worker's murder and sentenced to life in

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prison. It only took the jury
twenty one minutes to make their decision.

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That's ten minute Murder for today brief
and binge able true crime. My name

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is Joe. I'm the host,
and I really appreciate you listening. If

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All right, email question for today. Hello, mister Joe. I

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kind of like being called mister Joe. That makes me feel important. This

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is Sydney in LA. I have
a question. I'm curious about what court

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case do you think gets attention but
for the wrong reasons. Hi, Sidney,

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thanks for the email. This is
a tough one and I had to

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think about this a little bit.
And since you didn't specify a murder case,

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this is my answer. Okay,
so we all know the story about

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the lady that sued McDonald's because her
coffee was too hot. If someone mentions

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about how people just sue anyone for
anything, this case usually gets mentioned in

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some derogatory way. Let me tell
you her lawsuit is so legitimate. I've

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done research on this that no one
asked me to do. The coffee was

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being served at like one hundred and
ninety degrees, the spill costs third degree

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burns, and it was so hot
that it fused parts of her female area

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together. She required skin grafting.
She was in the hospital for eight days

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for spilled coffee. She initially asked
for twenty thousand dollars to cover medical expenses.

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McDonald said, now, we're not
going to do that. So they

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went to court and the jury awarded
her one hundred and sixty thousand dollars in

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compensatory damages to cover medicals, lost
wages, then another two point seven million

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dollars impunitive damages. Now that was
later reduced, and then they even ended

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up settling for an undisclosed figure.
But my point is, so many people

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have absolutely trashed this lady over the
years about suing for stupid things. That's

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not the case in this In this
situation, many more people would have absolutely

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been hurt for years to come if
they hadn't been forced to change the temperature

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that they serve their coffee. And
that's it. Thanks for listening to another

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ten minute Murder Podcast episode. I
will see you on the next one. Goodbye.