Rob Rinder’s Interrogation Secrets takes a unique look at the battle of wits between police and suspects in some of the most disturbing US and UK criminal cases of recent years. Criminal barrister and television personality, Robert Rinder, and a team of experts analyse police interviews. In each of these, the skilled work of detectives was key to cracking the case and securing a conviction.
With Rob as the expert guide, retired senior detectives from the U.S. and the UK, forensic and criminal psychologists, and body language experts examine the original police footage of interrogations at the heart of each case, to reveal the 'tricks of the trade' used to extract a confession and the tell-tale signs that a suspect is lying.
Episode 1: Melissa Huckaby
In the first episode, Rinder guides us through the case of a bipolar Sunday school teacher Melissa Huckaby, who was accused of the sexual assault and murder of Sandra Cantu.
Huckaby worked at the local church where her grandfather was the Baptist Minister. Her daughter was friends with eight-year-old Sandra at the time, and they often played together at Huckaby’s house in the same trailer park where Sandra lived.
On 27th March 2009, Huckaby drugged Sandra with prescription pills and then strangled her to death with a torn rag. This shocking crime gained national attention and kicked off a ten-day search for missing Sandra that sadly led to the discovery of her body inside Huckaby’s suitcase in a local irrigation pond.
Initially, police searched for a man based on details from the FBI’s profile of the suspect. But it soon became clear that Huckaby was involved when she reported that her suitcase, which was later found containing Sandra’s corpse, had been stolen and that she had found a note containing clues leading the police to Sandra’s body. Huckaby became the prime suspect in the case.
Episode 2: Diane and Rachel Staudte
The second episode examines the notorious 'antifreeze murders' that took place in 2012. Diane and Rachel Staudte murdered two members of their family and attempted to kill a third before police got involved.
Diane despised her husband and had deep hatred towards her children who she felt had become financial burdens to her. She came up with her murderous plan and involved her favourite daughter Rachel. The pair began spiking the drinks of their immediate family members with antifreeze.
Diane’s husband Mark was the first to perish at the age of 61 after suffering 'flu-like symptoms'. Just six months later, Diane’s son Shaun also passed away in similar circumstances.
Police were alerted to the suspicious deaths by an anonymous tip-off and were able to intervene before Diane's eldest daughter Sarah could be killed too. However, she had already been dosed with antifreeze and while she ultimately survived the attempt on her life, she was left with physical and neurological damage.
Episode 3: Cheyanne Jessie
In the third episode, Rinder examines the case of double-murderer Cheyanne Jessie. On 1st August 2015, police received a call from Cheyanne Jessie in which she claimed her father Mark Weekly, and daughter Meredith were missing. But police would soon find out that this was not just a missing persons case and that the pair had been murdered a couple of weeks prior.
Jessie felt her father and daughter were problematic in her disintegrating relationship with her boyfriend Matthew 'Cody' Munroe, so she repeatedly stabbed them both multiple times and shot them in the head. She left the bodies for four days before hiding them in plastic storage bins in a neighbour’s shed, and only called the police approximately two weeks after the murders. Police arrested her less than 24 hours after she made the phone call.
Episode 4: Marvin Williams
In the fourth episode, Rinder examines the murder of Cassandra Valentin by her fiancé Marvin Williams. Williams and Valentin had begun dating in 2004 but their relationship quickly became violent, and Valentin filed a number of domestic violence injunctions against Williams over the years.
In 2013, he was sentenced to four years in prison but was released again in 2016 and the pair resumed their relationship. On 21st January 2018, Valentin was found in her home having been stabbed multiple times in her neck and stomach. Emergency services found her lying on the floor in the hallway, with a broken piece of the knife blade still in her neck.
On the day after the murder, Williams left a voicemail for his sister that indicated he had killed his girlfriend, and he immediately became the prime suspect.
Episode 5: Lee Rodarte Jnr
In the fifth episode, Lee Rodarte Jnr, a chef at The Bonefish Grill in Jacksonville, Florida, murdered his colleague and ex-lover Savannah Gold.
As Rodarte and Gold worked together and he was effectively her manager, they had a secret relationship that was prohibited by workplace rules. Rodarte was angry that Gold was telling colleagues about the relationship and causing problems in his current relationship, so he met with her in the back of his car in the restaurant parking lot and strangled her to death. He then dismembered her and attempted to burn her body.
Savannah’s mother Sharon Gold reported her daughter missing shortly after, and Rodarte, pretending to be innocent, helped to hand out missing flyers. Detectives soon discovered that he had been one of the last people to see her alive, and began to question him.
