S21 Ep14: In Public Record: A Journey To The Truth of a M*rder and Trial w/Michael Kelly
Darkness Radio
Darkness Radio
4.7 • 3.2K Ratings
🗓️ 3 February 2026
⏱️ 140 minutes
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Summary
True Crime Tuesday Presents: In Public Record: A Journey To The Truth of a Murder and Trial with Former Police Officer/ Author, Michael Kelly
September 1990. In Shaker Heights, Ohio, teenage honors student Lisa Lee Pruett vanishes into the night. A boy calls 911 when she does not arrive for a secret late-night meet-up. Police soon find her nearby, stabbed to death and left exposed. Lisa had just passed an important test and earned her driver's license. She was a Girl Scout, athlete, musician, and lover of poetry. Then her life was cut short.
Investigators quickly focused on a troubled young man who lived a few blocks away. His name leaked, the media swarmed, and the case became a spectacle. Two years later, he was indicted on controversial testimony, tried under national attention, and ultimately acquitted. His life never recovered.
Decades later, the murder remains unsolved.
Now a former police officer reopens the trail, determined to separate rumor from evidence and find the truth, if it is still there to be found.
On Today's TCT, we talk with Author, Michael Kelly about why he went after this cold case, some of the challenges he experienced while investigating this case. The evidence left behind by the original investigators, and we talk about what famous professional wrestler played a huge part in breaking this case wide open!
Get your copy of "In Public Record..." here: https://bit.ly/3ZRnRpO
PLUS DUMB CRIMES AND STUPID CRIMINALS! WITH JESSICA FREEBURG!
A Mom is arrested after her 19 month old baby is flung out of the car they are travelling in, onto the road, in the middle of the intersection... AND MIRACULOUSLY SURVIVES! See the video here: https://bit.ly/3OjeKvC
Check out Jessica Freeburg's website and order her new books: https://jessicafreeburg.com/books/
and check out Jess on Tik Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@jessicafreeburgwrites
There are new and different (and really cool) items all the time in the Darkness Radio Online store at our website! . check out the Darkness Radio Store! https://www.darknessradioshow.com/store/
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome into the Bestin True Crime Podcasting. This is True Crime Tuesday. I'm your host, Tim Dennis. |
| 0:27.1 | Great show today, folks. Jessica Freeberger on the way with dumb crime, stupid criminals. But first, I want to talk to a little bit about cold cases. You know, it's always assuming that a cold case is never a cold case, |
| 0:42.7 | and you can always reopen it, you can always get back into it, and maybe we can always solve those cold cases. Well, I want to talk to you a little bit today about frustration, about how sometimes a cold case |
| 0:48.1 | just stays a cold case. You say, well, Tim, is that always the case? Well, today we're going to talk with our guest, Michael Kelly, about his new book called In Public Record, |
| 0:59.5 | A Journey to the Truth of a Murder and Trial. |
| 1:03.0 | A wonderful book that's out there right now by Wild Blue Press. |
| 1:07.0 | We'll talk about a certain case in Shaker Heights, Ohio. |
| 1:15.6 | That has been a cold case for a long, long time, September of 1990 to be exact. |
| 1:24.7 | And why this case is a particularly tough nut to crack and why he of all people tried to give it a shot. |
| 1:31.9 | Michael Kelly is a graduate of Youngstown State University and the YSU Basic Peace Officer Training Academy. |
| 1:37.4 | He's a former full-time police officer with numerous training certificates and evidence and investigation. |
| 1:41.2 | He now works in the gaming industry and lives in Northeast Ohio. |
| 2:00.8 | So, ladies and gentlemen, let's welcome in for the first time to True Crime Tuesday, Michael Kelly. Michael, how you doing? Good, good. Thank you for having me, Tim. Thank you, everybody. Thank you for being here. Love this book. I got to tell you, first of all, I love this book. And I love, first of all, you've got to be one of the most tenacious people I've ever met. First of all, I got to tell you that. |
| 2:03.3 | I hope that's not true, but... |
| 2:05.3 | I tell you, it takes... |
| 2:06.6 | In this case, I couldn't give up. |
| 2:10.0 | Tell me, tell me why, first of all. |
| 2:12.0 | Tell me what was it about it? |
| 2:13.8 | You know, because I'll tell you, I get inspired by certain things, right? |
| 2:35.3 | I can read something, I can see something, get inspiration. And I think most of us do this. We'll watch something on television. We'll read something and go, you know what, I'm going for it. And then we can run out of steam quick. You know, it's just like, yeah, I don't think I'm getting off the couch for that. |
| 2:37.1 | But you went a little bit further. |
| 2:40.5 | Tell us what it was that inspired you to go after this case. |
... |
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