Hey guys, before we start today's episode, we wanted to give you a friendly but important trigger warning.

Today's episode includes a handful of relevant details that have to do with child abuse.

We know you're here's true crime listeners, so a lot of this is par for the course, but when it comes to children, we want to be extra cautious for anyone who may have experienced something traumatic on either side of these heartbreaking stories.

For more information on child abuse awareness and how to report child abuse, if you or someone you know has experienced it,

please check out the show description for links and more information.

Thank you. I'm Well, welcome to shaking and disturbed.

I'm Darren Karp.

And coming down the aisle with his backwards hat and tennis hair, we've got John Mother bleeping Thresher on. Yeah. There we go. Wow. What did you think of the intro? I love that. You know what? That just made me sad a little bit. Let me tell you why. Because you're not going to be in New York to see my game show with Darren and you're an asshole. Oh, sorry, did I interrupt? Is that one? No, I can't. I know. It's on Friday. Well, the reason is, I call the worst. Let me, there, I have a thousand thoughts. The first thought, because I thought maybe I could get my Christmas gift. No, it's April. So why would I have a Christmas gift at April? That's ridiculous. I have your Christmas gift right here and that was the plan. But let me say this. It made me sad because it just reminded me of our live shows and we haven't done one in a long time. We're overdue. We should really do something small in New York, like just a cute little get together or something. Number two. I would love to, but you have to be here for that. Well, I'm ready to announce the reason that I can't be there.

Here we go. little get together or something. Number two. I would love to, but you have to be here for that. Well, I'm ready to announce the reason that I can't be there. I didn't want to say it on the show because I didn't want him to hear this. But I surprised my best friend and entered us in a pickleball tournament for his birthday. The friend that you inspired me to get the paddle for, Johnny, who you've met at my... Jaybone? The other Jaybone? Yeah. Okay. And I couldn't tell anybody because I didn't want him to hear it or to get back to him because a lot of my friends actually do listen to the show. So we're recording earlier in the week and I just wanted to surprise him. So that's where I'll be this weekend. Of course,

it's the one weekend I was hoping to come see you, but it'll be a memorable experience with Johnny.

I'm excited to do that with him. Well, obviously, you guys, if you listened to our NMR earlier

in this week, you know why we recorded earlier this week for NMR. And then we just thought,

let's do our episode early. So, you know, we decided that. But, John, before we get into this week's case, are you imbibing? I'm not imbibing this week only. Okay. This is a shout out to everyone who doesn't drink on the show. to be completely fair with you, like we said we're recording earlier in the week, and I didn't prepare a drink for this week's episode. So, yeah, tonight I'm not. But that's okay. What are you drinking? Anything? Where are you, by the way? I'm still in Los Angeles. I come home later this week. So by the time this episode comes out, hopefully we'll be back safely in New York City. But for NMR, I was in Los Angeles. Because it's a little bit earlier the week, and we're coming off a little bit of an Oscars poll. I am also not drinking today. I have my steady smart water. Hopefully this will make me a better podcaster.

But, you know, I need to be sobs for this case because there's kind of, there's interesting nuances to it.

There are.

Should we just go right into it right now?

Let's do it.

Let's do it.

You guys listening, crack open your drink and here we go.

So Melissa Lucio grew up in a Mexican-American household in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas. You know what's funny? Before we started the show, I was like, is it Rio Grande or Rio Grande? And I was thinking of- I thought it was Rio Grande. I almost just asked you about that. Then I was like, am I dumb? Well, it's- Maybe it's not going to be being dumb. I'm just No, no. It's, yeah, we're not from Texas, so, but I was thinking

it's... Maybe it's not going to be being dumb. I'm just... No, no.

It's...

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