transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] On July 5th, 1998, 82-year-old Manhattan socialite Irene Silverman vanished from her Upper East Side townhouse without a trace. There were no signs of a struggle, no forced entry, and no body would ever be found. Just days later, two people were pulled over in a stolen Lincoln town car halfway across the country, carrying passports, forged documents, and a bag filled with drugs that didn't belong to them. They weren't arrested for murder, at least not yet. Hey, guys, and welcome to the Moms and Mysteries podcast, a true crime podcast featuring myself, Mandy and my dear friend, Melissa. Hi, Melissa.

Speaker 2:
[00:43] Hi, Mandy. How are you?

Speaker 1:
[00:44] I am doing all right. I feel like I'm having a manic Monday, but today is not even Monday.

Speaker 2:
[00:49] Yeah, it's hard to have a manic Monday on a Tuesday, but it's possible.

Speaker 1:
[00:53] Oh, it absolutely is possible. It's been one of those weird days where things haven't made any sense to me. So I told you this morning that I had an appointment to go to my lady doctor, just my regular checkup visit. And I scheduled the appointment for 9:30 a.m. So I was thinking that would be a great time to do an appointment, get it out of the way for the day, get home. I can do whatever else I need to do. So I didn't really account for the fact that that's the same time that everyone's driving to work, right? So the traffic was horrendous getting down there. And then Melissa, I got all the way there and go check in. And the nice receptionist tells me that I don't have an appointment today. So I'm like, what's going on? This has been literally in my calendar. I scheduled this appointment probably like three months ago. It was just a long wait. Like there was no openings. And I had this in my calendar. I've been seeing it coming up for weeks and weeks. Over the weekend, I was like, okay, my appointment's on Tuesday. So for her to tell me that it wasn't today, I was genuinely so lost. So I'm like looking at my calendar, I'm like, what is happening? I asked her like, okay, and she goes, well, let me just look up your name. She does. She goes, okay, you have an appointment scheduled for May 11th. So I'm like, why am I here today? What am I doing here?

Speaker 2:
[02:05] She's probably like, no, we're wondering, why are you here today?

Speaker 1:
[02:08] So that's how my day really started off, was just that it was very confusing. It was driving all around early in the morning and then being confused when I didn't in fact have to be where I thought I did. So that was how the day started and it's just been one of those things. You know how sometimes that happens and then you feel like you can't get your footing like the rest of the day?

Speaker 2:
[02:25] Absolutely. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[02:26] That's been me all day, but we're here.

Speaker 2:
[02:29] We are here. So 2026 is a big year for us. Don't know why, but I've decided it's a big year for us.

Speaker 1:
[02:35] You can just say that and it will be.

Speaker 2:
[02:38] I don't ever say this, so I really am hoping for big things. But on our website, momsandmysteries.com, you can sign up for a newsletter. We're sending out a little newsletter. It gives you an idea of what's going on this week, what episodes we have. You can easily click on and listen to the episode or go to YouTube, whatever you want. Also, we have YouTube, youtube.com/momsandmysteries. We are everywhere. Wait, you haven't seen the movie. I haven't either. Everything everywhere all at once. We are, that's our, that's my motto for 2026 for us in April, the end of April, almost May. We're every, well I can't even say it.

Speaker 1:
[03:13] That's our motto just for like the next two weeks, or that's the motto for the rest of the year.

Speaker 2:
[03:17] By summer, I'm going to remember how to say it.

Speaker 1:
[03:19] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[03:19] So anyway, if you want to send it for a newsletter, we won't send junk to you. So it's at momsandmysteries.com. We would love to see you there.

