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This is Shattered Souls. I'm your host, Karen Smith. This podcast contains graphic language and is not suitable for children.

Welcome to Shattered Souls. This is Episode 1. I chose this case for the first episode for a few reasons. It was the first time that I took a case home.

I was talking to my former lieutenant about a month ago and she mentioned this case out of the blue because it affected her really hard as well. I had no idea.

It was a really difficult case on a number of levels.

I guess I should tell you first of all, in the fallout from this case, it was the first time that I had a real visceral reaction.

And that happened in the form of a nightmare, the night of the crime scene. I went home. It was late at night and I had to grab a couple of hours of sleep before I went back in the morning.

I finally found sleep in the wee hours. I couldn't get to sleep. I was restless. My brain was racing. So I put a comedy DVD into the player and hoping that that would help.

I guess it did. I finally fell asleep. But a short time later, I woke with a start and I instinctively kicked an imaginary person off the mattress.

And I was extraordinarily nauseous and I threw the covers off and I ran to the bathroom and got sick. And as I was holding my hair back, I came to the realization that I was home.

It was in the middle of the night. I wasn't back at the crime scene. I wasn't back in the autopsy suite. I was safe.

In this nightmare, I'm back in the autopsy suite. And I can hear and see the silver tools clanking in the sink, the flows of blood going down the drain and the autopsy is taking place.

And everything is exactly as it was the day before. A shiny liver is thrown into a scale and the weight is notated on a dry erase board.

And all of the things that normally happened during an autopsy are going on. And I sort of walk across the room and lean against this fairly clean spot on the counter. And I meet my coworker there.

And as I'm talking with him and having some mindless banter, I looked across the room and I see my victim's body laying there on a cold steel table.

Her body is just stark white and her hair is combed back and her lips are parted in a half smile. I started taking some notes and in my peripheral in my dream, I watch as her head snaps to the right.

And I caught her eyes and she's looking right at me. And blood starts to flow from all of her wounds and her teeth unstick from her lips. And she gurgles at me. Please help me.

And that's when I wake up and that's when I ran to the bathroom. So it was a really horrible scary dream. And it's the same one that replaced itself over and over again. And I never know when to expect it.

Back in real time in my bathroom, I grabbed a towel off the rack and I wadded it into a ball and I sat there rocking on the edge of the shower, just wondering what in the hell was going on.

Why was this homicide affecting me so strangely? This had never happened before and I'd worked dozens and dozens of murders, but I'd never taken one home like this before.

So it was a little bit of cause for concern, but I had a job to do. So I finally fell asleep for maybe another hour and a half and I woke up and I had to finish my job.

But ever since then, I never know when this nightmare is going to creep up on me again. It's happened. Oh my god, countless times. And it's always the same. And it always scares the shit out of me.

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