Beyond Betrayal | The Making of 'The Crimes of Margo Freshwater'
Betrayal Weekly
iHeartPodcasts | Glass Podcasts
4.2 • 8.5K Ratings
🗓️ 10 February 2026
⏱️ 30 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Curious about what it really takes to unravel a decades-old fugitive story? Andrea sits down with Cooper Moll, host and reporter of Glass Podcasts and Sony Music Entertainment's new series The Crimes of Margo Freshwater, for an in-depth conversation about the making of the show.
They dive into the behind-the-scenes challenges of tracking down Tonya McCartor, formerly known as Margo Freshwater, securing her first-ever interview, navigating the moral gray areas of reinvention and guilt, and turning a true crime story into a nuanced, human-centered narrative. Cooper shares unexpected twists from the reporting process and why this tale of identity, deception, and second chances hits so close to home for the Betrayal community.
If you haven’t listened yet, binge The Crimes of Margo Freshwater now. It’s an original from Glass Podcasts and Sony Music Entertainment, with episodes available on The Binge, exclusively on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart, or wherever you get your podcasts. Listen to The Crimes of Margo Freshwater here.
For more from Andrea and the team, email us at betrayalpod@gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. I have the incredible Cooper Mall here with me today to talk |
| 0:09.2 | about the crimes of Margo Freshwater. Cooper, thank you for joining me today. Thanks for having me, |
| 0:15.7 | I want to talk a little bit about your new project, Glass Podcasts, New Project, The Crimes of |
| 0:22.0 | Margot Freshwater, because we both had our hand in it in one way or the other, but it's something |
| 0:27.4 | that I feel like we've dedicated a lot of time to. And I just am excited to share a little bit |
| 0:34.7 | about the story with the betrayal audience. For people that don't know, this is a story |
| 0:39.2 | about a set of circumstances that led a woman to go to Tennessee and meet somebody that resulted |
| 0:48.5 | in a crime spree, a murder spree, and a number of people ended up dead. |
| 0:54.8 | And so it's a complicated thing to approach because there are people that lost their lives. |
| 0:59.8 | Walk me through because this story was something that at glass we were developing for like |
| 1:05.2 | a few years. |
| 1:06.0 | It was always percolating in the background. |
| 1:08.0 | There was something gravitating me, my colleague Ben, my colleague |
| 1:12.2 | Carrie towards Tanya, A.K. Margo. When you came onto it, you were meeting this material with |
| 1:19.7 | like fresh eyes, like new, like you didn't know much about it. So tell me what it was like to |
| 1:25.4 | interact with the story for the first time and what stood out |
| 1:29.1 | to you that made you think I need to be part of this. |
| 1:31.6 | I think for me, I've always been interested in double lives or people who have to create |
| 1:38.7 | another identity. |
| 1:40.9 | And not always because they're being malicious or they're being deceitful, but out of necessity. |
| 1:47.8 | And I've always been interested in the psychological toll of that. |
| 1:53.6 | I mean, what is it like to keep up with all of the stories and lies and all of the different things? |
... |
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