Speaker 1:
[03:26] Awesome. All right. So let's get into the story for this week. This one is really a crazy one. I don't think we've ever done a case like this before. I'm sure these types of stories exist, but we have an interesting dynamic in this week's episode. So I can't wait to get into it. Now, at first glance, this story looks like a missing person's case that just eventually turned into a murder investigation. But the deeper you go, it's harder to just see it that way. It's not quite that black and white. What happened in the story wasn't really just sudden or opportunistic. It was the result of years of calculated deception, manipulation, and control. Long before our victim today, Irene Silverman, ever disappeared, there was already someone moving through the world with a very specific skill set. Someone who had spent decades figuring out how to take what she wanted and remove obstacles when they got on her way. Her name was Sante Kimes. She wasn't just doing any of this alone though, which is where the story turns crazy. So before the headlines in the courtroom drama and before anyone gave her the nickname the Dragon Lady, which is what she came to be known as, she was known as Sante Siners, born in 1934. And nothing about her early life really suggested that she had any kind of wealth or status. She didn't have a built-in advantage. There was no obvious path into these circles that she would end up moving through later in her life. What she did have was a strong sense that she deserved more than what she had. And she also had this willingness to just ignore the usual rules for obtaining those types of things. At a young age, she started stealing, lying, and manipulating situations to her advantage. None of that was really a sophisticated process for her at first when she was younger. But it did establish that this was going to be a trend in her life. Sante was not impulsive. She was someone who really paid attention and watched how people behaved. She paid attention to what people trusted and where people would let their guard down. Then she learned how to operate in those spaces without drawing attention to herself. As she got older, she really sharpened all those instincts. She moved through relationships quickly. She was married multiple times and each one of her marriages really was more to serve a purpose than it was for a loving relationship. These relationships weren't really based on emotional decisions like most of us do. They were relationships that offered her access to a different lifestyle or a different social circle. All of this is supposed to be to her own advantage. That progression eventually led her to a man named Kenneth Kimes Sr. Her marriage with Kenneth changed everything. Kenneth Sr. was wealthy. He was well-connected and well-respected, and he had an established life with credibility. For Sante, that is what matters the most. That matters more than anything else in the world. And for the first time, now she wasn't just relying on her own instinct and ambition. Now she has resources, and she has a cover, now that she's married to this wealthy man. And that combination of things allowed her to expand what she was doing without anybody really catching on right away.

Speaker 2:
[06:34] Once Sante married Kenneth, the scale of her crimes shifted in a noticeable way. She was no longer limited to small, opportunistic theft. Now she had access to money, property, and social standing, and she used all of it to her advantage. During this period, she began developing what would become her standard approach. She would gravitate towards schemes that looked legitimate on the surface, but were structured in a way that allowed her to manipulate outcomes behind the scenes. Shoplifting for her, though, did not disappear, it just became more organized. At the same time, she moved further into fraud and insurance-related schemes, including arson. Properties would burn, claims would be filed, and the money would just come in. Because all of this was happening within the context of this wealthy and seemingly stable household, it didn't immediately raise the level of suspicion that it might have otherwise. Sante understood that perception was just as important as execution. If people believed that she belonged in a certain environment, they were far less likely to question what she was doing within it. From the outside, her life appeared controlled and successful. She maintained the image of a devoted wife and mother while moving through affluent social circles and managing multiple properties. Underneath that, though, she was constantly working angles. Every move, every relationship, and every opportunity became part of a larger system that she was building, one where identities could shift, rules could be bent, and consequences could be avoided as long as she stayed ahead of them. This was kind of interesting. I watched a small documentary last night about this lady, just to learn more because I was fascinated. And one thing that was really interesting to me with her husband at some point is they like, there's this infamous picture of them meeting President Ford back in the day. But they did that by lying and saying that he was an ambassador, which she was an ambassador of nothing. They would do that to get good seats in restaurants and stuff like that. But they were able to actually basically, yeah, like break into the White House. Not really, but you know, get themselves into the White House and have this picture with him. And nobody was the wiser.

Speaker 1:
[08:44] But what's crazy to me is that people could literally, I feel like people just did that back then. People just lied and got all kinds of advantages and benefits. And I'm like, it is wild. And obviously now we have different systems in place that are supposed to stop that from happening. And you can get caught doing these things a lot easier. But it is crazy to me that somebody would be able to lie and deceive their way into meeting a president or a big figure in the country. That's crazy.

