The Trail Went Cold - Episode 159 - Charles Southern

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

True Crime, Tv & Film

4.5 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 29 January 2020

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

December 1, 1987. Chicago, Illinois. While speaking with his mother on the phone, 39-year old Charles Southern shares his plans about taking a trip to India. After not hearing from him for weeks, Charles’ parents check his house and discover he is missing, but they find what appears to be a Last Will and Testament naming a woman named Terri Hoffman as executor of Charles’ estate. Hoffman is the founder of a new religious movement Charles had joined called “Conscious Development of Body, Mind and Soul”, but they are accused of functioning like a cult and over the course of several years, a number of people associated with them would die under suspicious circumstances. Was Conscious Development responsible for Charles Southern’s disappearance? This week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold” not only covers an unsolved missing persons case, but also explores the story of a bizarre cult and their potential culpability in several deaths. Special thanks to listener Carolina Young for providing the opening narration on this episode. Additional Reading: https://unsolved.com/gallery/charles-southern/ http://charleyproject.org/case/charles-southern-jr https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terri_Hoffman “Texas Monthly” Vol. 18, No. 5 (May 1990) http://www.dmagazine.com/publications/d-magazine/1990/march/the-aura-of-murder/ http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19900304&slug=1059149 “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon! Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

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0:00.0	December 1st, 1987, Chicago, Illinois.
0:05.0	While speaking with his mother on the phone, 39 years old Charles Sutton,
0:10.0	cherished his plans to take a trip to India.
0:13.0	After not hearing from him for weeks, Charles's parents check his house and
0:18.0	discorded his mission, but they found what appears to be a last wheel and testament where Charles names a woman named Terry
0:26.2	Huffman as the executor of his state.
0:30.6	Huffman runs a spiritual movement called Conscious Development, a call-like organization with Charles had joined.
0:38.0	While several people associated with Huffman will die under suspicious circumstances over the years.
0:44.8	She's not charged with any of their debts, and Charles Sudden is never found.
0:50.5	After that, the trail went cold. Oh, uh, uh, uh, uh, right, uh, uh, right, uh, and uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, yeah. Oh, uh, uh,
1:14.0	uh,
1:15.0	and uh, and uh, uh, uh,
1:18.0	uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, Hello everyone and welcome to our latest episode of the Trail Went Cold.
1:34.0	I'm your host Robin Warder and we've got an unusual missing persons case to cover today.
1:39.5	The 1987 disappearance of Charles Southern.
1:43.0	That voice you just heard narrating our intro was Carolina Young,
1:47.0	the winner of our most recent Trail went Cold listener voiceover contest,
1:51.0	so thank you very much Carolina this is a recurring monthly
1:54.8	contest which we've been doing for over two years now and if you would like to
1:58.8	enter I will be providing instructions for how to do so near the end of this episode.
2:04.0	Anyway, this story is going to stretch far beyond your typical missing persons case
2:09.0	and delve into a topic which has not received too much coverage on this podcast,
	...

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