Journey Into Darkness: The Stayner Brothers Part 2

True Crime Campfire

True Crime, Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 6 December 2024

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

When we left you at the end of Part 1, fourteen year old Steven Stayner had escaped from seven years of captivity and abuse at the hands of child predator Kenneth Parnell—and he’d rescued Parnell’s next intended victim, a little boy named Timmy White. The story made international headlines, and Steven Stayner became his hometown’s living legend. It was March 1980, both boys were back home safe and Kenneth Parnell was behind bars where he belonged, waiting to go to trial. It seemed like a happy ending. But the story doesn’t end there. The second half of the Stayner saga is even darker than the first. Justice is denied. Secrets come to light. And another member of the family lets his most depraved fantasies cross over to real life.

Big thanks to Mike Moran of the podcast Confessional with Mike Moran for doing much of the work/research on this one and last week's!

Sources:
Wikipedia: Cary Stayner
A&E's American Justice, episode The Yosemite Killer
The Crime Reel: Part 2 of The Troubled Lives of the Stayner Brothers
Casefile (podcast): Yosemite Sightseer Murders Parts 1 and 2
CBS News: The Yosemite Murders
SF Gate: https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/defense-to-fight-for-stayner-s-life-lawyers-2820211.php

Follow us, campers!
Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfire
https://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/
Facebook: True Crime Campfire
Instagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079
Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfire
Email: [email protected]
MERCH! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello, campers, grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire. We're your camp counselors. I'm Katie. And I'm Whitney. And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction. We're roasting murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire.
0:20.2	When we left you at the end of part one, 14-year-old Stephen Stainer had escaped from seven years of captivity and abuse at the hands of child predator Kenneth Parnell.
0:30.7	And he'd rescued Parnell's next intended victim, a little boy named Timmy White.
0:35.6	The story made international headlines, and Stephen Stainer became his hometown's living legend.
0:41.7	It was March 1980. Both boys were back home safe, and Kenneth Parnell was behind bars where he belonged, waiting to go to trial.
0:49.8	It seemed like a happy ending. But the story doesn't end there. The second half of the Stainer
0:55.6	saga is even darker than the first. Justice is denied. Secrets come to light. And another
1:02.7	member of the family lets his most depraved fantasies cross over into real life. This is Journey
1:09.2	Into Darkness, the Stainer Saga, Part 2.
1:12.0	If you listen to last week's episode, the Kenneth Parnell case seems pretty open and shut.
1:29.0	What defense could Parnell possibly try?
1:31.5	Like, oh, I just slipped and accidentally kidnapped two kids.
1:35.2	Hate when that happens.
1:37.1	And yet, when Parnell first went to trial in 1981, he pled not guilty.
1:42.6	Granted, he did have at least one advocate, his mom, who argued that he had to be
1:47.0	innocent because he visited her all the time and he'd never brought along a child. Well, mom has
1:52.8	spoken, case closed. The kidnapping cases of Timothy White and Stephen Stainer were to be tried
1:59.3	separately with Timmy's up first,
2:01.7	and because Stephen's classmate Sean Porman had helped Parnell grab Timmy, he'd be tried
2:06.2	alongside him. Early on, it was unclear how much Stephen was going to cooperate with the
2:11.3	prosecution in Timmy's case. Though his trial was scheduled for later, they did need him to
2:16.2	explain to the jury exactly why Parnell had kidnapped both boys.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from True Crime Campfire, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of True Crime Campfire and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.