'Over My Dead Body': The No. 1 Apple iTunes podcast focuses on Dan Markel murder case
The story of Dan Markel’s life, both professionally and personally, and his untimely murder in his Tallahassee garage is coming to the ears of true crime buffs across the world through a popular, new podcast.
“Over My Dead Body” is the latest in a line of successful audio stories by Wondry. It details the Markel case and looks at the possible motives for the Florida State law professor’s July 2014 shooting which Tallahassee Police say was a murder-for-hire plot orchestrated by the family of his ex-wife Wendi Adelson.
The podcast started Feb. 14. After three of six episodes have aired, it remains the number one Apple iTunes podcast.
Host Matt Shaer and co-writer Eric Benson spent years locating and interviewing people connected to the case, Adelson and Markel, including his parents, his ex-wife’s brother Rob Adelson and friends of the former couple.
The Tallahassee Democrat’s crime and courts reporter Karl Etters is in several episodes detailing the police’s two-year search for clues and suspects before an arrest was made in May 2016 when career criminal Sigfredo Garcia was arrested at a Hallandale Beach, Florida gas station.
More on the Dan Markel murder case
- Dan Markel's parents hoping for more arrests four years after his murder
- Defense attorney: New charges in Markel case 'mere speculation'
- Rivera: 'We were coming up here to kill somebody'
- Police: Magbanua was 'conduit' in Markel slaying
- Markel, Adelson sparred up to the end
That set off a cascade of accusations in which investigators say Wendi Adelson’s family, primarily her brother Charlie Adelson and mother Donna Adelson, enlisted Garcia to kill Markel in the fallout from the couple’s acrimonious divorce.
No one in the Adelson family has been arrested in connection with the murder and have denied any involvement through their attorneys.
Luis Rivera, a Miami-area gang boss was also arrested in connection with the murder and turned state’s witness in exchange for a 19 year prison sentence to run concurrently with 12 years he is serving on an unrelated charge.
His testimony led to the Oct. 2016 arrest of Garcia’s girlfriend Katherine Magbanua, who was also dating Charlie Adelson and working at the family’s Tamarac dentistry institute, as the suspected link between the family and the killers.
She is suspected of running communication between Garcia and the family and orchestrating the payout of $100,000.
Garcia and Magbanua have both pleaded not guilty to counts of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder and solicitation to commit murder. Their attorneys maintain they are innocent.
They are set to stand trial June 3.
Contact Karl Etters at ketters@tallahassee.com or @KarlEtters on Twitter