Speaker 2:
[09:09] There are infamous White House crashers from early 2000s, Michaela and Tariq Salehi. And I only know their names because they're part of the Real Housewives of Washington, DC. But they did that. That was a big thing with them going in is they were able to. But it's these people who act like they have so much knowledge and you think, well, yeah, they belong here. Like, they're clearly, they're wealthy, they're this or that. And she was somebody, Sante was somebody who really could make people believe the lie, really. This period of time, though, is important because it's where Sante proves something to herself. She isn't just capable of getting away with these crimes once or twice. She can do it repeatedly in different places and under different circumstances without losing control of the narrative. Once that belief sets in, the line between what is risky and what's possible starts to shift.

Speaker 1:
[09:59] By the mid 1980s, the version of Sante Kimes that had been building over time was no longer operating in the background. What had started as manipulation and theft developed into something a lot more structured and much more disturbing. In 1985, she was arrested and later convicted on federal charges for holding young Mexican women as domestic slaves. I'm not using that word lightly. It's actually a very accurate term here. These women were brought into her home under the promise of work, and then they were cut off from the outside world. Their identification was taken from them, their movement was restricted, and they were forced to work long hours with no pay. When they would resist, the punishment was physical. This abuse included beatings and burns inflicted with cigarettes, along with a level of psychological control that kept these women isolated and dependent on Sante. She wasn't just trying to maintain order in her household. She was establishing complete authority over the people inside it. And what stands out about this case is how organized all of that was. There were systems in place designed to prevent these women from leaving and to maintain control over their daily lives. It really reflects the same kind of thinking that Sante applied to her financial crimes, but in this situation, she's focusing on controlling people instead of money. When the case came to light, it forced a shift in how she was viewed. This was no longer just someone pushing the limits of fraud. It really revealed a whole new side of her. It was this willingness to control and even harm others in a much more direct way. She was convicted and sentenced to prison, and for a brief period, it did appear as though her pattern had been interrupted.

Speaker 2:
[11:36] But that interruption did not last. After serving her sentence, Sante didn't come out of prison changed in any meaningful way. If anything, she just came out more deliberate. Instead of stepping back, she adjusted her approach based on what she had learned. She had seen how the system worked and where it could be challenged. And she used that knowledge to refine what she was already doing. Around this time, her son, Kenneth Kimes Jr, was growing up in the middle of all this. He wasn't kept separate from her activities or even shielded away from them in any way. Instead, he was brought into it directly. Sante pulled him out of traditional schooling and took over his education. But what she really focused on with him had nothing to do with academics. She taught him how to read people, how to gain trust, how to manipulate situations, and how to avoid consequences. These weren't abstract ideas. These were practical skills that he was expected to use. Because of how early this influence started, it didn't feel unusual to him. It felt completely normal. By the time he was old enough to understand the broader implications of what was happening, he was already part of it.

Speaker 1:
[12:44] This is what I was saying before. I'm like, I don't know of another case that we've covered not immediately anyway where there's been this dynamic of a mother pulling her child into a life of crime. Literally from the day they were born, grooming them into this life of crime. That's something that I feel like we do not hear about very often.

Speaker 2:
[13:02] For sure. I feel like if we've heard of it at all, it would be like a black widow situation where they're off killing their husbands and somehow the kid gets involved. But not this. This is totally different to be going outside the family and doing this. It's so weird. It gives me the chills.

Speaker 1:
[13:20] Me too. It blows my mind to think of anybody that is capable of doing this. It's wild. But by the time Kenneth Kimes Jr. reached his teenage years, there was pretty much no separation between his life and this world of Santes that she had created and pulled him into, like I was saying. There was no outside structure to compare it to, and there wasn't a clear point where he was able to step back and recognize this as something different. As we were saying, this started when he was very young, so to him, this is just how life works. This is just what you do. Sante had removed most outside influences. Over time, her son began participating in what she was doing, rather than just simply being an observer of it. At first, his role was limited, but as he became older and more capable, his responsibilities, if you want to call them that, expanded. Then the dynamic between Sante and Kenneth Jr started to change. Now, he wasn't just learning from her, he really was becoming part of the system, and as his role got bigger, so did Sante's reliance on him.

