'A Longer, Deeper Look At What Happens Inside A Police Investigation': 'Break In The Case' Podcast Highlights Work Of NYPD
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - The newest true crime podcast hits close to home.
"Break in the Case" highlights the work of the NYPD.
LINK: Break in the Case podcast
CBSN New York's Jessica Moore went to their Brooklyn studio where she found sometimes truth is more compelling than fiction.
In the NYPD's new true crime podcast, stories are ripped straight from the department's cold case files and are told by the people who lived them.
The first season of the podcast focuses on the Baby Hope case. On July 23, 1991 three men walking in the park below the Henry Hudson bridge. One man, construction worker Joe Rizzo, found the body of 4-year-old Anjelica Castillo in a cooler. Detectives nicknamed her "Baby Hope." Five episodes explore the Baby Hope story in intimate detail.
"We said 'Let's go down and look.' I had shovel and I popped it open. Filled with maggots. To this day, I still don't know why I tipped it over- plastic bag came out... I cut bag open, I don't know why," Rizzo says in the podcast.
Web Extra: Creators Of "Break in the Case" speak about podcast
"Why a podcast?" CBSN New York's Jessica Moore asked.
"People listen," said Edward Conlon, a New York Times bestselling author and retired NYPD officer, who serves as the podcast's reporter and narrator. "This is a longer, deeper, slower look at what happens inside a police investigation. What cops can do, what they can't do, what they can try and what works, what doesn't, and how you just keep going."
"We hear about true crime podcasts a lot. Some are sensational, some are quite graphic. As I understand it you're trying to maintain the integrity of the investigation and talk to the people involved," Moore asked.
"Yeah. It's intimate but respectful. These detectives are giving their reactions. They're people with kids of their own, which is why this particular case affected them so deeply and why it stayed with them even after they left that precinct," Conlon said.
For 20 years, detectives struggled with the Baby Hope case, until one day, police got a tip on that changed everything. That anonymous tip eventually led police to the accused killer, the baby's cousin Conrado Juarez, who confessed he sexually assaulted Baby Hope and dumped her body.
Juarez remains in prison, charged with murder.
While the Baby Hope case was solved, others remain a mystery, something Conlon hopes the podcast will change.
"A lot of people are willing to take the time to listen to the story, and once you've heard the story you'll care a lot more, and you'll think a lot more, and maybe something will come to you that will be of use to us," Conlon said.
In launching its new podcast, the NYPD joins a few other departments across the country who've realized this intimate medium is a great way to show the public a different side of the police officers who vow to serve and protect.
"You'll hear them talk about their families, how they're hurt and frustrated working on a case like this. So when you see a detective knocking on your door, now you'll understand the reason why," Conlon said.
Baby Hope is a five part series that took six months to produce and record, a labor of love that Conlon says opened his veteran NYPD eyes to the struggles of working such a gruesome case.
"Detectives, in this case Jerry Giorgio, his wife bought the dress Baby Hope was buried in. They visited the cemetery. They attended Masses. They just couldn't let this go," Conlon said.
"Some of these cops really haven't told their stories before, and this is the perfect medium," said producer and editor Jill Bauerle.
Bauerle says the team is often working 16 hour days to get the podcast on the air, but she believes this is the best way for listeners to understand what really happens behind the scenes.
"To hear in their own voices what's going on in their minds when they're seeing really gruesome things or they're hitting a dead end, it's just fascinating. And that's a voice that's often missing in stories about detective work. Detectives like to stay in the shadows. So it's a really great forum for them," Bauerle said.
You can catch new episodes of the show every Tuesday wherever you download podcasts, or by clicking here.
The project was done in partnership with the New York City Police Foundation.