True Crime: DECODED with Scott Rolle

Charles Manson, Part 2: The Trial, The Motive, and The Verdict

In this episode, Scott Rolle and Jersey Joe go deeper into the prosecution's strategy, the courtroom chaos, and whether Charles Manson would survive a trial today. They break down the credibility of witnesses who were themselves killers, the Helter Skelter theory that convicted him, and the death sentences that somehow never got carried out. Over fifty years later, the debate over guilt, motive, and justice is still very much alive.

Charles Manson, Part 1: The Murders That Terrified a City

In this episode, Scott Rolle is joined by attorney, writer, and conspiracy theorist Joe Racioppi, aka Jersey Joe, to decode one of the most infamous criminal cases in American history. Seven people were slaughtered across two nights in Los Angeles in August 1969, and the man who became synonymous with the killings never laid a hand on any of them. Scott and Jersey Joe dig into the competing motive theories, the unlikely connections that tied Manson to the victims, and the question that still haunts the case: would a jury today, armed with modern forensic standards, ever convict a man who never pulled a trigger?

D.B. Cooper, Part 2: The Suspect Who Got Away

In this episode, Scott Rolle and Buddy Levy pick up where they left off, digging deeper into the case for Kenny Christiansen as D.B. Cooper. They examine the potential accomplice hiding in plain sight, the missing cigarette evidence that could have cracked the case wide open, and why the FBI's reasons for ruling Christiansen out may not hold up to scrutiny. With the case now officially inactive, did law enforcement ever truly give their strongest suspect a serious look? And does the perfect crime only work if someone was waiting on the ground?

D.B. Cooper, Part 1: The Hijacker Who Vanished

In this episode, Scott Rolle is joined by Buddy Levy, his co-star from the History Channel's Brad Meltzer's DECODED, to revisit the only unsolved skyjacking in American history. On Thanksgiving Eve 1971, a man calling himself Dan Cooper boarded a Northwest Orient Airlines flight, handed a stewardess a bomb threat note, collected $200,000 and four parachutes, and leaped into the night sky over the Pacific Northwest without a trace. Scott and Buddy break down the crime itself, the airport security lapses that made it possible, and the circumstantial case building against their top suspect, Kenny Christiansen. From a hidden stash of cash and a suspiciously well-timed home purchase to a deathbed secret and a hidden compartment in the attic, does the evidence finally point to D.B. Cooper's true identity?

The Lindbergh Kidnapping, Part 3: Was Bruno Hauptmann Guilty?

In this final episode investigating the Charles Lindbergh case, Scott Rolle is joined again by special guest Joseph Racioppi, aka Jersey Joe, an expert on the Lindbergh kidnapping case, to explore the trial of Bruno Hauptmann. Did the evidence truly prove he built the ladder and wrote the ransom notes? Or was the wrong man executed? We analyze the wood evidence, handwriting claims, and the theory that Charles Lindbergh himself may have been involved.