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Welcome to Unspeakable, a true crime podcast where I tell
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stories of real crimes with real victims, whose cases are
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so shocking that many are left wondering how is this
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even real? I use my experiences in law enforcement corrections,
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and combined with my years as a criminal justice educator,
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dig deep into complex cases of evil acts, some so
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evil many feel they are unspeakable. Warning Unspeakable as intended
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for mature audiences. If you are easily offended, then I'm
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not your girl. Listening discretion is advised. Hey y'all, kJ
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you're back for another sort of unspeakable? How are you doing?
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What's going on? I got a pretty good one for
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you today. This one I wrote all week and I'm
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just tickled by it because I think it's I think
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it's an interesting one, and it's not something that's kind
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of like.
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Your typical story.
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So come with me, if you will, to Bellevue, Washington.
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Where are my Washington people at? Before I actually jump
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into it, did y'all see? I know everyone's watching now
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with that airplane crash that you know, God rest their souls,
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all those victims and those plane in the planes in
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Washington that hit the river and the helicopter and just
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the tragedy of all of that. Well, what if I
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told you a friend of mine that works in law
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enforcement was on a plane and I was freaking out.
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I thought, oh my god, he was on the plane
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in Washington. You know, I always go worst case scenario.
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But he messaged after the plane crash and said it
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wasn't me. I've landed on the ground and it stressed
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me out. So I just want to tell everyone that
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you are in my thoughts and you're in my prayers.
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If you were affected by that plane crash, if you
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know or any of the people on that plane, that
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just a tragedy. We don't have all the answers at
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the time that I'm recording this, but my heart and
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my prayers and my I guess just everything, it's with
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you right now if that was something that affected you.
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But we're gonna go to Bellevue, Washington in this case,
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and that is the fifth largest city in Washington. It's
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referred to as a city in a park because this
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area of Washington has over one hundred parks within its limits.
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So sounds beautiful. I've never been there. If you're from
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that area, reach out to me. Let me, know, what's
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it like? Do you like it there? But it sounds amazing,
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sounds like a great place to be. And one thing
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that I was interested in is the fact that this
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city's crime rates are consistently low. This is a great
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place to raise a family from everything that I researched,
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and so when crime rates are low in an area,
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it's always shocking when something goes down there. So this
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happened to also be the home of forty eight year
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old Baron Lee. And Baron was originally from Hilo, Hawaii,
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And he's sporting that typical black hair and that tan skin.
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And when you are looking at Baron, he has a
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kindness about him and it just shines through in photographs.
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I have met people like this that they just I
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hate saying someone lights up a room. I hate saying
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that because it's just tied with the fact that somebody's
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gonna die. But he has a kindness about his face,
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and when he smiles, it just is so warm and
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so inviting. He's super sociable, a man who was unafraid
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to put himself out there in regard to people and community,
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and it's just no surprise that he was really successful
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in his car sales career. He was likable. That's a
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job where you have to be like. Nobody wants to
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think of a sleazy car salesman. They want to think
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of somebody that's gonna be true and right and personal
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and knows what they're talking about. And barn was that guy.
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He had just been promoted to sales manager at Beer
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Toyota and.
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He was doing great. He was the American dream, you know.
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He was just out there and killing it in his
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neck of the woods, clean cut, trustworthy. That's a great
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combo to having a man, don't you think. And that,
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my friends, is Barren Lee.
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Now.
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Not everything had been perfect in his life, though, And
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I don't want to make it sound like he's just
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this guy that everything went great. He had been through
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a lot in his life, and some things that he
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went through even the strong of us of us would
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take heart. So as a child, he experienced really tough
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times that would eventually leave him in the care of
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the state. He would become a foster child, and without
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his birth parents to love and care for him, he
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really had a hard time, you know. And you can't
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blame kids for that. When a kid is put in
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foster care. And then someone you know, they're angry, they're mad,
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will know shit, their life has been upended, you know,
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everything they're used to and even if their parents suck,
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even if they have the shittiest parents on the earth,
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that was still their parent and they still love them
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for what they knew them to be. And through a
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child's eyes, I'm sure this is very difficult. So he
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was put into foster care. And you know, maybe that's
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why as he got older and he grew up, he
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became such a kind hearted and understanding person and he
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very much could identify with other people and their struggles
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and the emotional turmoil that people can go through. I
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think that's a beautiful thing when you know, I'll tell
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you this, when you meet somebody and you see a
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beautiful light about them in whatever regard it is. Maybe
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they're always willing to help, Maybe they're just always kind,
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Maybe they always come at you with a compliment, maybe
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they're just they go out of their way to open doors.
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When you meet somebody with a light about them like that,
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you can trust that they are healing something within themselves
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that they lacked. So it makes sense to me that
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Baron grew up to be a kind hearted and compassionate person.
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He also, although he made it through foster care and
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he grew up, he also had been through a pretty
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trying divorce that left him with the sharing of custody
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of his baby boy named Eric. And this Eric is
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a ar ik just interesting fun fact, not the typical spelling.
