Rights on Record (2026)

31/12/2025

He was a writer obsessed with anorexia, and he took the life of his lover.
Marco Mariolini, an antique dealer, authored a memoir called The Anorexic Hunter, in which he described a fetishistic obsession with anorexic and skeletal women, and even admitted in public that he feared he might one day be dangerous.
He met Monica Calò, a 29‑year‑old speech therapy student, and their relationship became deeply controlling and abusive, especially with food, body image, and diet choices. Arguments about her weight and appearance escalated.
In July 1998, after one fight, Mariolini st-bbed Monica 22 times, ending her life. He was later tried, convicted, and given a 30‑year sentence.

30/12/2025

In 2014, a quiet Wisconsin suburb was shaken by a case that seemed almost impossible to comprehend. Two 12-year-old girls, Anissa Weier and Morgan Geyser, convinced their friend Payton Leutner to walk with them into a wooded area. Once there, Payton was attacked and st*bbed 19 times. The motive, later revealed in court, was rooted in a shared obsession with the fictional internet character Slender Man, whom the girls believed they needed to impress.
Against overwhelming odds, Payton survived. Gravely injured, she managed to crawl out of the woods and reach a nearby road, where a passerby found her and called for help. She spent nearly a week in the hospital but ultimately made a remarkable physical recovery.
Both attackers were arrested shortly afterward. During the legal proceedings, experts testified that each girl was suffering from severe mental illness at the time of the attack. As a result, they were found not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect and committed to secure psychiatric institutions rather than prison. Morgan Geyser received a commitment of up to 40 years, while Anissa Weier received up to 25 years, both with periodic reviews based on treatment progress.
In September 2021, Anissa Weier was granted conditional release from the Winnebago Mental Health Institute under strict supervision, including GPS monitoring and mandatory outpatient psychiatric care. Two years later, in September 2023, the court approved the removal of her GPS monitor, citing compliance with treatment requirements.
The case remains one of the most disturbing examples of how untreated mental illness, combined with online fantasy, can lead to real-world violence — and it continues to be studied and debated years later.

29/12/2025

An 11-year-old boy lost his life while playing ding-dong ditch.
In August 2025, a group of kids in Houston, Texas, was playing a late-night doorbell prank ringing and running.
At one of the houses, 42-year-old Gonzalo Leon Jr. allegedly stepped outside and opened fire.
Jermani Brooks, 11 years old, was struck in the back while running away. He d-ed later that night at the hospital. Police say there was no threat, no confrontation, just a child playing a game.
Leon has been charged with m-rder. Officers later found around 20 guns inside his home.
One pull of the trigger turned a harmless prank into a tragedy no family should ever endure.

28/12/2025

She spent nearly 60 years inside an iron lung, and still managed to live with grace.
Dianne Odell was just three years old when polio paralyzed her from the neck down. From that day on, she lived inside a giant metal cylinder, a machine that breathed for her. She couldn't leave it. Not for a minute.
And yet, she lived. She got her high school diploma, took college courses by phone, wrote a children’s book using a voice-activated system. She never once complained.

In 2008, a power outage knocked out the generator that kept her iron lung running. Her family tried to pump air manually, but it wasn’t enough. She passed away quietly in her home at age 61.
She wasn't defined by the machine. She was defined by how she lived inside it, with strength, humor, and heart.

27/12/2025

They went for a walk on a warm February afternoon, and never came home.
On February 13, 2017, Abigail “Abby” Williams, 13, and Liberty “Libby” German, 14, set out on a hike along the Monon High Bridge Trail in Delphi, Indiana. When they didn’t return, a frantic search began. The next day, their bodies were found in a wooded area nearby, a scene investigators would later describe as “staged” and “deeply disturbing.”

