Sex Lies Murder Suicide

WEBVTT

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Discretion is advised. Ten needed murder. Chari was born in Flint, Michigan,

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on October thirteenth, nineteen seventy one. By sixteen years old, she

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was already out on her own.
She was drawn to the seedier side of

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life, and it welcomed her with
open arms. By nineteen she was married

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with the child. That marriage was
short lived. Chari bounced around from one

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man to another. She eventually had
three children with three different fathers. And

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don't get me wrong, I'm not
saying anything necessarily negative about this, because

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life happens. People make mistakes,
get mixed up with the wrong people,

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and before they realize, boom pregnant. What I'm saying is this aspect is

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part of a behavior pattern that helps
tell the bigger story. Shari did get

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married a second time, but that
husband went to jail for hitting one of

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the kids so hard that it fractured
their skull. It seemed as though she

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attracted men of questionable character. And
this is what I'm saying, three baby

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daddies isn't exactly the problem. It's
the type of person she's associating with.

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Shari had a way of making any
man feel like he was the most important

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man in the world, and she
was able to make many men all feel

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that way at once. She could
juggle the men in her life at the

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bars and the online chat rooms better
than most circus performers. She found an

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outlet for her wild side in online
chat rooms. She could be whoever she

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wanted to be and say whatever she
wanted to say. But her life online

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didn't pay the bills. Ninety seven, she was twenty six years old and

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selling Mary Kay cosmetics, but needed
more work. She applied for a job

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working in the office at B and
D Salvage Yard. The owner, Bruce

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Miller, was kind and willing to
give Sharie a chance. He was twenty

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years her senior, but the two
started dating, which may explain why he

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hired her with zero experience. He
had money, he provided stability, and

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he liked her children. It seemed
like Chari may have finally found the prince

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in her fairy tale, and in
nineteen ninety nine they got married. But

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Cherie wasn't some helpless princess that needed
rescuing. Most people in town didn't know

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that she got married because she was
still frequenting the bars and flirting shamelessly with

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the men buying her drinks. While
she was working in her husband's office,

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she had plenty of time to get
on the computer and check in with her

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chat room romances. I'm from the
nineteen hundreds myself, and in the early

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days of the internet and chat rooms, we called these people men and women

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alike chat hose. And one of
the men that she started talking to was

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Jerry Cassaday. Cassaday was once a
cop with aspirations of joining the FBI.

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In his cop office, he exposed
an issue and then was shunned by his

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coworkers. He eventually quit the force, and he started drinking too much and

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his marriage crumbled. He was lonely, but found a new career as a

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pit boss at a casino in Reno. Cheri told her husband that Mary Kay

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was having a convention in Reno.
She planned a trip to go see him.

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Her face stayed flush the whole time
she was in Reno, but not

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from her Mary Kay blush. Cherie
and Cassaday had moved from an online romance

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to a full blown physical relationship.
He was absolutely crazy about her, and

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she filled his lonely nights with passion. Their whirlwind romance consisted of several actual

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visits and many many online chats.
She wasn't one that liked to be tied

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down, maybe fityly, but not
metaphorically. She could get divorced, but

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she needed Bruce Miller's money. Her
problem seemed to have resolved itself on November

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eighth, nineteen ninety nine, when
she found out that her husband had been

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killed at work. Bruce was late
coming home, and she called her brother

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in law and asked if he had
heard from him. He went to go

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check the office and found Bruce dead. He had been murdered, shot with

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a twenty gage shotgun. The police
had little to go on. They speculated

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what it looked like a robbery gone
bad, and the case went cold.

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Miller and Cherie had not even been
married a year. They were practically still

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newly wet. But while the family
was planning the funeral, Cherie was once

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again visiting the bars as Bruce Miller's
widow. She got the salvage yard,

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which she sold, got the money
in the bank accounts, some stocks he

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owned, and the cash from his
life insurance policy, and just two weeks

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after Bruce's death. Two weeks now, Cherie had a new boyfriend move in

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with her. This new boyfriend was
not Jerry Cassaday, so what happened to

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him? They seemed like teenagers in
love Romeo and Juliet fighting to be together

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against all odds. Cheri had ended
that relationship with Jerry almost immediately following her

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husband's death. Maybe it was guilt
over the affair. Maybe it was not

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wanting to be in another serious relationship
so soon. However, Jerry couldn't get

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past the love that he thought that
they shared. In February of two thousand,

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Jerry Cassaday was found dead in his
home. He committed suicide. They

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also found a briefcase under his bed. There was a note taped to the

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outside of the briefcase, addressed to
his parents, but what was inside was

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about to destroy the new life Schurie
had carefully constructed. At what point Cheri

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started to develop her plan is unclear, but she intricately spun a web of

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lies that pulled Jerry Cassaday right in
those ways she used to lure him.