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But he loved his baby Eric with every ounce of
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his being. But Eric's situation was also marked by tragic
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circumstance because Eric was born a healthy, bouncing baby, but
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within days of his birth, things began to change. Unbeknownst
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to his parents and to the doctor's baby Eric was
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lactose intolerant. Now, this isn't common in newborns, and I
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did do research on this. I'm not an expert. I'm
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not giving medical advice or anything, but this is not
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as common in newborns as I guess maybe I would
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have thought it was. And so it went undiagnosed for
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a week. But by then baby Eric had been consuming
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milk that essentially was poisoning him for that first week
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of life, and in the most tragic of circumstances, this
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led to severe neurological and muscular damage that would alter
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Eric's life forever. So he was diagnosed along with that
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lactose intolerance, which this was interesting to me, but if
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you're born with lactose intolerance, these may not be the
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proper medical terms, but my understanding of what our research
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is that even a mother's breast milk can poison the baby.
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That's bizarre, you know what I'm saying, because it's to me,
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because we're.
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Built for that.
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That's what we're for, is to create the nourishment for
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our babies. But even that was problematic for baby Eric
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to consume. So on top of that, he was also
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diagnosed with dystonia and cornectorus, which was a billy rubin
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encephalopathy illness, and so all of that combined would cause
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damage to baby Eric and so he would require on
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the clock care for the rest of his life and
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he is completely dependent on the care of someone else.
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Lucky for Eric, though, his mama and his daddy were
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never gonna let him down until his mother did. Sharon
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was his mother's name, Sharon and Baron. And I know
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that's kind of funny. Their name's rhyme, but hey, shout
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out to miss Mary if you're listening.
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You know who you are.
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But my friend Mary. Her sister's name is Dora. And
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guess what her husband's name when she got married. Guess
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who she married.
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Guess who? Dora married? Barney.
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I'm not laughing at him, I'm laughing with him. But
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can you imagine Dora and Barney showing up to your
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kid's birthday party and it's not them? But anyway, shout out,
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miss Mary, you know I love you. But Sharon and
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Baron had gotten married in what was a whirlwind romance.
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Sharon was young, she was only eighteen, and Baron was
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ten years her senior, so he was older, but they
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were in love and it just was a whirlwind romance
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and they took a leap of faith. So they got
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married in twenty ten. Eric was born shortly thereafter, and
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that love, that hot, intense, oh you know, like just
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that new falling in love feeling, it really would be
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short lived and their differences would just become too much
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to handle. So the marriage soured in twenty fifteen, and
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that's when Sharon went and she filed for divorce from Baron.
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But Baron is not one.
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Of those dads that's just gonna go okay, Well, I'll
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get him every other weekend.
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No frickin' way.
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Baron wanted custody of his baby boy, and this would
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turn into your typical battle of the exes. Unfortunately, and
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we all know the drill here. You know, both of
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them are saying the other one's shitty. Both of them
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are claiming that they're bad parents. And something I hate
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about that is when someone gets divorced. Two people get divorced,
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and then all of a sudden they start saying, how
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shitty the other person is.
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Well, baby, you married, you had the kid.
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With them, so maybe let's both take a look in
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the mirror and figure out that we both probably or
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screw up. But either way, not one to be easily deterred.
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Baron continued on with his life and they were sharing
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custody of little Eric, who, by the way, fun fact,
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Eric's middle name is Dragon and his daddy calls him
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by that. That's his nickname, so he calls him Dragon,
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and that's kind of interesting. I've never met someone with
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a name Dragon. So I did have a neighbor one time,
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who's last who's named his child vicious?
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That's a true story, vicious.
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Wow, But this baby's name is Dragon, so you know,
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when I say that his mother let him down, what
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do I mean by that? Well, when Eric was six
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years old, the courts would have to intervene because they
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would determine that Sharon was an unfit parent. And for
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a court to say you are an unfit parent, if
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you've ever watched the court systems, you're given hella opportunity,
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hella opportunity to get your shit straight. So for them
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to finally come down and say, all right, look, you're
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not what's in the best interest of this child. I
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want you to understand how bad you probably are doing
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with that kid. And one of the main things that
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was cited in the court decision was neglect. They said
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neglect was cited as the cause of the ruling, and
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Child Protective Services had even taken Eric from her and
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placed him in foster care because they were so concerned
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for his well being. So I'm sure that was a
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shot in the heart to Baron, who himself had experienced
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that as a child, and now his own.
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Child was set in foster care.
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So Sharon had still been given overnight visits because like
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I told you, they're going to try to do everything
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to reconcile this issue and to have custody of your
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own child as the goal of the courts.
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But it was too.
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Bad and that was eventually revoked and she was limited
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to supervised visits of the baby. Now I know people
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want to know more, I will tell you this. I
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dug I reached out to people which I can I
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can touch on later.
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I just didn't get anything back.
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Nobody responded to me as this is a touchy case
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by the time that I'm recording this, but all I
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know at this point is neglect was cited. So Baron
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had been continuing to fight for custody of Eric since
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their divorce started, and it took him nearly two years
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for that to take full effect with you know, combination
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of hers being Sharon being cited as a neglectful parent.
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So it may have taken time, but finally the court
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saw the truth and Baron was awarded custody of young
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Eric in May of twenty nineteen. So just how devoted
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was Baron to his young son, y'all this would be
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proven by his willingness to.
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Uproot his entire life and move.
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He was willing to move to be closer to Eric's
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home and where Eric had been living for the past