Before her d-ath, Libby managed to record a man on her phone, a short clip that became one of the most chilling pieces of evidence in modern true crime history. The audio, released by police, captured a male voice instructing the girls: “Down the hill.” That brief phrase became synonymous with the case, sparking endless speculation and online sleuthing.
For years, the investigation seemed stalled. Then, in October 2022, police arrested Richard Allen, a 50-year-old CVS pharmacy worker from Delphi. Detectives linked him to the scene through ballistic evidence, a bullet found near the girls’ bodies matched a gun registered to Allen. Witnesses also recalled seeing him on the trail that afternoon.
Prosecutors allege Allen acted alone, describing the crime as “ritualistic” and “heinous.” His defense, however, argues that the evidence is circumstantial and claims his confessions were coerced. Allen’s attorneys have also alleged mistreatment in jail, describing him as being kept in solitary confinement under harsh conditions.
In a dramatic twist, court documents unsealed in 2023 revealed references to Norse and pagan ritual elements, claims that have since been disputed by prosecutors as defense “fiction.” The community of Delphi, a small town of just 3,000 residents, continues to grapple with the emotional scars of a case that has drawn worldwide attention.
As of late 2025, Richard Allen remains in custody, awaiting trial. The families of Abby and Libby, who have spent nearly a decade seeking justice, continue to attend hearings — often wearing purple, the girls’ favorite color.
For them, it’s not about the headlines or the viral audio clip. It’s about two young best friends whose story should have ended with laughter on a hiking trail, not in silence.

26/12/2025

In 2004, 23-year-old Florida teacher Debra Lafave was arrested after authorities discovered she had been involved in a s**ual relationship with her 14-year-old student.
The encounters, which occurred in her classroom and car, came to light when the boy confided in a friend, who went to the police. The story quickly exploded across national headlines — not only because of the crime, but because of Lafave’s looks. Her attorney’s claim that she was “too pretty for prison” ignited widespread outrage and debate over privilege and justice.
In 2005, Lafave pleaded guilty to two counts of lewd and lascivious battery. To spare the victim from testifying, prosecutors agreed to a plea deal: three years of house arrest and seven years of probation, with no prison time.
After her conviction, Lafave registered as a s*x offender and withdrew from public life. Years later, she spoke about her actions with remorse, saying she was struggling with mental illness at the time and would carry the consequences of her choices forever.

25/12/2025

She was only three months old when her life ended in one of the most horrifying crimes Ohio had ever seen.
In March 2015, police in Hamilton County responded to a quiet suburban home after a 911 call. Inside, they found baby Janiyah Watkins lifeless on a kitchen counter, the scene so disturbing that even seasoned officers struggled to speak about it. Her mother, Deasia Watkins, just 22 years old, had been battling severe mental illness and postpartum psychosis.
Only days earlier, child services had removed the baby from Deasia’s care, placing her in the custody of an aunt who was meant to keep them apart. But somehow, that morning, Deasia gained access to the home. What followed defied reason, an act of violence that authorities could barely describe.
In 2017, Watkins pleaded guilty to m-rder and was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. Her defense said she wasn’t herself, that she’d lost touch with reality and needed psychiatric help, not hatred.
For many, the case of baby Janiyah remains one of heartbreak more than horror, a tragedy born not just of violence, but of a system that saw the warning signs too late. And years later, the image of that quiet neighborhood still carries the echo of what happened behind closed doors.

24/12/2025

This photograph is the final known image of David A. Johnston, a USGS volcanologist, taken roughly 13 hours before he lost his life. On May 18, 1980, Johnston was stationed at a monitoring site about six miles from Mount St. Helens when the volcano erupted.
For months leading up to the disaster, scientists had been watching the mountain closely. After more than a century of quiet, Mount St. Helens began showing troubling signs in March: clusters of small quakes, fresh vents opening at the summit, and regular ash bursts. A swelling bulge on the northern flank — caused by rising magma pushing outward — became one of the most alarming indicators, and Johnston was part of the team tracking its growth.
The morning of May 18 appeared uneventful. Instruments showed nothing out of the ordinary, and the volcano looked stable. That changed instantly at 8:32 a.m., when a magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck beneath the mountain. The shaking triggered the largest landslide ever recorded, sending the entire north side of the volcano hurtling downhill at over 100 mph and violently displacing the waters of Spirit Lake.
The collapse uncorked a devastating sideways blast of superheated gas, ash, and rock — a lateral explosion that surged directly toward Johnston’s observation post. He radioed a final message before being overtaken by the eruption.
Johnston’s death remains one of the enduring reminders of the risks volcanologists face while trying to understand and monitor some of the most powerful forces on Earth.