Speaker 2:
[14:23] The interesting thing here is there's this other layer to this dynamic that becomes clearer when you look at Sante's older son, Kent Walker. Unlike Kenny, Kent eventually distanced himself from his mother and built a separate life. He later wrote about his experiences growing up with her, making it clear that he understood what she was doing and made the decision to step away from it. Of course, that contrast matters because it shows that there was at least some point another path available. Kenny, however, did not take that path. When Kent left, Kenny was still deeply embedded in the environment that Sante had created, but he didn't have the same level of distance or the same opportunity to re-evaluate what was happening around him. By the time he might have been able to do that, his role had already been established. He talked about in the same documentary, I was surprised to see him speaking actually, that he realized things were not normal when he got in trouble, his mom was having him, they were just stealing stuff, that was just a thing, part of their family. He stole some surfboards and got caught, and he goes home and his mom was pissed, and he was like, why is she so angry? She said, you do not get caught. That was it. She didn't care about the stealing, she cared that he got caught, and he realized, oh, that's not right. He said basically, that's the moment he realized like, oh, this is not normal. And he said it was, he thinks it saved his life really, that he got caught in that because he said, that's the only reason I even knew. Because how do you differentiate if your parent, this adult is telling you all these things are okay, and you know they're not okay, but they say it's okay, so who do you listen to? It has to be a real mind, you know what?

Speaker 1:
[16:06] Yeah, no, for sure.

Speaker 2:
[16:08] Sante also appeared to treat him differently. Kenny Jr was the one she kept closest, the one she invested the most time in, and the one she shaped more deliberately. That level of attention created a dependence that made it much harder for him to separate himself from her influence.

Speaker 1:
[16:24] What I think is interesting and also kind of disturbing and sick about that too, is the fact that she did have this older son, that I feel like she wasn't able to quite get her claws in. And so I feel like for her, right, that's always been her thing, is figuring out where people's weaknesses are, and learning how to exploit them and to benefit myself. So I feel like in a sick way, she like learned from her older son how to better manipulate her younger son, which is like-

Speaker 2:
[16:49] Absolutely, it was like her second chance.

Speaker 1:
[16:51] Right, just so awful.

Speaker 2:
[16:53] Yeah, but as a result, his understanding of what normal and acceptable was built entirely around her perspective. And when the stakes increased, there wasn't a clear moment where he could step back and question it. From his point of view, each step forward was simply a continuation of what he already knew. And we have so much to get into with this story, and we will after a quick break to hear a word from this week's sponsors. This episode is brought to you by Iqbar, our exclusive snack, hydration, and coffee sponsor. Iqbar protein bars, Iq hydration mixes, and Iq Joe mushroom coffees are the delicious, low sugar, brain and body fuel you need to win your day. I feel like I'm always trying to have something on hand that's quick, but doesn't make me feel terrible after I eat it because that window between meals gets a little chaotic.

Speaker 1:
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Speaker 1:
[19:48] So when we left off, Kenny Kimes Jr. had become fully embedded in his mother's world. And by that point, the line between learning and participating had completely disappeared. By the early 1990s, Sante and Kenneth Jr. were no longer dabbling in isolated schemes. They were now operating together, moving from place to place, and adjusting their approach depending on the situation in front of them. The details would change, there would be different states, different identities, different financial setups, but the underlying structure stayed the same. As their operations became more and more complex, the risk of being exposed, of course, became greater. And the more moving parts there are, you know, obviously, we know this. And the more you have going on, the more likely it is that something's going to go wrong and someone's going to notice that something's kind of not going, not right, you know. So one of the first people that was connected to this risk of getting caught was a man named Elmer Holmgren. He was an attorney who worked with Sante during earlier insurance-related cases that were tied to some arson claims. So he had direct knowledge of how those arson claims were handled, including the paperwork and the inconsistencies behind him, and that kind of information made him valuable at one point but also made him dangerous later on. And in 1991, he disappeared. At the time, his disappearance didn't immediately lead to charges against Sante or Kenny. It was actually treated as a missing persons case with no clear resolution, and that's pretty much how it stayed for years. It wasn't until a lot later, when Kenny Jr. began speaking to investigators, that a lot more detail about this actually emerged. According to him and what he said later, his mom actually murdered Mr. Holmgren by striking him in the head with a hammer while he was inside of a car. But now with this new information that she may have actually been involved in someone's murder, it introduces this new element where possibly we can now determine that Sante is willing to eliminate a perceived threat in her circle. Once you cross that line, the range of possible outcomes definitely changes.

