Eighteen years after he worked as the assistant district attorney in the brutal kidnapping, sexual assault and murder of 5-year-old Samantha Runnion, David Brent still has every word from her mother’s victim impact statement stored in his phone.
As he read the words out loud to Gina Osborn and Tracy Miller during an upcoming episode of their podcast “Behind the Crime Scene,” they cried.
“We show our emotions,” Miller told Forensic. “We want [our guests] to feel the emotion we feel. What’s unique about us is we understand that emotion.”
Unique may be an understatement to describe the experience of the two hosts of the new Behind the Crime Scene podcast series. Miller has 23 years of trial experience as a prosecutor in Orange County, where she initiated and led the largest gang prevention program in the nation. At just 24 years old, she began her career as a law clerk for prosecutors Marcia Clark and Christopher Darden on the world-famous O.J. Simpson case—which is episode 3 of the podcast.
Osborn is a retired FBI special agent with 22 years of experience under her belt. While at the FBI, she led investigations into Asian Organized Crime in Orange County and supervised counterterrorism investigations in Southeast Asia. She became the go-to for computer forensics, establishing the FBI computer forensics lab in Orange County—the one that would become the center of conflict between the FBI and Apple during the 2015 San Bernardino terrorist case.
Behind the Crime Scene, launched in April, explores the human side of first responders, investigators and prosecutors. Each episode details a notorious case that either the women worked on personally, or they know/worked with the guest.
“When we created the format for the show, we were very strict,” Osborn told Forensic. “We wanted to interview first responders, investigators or prosecutors and tell their stories. It had to be a case where they were haunted by it—a significant case with a lesson that impacted them that they wanted to share. We’re trying to humanize law enforcement and I think that’s important, especially now.”
The first episode of the series—Rescuing the Boy in the Bunker—details the 2013 kidnapping of 5-year-old Ethan, who was snatched off a school bus by Jimmy Lee Dykes. Dykes, who shot and killed the bus driver, held Ethan in an underground bunker for six days. Podcast guest Michael Osborn, retired FBI Assistant Special Agent in Charge, speaks about the tense days from beginning to end of the hostage situation, including negotiating the delivery of Ethan’s daily medicine, coloring books, food and toys.
“It was an interesting case where law enforcement came together to rescue the boy,” Osborn said. “For the first episode, we wanted to do something that related to crimes against children because both Tracy and I worked those types of cases.”
In the second episode, attorney Marc Greenberg discusses the shooting of California Highway Patrol officer Don Burt. During a routine traffic stop, Burt pulled over Vietnamese gangster Hung Mai, who then shot him seven times.
“Gina and I both know people who were at the scene afterward that knew the officer and they are still very impacted,” Miller said. “That’s what the podcast is about. What still haunts them about the case? Because those are the beautiful stories. The stories of human perseverance; the stories of how involved our prosecutors, first responders and detectives become in these cases.”
Other episodes in Behind the Crime Scene focus on the 2015 San Bernardino terrorist attack, the 2006 MySpace cyberbullying trial, and more. A new episode is released every Tuesday morning, with a bonus episode and a week break after every 5 episodes. There are currently 7 episodes available with the next airing on Tuesday, June 16. You can subscribe to Behind the Crime Scene wherever you listen to podcasts, including Spotify and Apple.
“Even people who aren’t in the field can relate,” Osborn said. “Everyone has a struggle they are overcoming. Everyone has challenges in their life. That’s what we are trying to tell people. You can relate because law enforcement is just like anyone else, trying to do their job.”
Photo: Behind the Crime Science podcast hosts Gina Osborn (left) and Tracy Miller (right).