23/12/2025

The crash that left Daniel Waterman paralyzed for months began with a text message and ended with a deliberate, deadly act on a Florida highway.
On February 9, 2025, 22-year-old Daniel Waterman was riding in a car driven by his girlfriend, 24-year-old Leigha Mumby, as they traveled along Interstate 95 in Flagler County. Earlier that day, Mumby had discovered she was pregnant. Tension rose sharply during the drive when Waterman received a message from a female friend in New York. According to investigators, the argument escalated so quickly that Waterman tried to get out of the moving vehicle.
An affidavit states that Mumby slowed to roughly 50 miles per hour as Waterman reached for the door, then suddenly accelerated to an estimated 80 to 90 miles per hour and steered straight off the roadway. There were no skid marks, no signs she attempted to brake. Waterman later told detectives — communicating through a letter board — that she had warned him moments before impact, “I don’t care what happens. You’ll get what you deserve.”
The crash left him with devastating injuries: a fractured cervical spine, a broken femur, a dislocated hip, severe lung trauma, and multiple other internal injuries. He slipped into a long coma, and when he eventually regained brief periods of awareness, he confirmed to authorities that the crash had been intentional.
Waterman fought for his life for eight months but di*d on October 8, 2025, from pneumonia linked to his injuries.
With his d*ath, prosecutors upgraded the charges against Mumby to vehicular homicide, adding to earlier counts of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and reckless driving causing serious bodily harm.

22/12/2025

He drove away from work, and was never seen again.
On June 23, 2021, 24‑year‑old geologist Daniel Robinson left his job site in Buckeye, Arizona, in his blue Jeep Renegade and vanished. The vehicle was later found rolled over in a ravine about three weeks later, with airbags deployed and many of his personal items left inside.
Daniel was born without his lower right arm, but that never stopped him from pursuing his work and passion. Investigators describe him as 5′8″, with black hair and brown eyes. His disappearance has sparked questions over what happened on that final day.

The scene where the Jeep was found raised suspicions of foul play. His family and a private investigator say the crash looked staged, pointing to strange data about the vehicle’s mileage and ignition use after the crash.

Despite searches covering dozens of square miles, forensic efforts, and constant pressure from his father, Daniel remains missing. His case is still open and the answers are still waiting.

21/12/2025

She waited until he was asleep, then dumped a bucket of boiling sugar-water over him.
That moment she poured a bucket of boiling sugar-water over him marked the end of one life and the shattering of another. In July 2021, 59-year-old Corinna Smith was found guilty of m*rdering her 80-year-old husband, Michael Baines, at their home in Neston, England.
The day before the attack, Corinna’s daughter accused Michael of s*xually ab*using both her and her late brother, Craig. Craig had lost his life to s*icide in 2007 after claiming the same. Although these allegations were never legally proven, Corinna believed them, and that belief consumed her.
Later that evening, Corinna filled a garden bucket with two kettles of boiling water and three bags of sugar, creating a thick, scalding solution designed to cause maximum harm. She then went to the bedroom she shared with Michael while he slept and poured the mixture over his body. He suffered burns covering approximately 36 % of his body, including a devastating injury to his right arm and hand.
Corinna admitted that she believed the abuse claims and connected them to Craig’s d*ath, but the court found she acted deliberately. In her sentencing remarks, the judge said the act “took away any opportunity for the allegations to be tested” and described the attack as “particularly nasty and calculated.”
The jury convicted Corinna of m*rder, and on July 9, 2021, she was given a life sentence, with a minimum term of 12 years before she becomes eligible for parole.
Her case remains a haunting example of how trauma, trauma-induced belief, and rage can collide — a story of father and mother and child lost, of accusations never tested and a life taken in response to a suspicion.

20/12/2025

In 2014, the d*ath of 18-year-old Conrad Roy in a Kmart parking lot in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, initially appeared to be a heartbreaking case of a young man lost to s*icide. But within weeks, investigators uncovered a digital trail that turned the tragedy into one of the most unsettling criminal cases of the decade.
Conrad had d*ed from carbon monoxide poisoning inside his truck, yet what made the case extraordinary was the discovery of hundreds of text messages between him and his then-girlfriend, 17-year-old Michelle Carter. The messages revealed a pattern of pressure and encouragement, with Carter repeatedly urging him to carry out the act and reassuring him when he hesitated. At one point, when Conrad stepped out of the truck in fear, Carter told him to “get back in,” a moment that became central to the prosecution’s argument.
Prosecutors described her behavior as calculated, noting that she researched methods of su***de and messaged friends afterward as though she were the shocked, grieving partner. Her defense argued she had been struggling with mental health issues herself, but the judge ultimately concluded that her words had played a direct, causal role in Conrad’s d*ath.
In 2017, Michelle Carter was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and later served a 15-month jail sentence. The case ignited national debate about digital communication, personal responsibility, coercion, and how far the law can extend into virtual conversations that influence real-world actions.

Rights on Record