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After they initially met, She sent
him a video of her pleasuring herself for

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him to watch whenever he missed her. Jerry wanted her to leave Bruce,

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but she told him that she couldn't
leave. Bruce was abusive and tied to

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the mafia. Now hold on,
it gets worse. She sent Jerry Cassaday

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a video of a sonogram and told
him that she was pregnant with his child.

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He was ecstatic, although that excitement
was soon replaced with rage when Cheri

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told him that her husband had raped
her until she lost the baby. She

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sent Cassaday pictures of bruses from fights
that they had. Then Cassaday started receiving

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emails from air Quotes Bruce. The
emails were cruel, taunting, and full

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of threats. Cassaday thought the safety
of Cherie's life was literally in his hands.

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He went to Flint, Michigan,
walked into Bruce's office, and he

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shot him and went back home,
waiting to hear that Cheri was safe and

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they could finally start their life together. But that call did not come.

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In fact, Schari wouldn't respond to
his emails or phone calls. Eventually,

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she told him that she was seeing
other people and that they were done.

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Jerry Cassaday must have been pretty confused. After all, Chari had asked him

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to kill her husband. Suri had
even planned the whole murder. Was he

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just a pawn in her twisted evil
game. Maybe that's when he started to

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discover the truth, the truth being
that Bruce Miller was actually a decent man.

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He helped Shari with her kids,
He didn't abuse her. She used

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makeup for the bruces and the pictures
that she sent to Jerry. He had

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not even sent the threatening emails.
Schari created a fake account and sent those

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emails, pretending to be Bruce to
Jerry. And she was never pregnant with

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his child. She had a tubal
ligation years before. He was devastated,

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maybe even racked with guilt, realizing
he had been played and tricked into murdering

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an innocent man. But when Cassaday
took his own life, he made arrangements

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to take Schari down with him.
In the briefcase, the police found videos,

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pictures, and copies of their online
conversations, more than enough to link

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Shari to the crime. In February
of two thousand, Shari Miller was arrested

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without bond. On December twenty second, the jury found her guilty of all

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charges. On January twenty ninth,
two thousand and one, a judge sentenced

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her to life in prison for the
conspiracy to commit murder and second degree murder,

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but in August of two thousand and
eight, a federal judge overturned the

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conviction and ordered a new trial,
stating that the suicide note from Cassaday should

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not have been entered in evidence since
he was dead and not available for cross

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examinations without Ouiji board. So on
July sixteenth, two thousand and nine,

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a federal judge ordered that Shari be
released from jail until her new trial.

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The prosecutor from Genesee County did not
agree with the disay decision and ordered that

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she be immediately arrested upon release from
the prison and brought back to the county

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jail. On July twenty second,
she was once again arraigned. The new

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trial was set to start in October. Cheri's attorneys filed an appeal and the

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trial was put on hold. Not
only did they manage to postpone the trial,

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but on July twenty ninth, she
was released on a one hundred thousand

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dollars recognisance bond. Chari was out
of jail, she visited with family and

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friends, planned to shower for her
pregnant daughter. Wrote to her son serving

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overseas, took photography classes, went
to counseling, and met other men both

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online and in bars. While she
was enjoying her freedom, the wheels of

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justice continued turning. On June twenty
first, twenty ten, the US Court

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of Appeals agreed that Cassaday's suicide note
was not admissible. On November fourteenth,

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twenty eleven, the U. S
Supreme Court vacated the Court of Appeal's decision

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and sent the case back to the
Sixth Court Circuit of Appeals. The Court

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of Appeals sent the case back to
the district court. It's all pretty confusing,

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but throughout the entire process, Shari
Miller maintained she was innocent and wrongfully

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accused, although once she returned to
prison, she wrote the judge a letter

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admitting her guilt to the murder.
Her letter sounded remorseful, she said,

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spending the last few years where her
family and friends had made her really realize

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which she took away from Bruce Miller
and his family. She admitted to manipulating

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Jerry Cassaday to kill her husband.
She even claimed that she always wanted to

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admit that she was guilty, but
that her lawyers would not let her as

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emotional as her letter may have seemed. On August twenty eighth, twenty seventeen,

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the judge denied Cheri's motion for relief
from the judgment. Not only that,

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her lawyer said that at no point
ever in life that she ever asked

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to plead guilty that would have actually
simplified the case, allowing her to just

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take a plea deal with a shorter
sentence. The story has been featured on

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multiple TV shows, including In Investigation, Discoveries, Deadly Women. A book

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called Fatal Error was written about the
case and turned into a movie. Even

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while in prison, Shari has continued
communicating with men. During the case,

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the prosecutor issued a public warning to
be careful when meeting people online. You

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never really know who you may be
talking to. That's ten minute murder for

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today, Brief and bingeable true crime. I'm Joe the host, and thank

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