Speaker 2:
[21:59] A similar pattern would appear a few years later, and this time it happened outside the United States. In 1996, Sante and Kenny were in the Bahamas, where they had established offshore accounts as part of their broader financial operations. These accounts were designed to obscure the movement of money, which meant they required a certain level of cooperation from the people managing them. And that kind of arrangement tends to attract attention when something doesn't add up. At some point, a banker named Syed Bilal Ahmed began asking questions about those accounts. The exact trigger for his concern isn't really documented, but it was enough to put him in a position where he could challenge what was happening. Not long after that, he was dead. Years later, Kenny told investigators that he and his mother had gone to Syed's residence, where they drugged him and drowned him in a bathtub. The setting is different from the earlier case, but the outcome really follows the same pattern. When someone moved from being useful to being a problem, their role in the situation changed quickly. By this point, of course, this pattern is very difficult to ignore. The progression from fraud to something more permanent doesn't happen all at once, but it's clearly established across multiple situations. But the next case would bring that pattern into much sharper focus, largely because of how closely the victim was connected to them.

Speaker 1:
[23:20] So that case involves David Kazdin, and it stands apart from these earlier cases for a very specific reason, and that is that David knew Sante personally. He wasn't someone operating on the edge of her business dealings or someone she just encountered through a one-off transaction. There was an existing relationship between them, and that meant there was also a level of trust that would make it easier for him to recognize when something was wrong. In 1998, David discovered that his name had been used in connection with a loan that was taken out for approximately $280,000. And the documents associated with that loan, as it turns out, had been forged, and his identity was used without his knowledge. When he realized what had happened, he confronted Sante directly. I assume he knew it was her right away. I guess if you know someone like this, then you would suspect them possibly. But that confrontation created a situation where the risk was immediate and specific. Now, this is no longer about suspicion and curiosity. David realizes he has enough information to expose Sante's whole scheme in a way that could have very serious consequences for her. And shortly after that, he disappeared. His body was later found in a dumpster near Los Angeles International Airport, and he had been shot. At the time, the case was investigated as an isolated homicide. There was no immediate public connection to any of these earlier disappearances mentioned, and without that context, without knowing that Sante was connected to all of these people, it just remained a standalone case for a period of time. And the fact that nobody was really looking into her specifically for this murder gave Sante and Kenny Jr. the ability to keep it moving.

Speaker 2:
[25:01] While the situation involving David was unfolding in California, Sante and Kenny were already focused on something much larger in New York. They had identified a new target, Irene Silverman, an 80-year-old woman who owned a valuable townhouse on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. The property itself represented long-term financial stability, which made it significantly more valuable than the short-term gains that they had pursued in earlier schemes. Their approach reflected that difference. Instead of acting quickly with Irene, they built access over time. Kenny Jr. entered Irene's life first, using the name Manny to rent a room in her home. That arrangement gave him a legitimate reason to be there and allowed him to move through the house without drawing attention. It also gave him the opportunity to observe her routines and understand how she managed her daily life. And while he was establishing that presence, Sante focused on the broader structure of the plan. She worked on gathering the information they would need to operate in Irene's name, including financial details and personal identification. The goal wasn't simply to take her assets and leave, though. They were preparing to step into her position in a way that would allow them to continue using those assets without immediate detection. This plan required patience, coordination, and a level of detail that went way beyond what they had done before. Part of this plan involved forging documents that would transfer ownership of Irene's townhouse into their control. So this was not some weird idea they had or something they were still trying to figure out. It was in motion. They were working towards a version of events where, on paper, Irene had willingly signed over property even though there's literally no indication she had any intention of doing so.

Speaker 1:
[26:48] You already know this makes me so bad.

Speaker 2:
[26:51] You're pissed.

Speaker 1:
[26:52] Yeah. Of course, it's also terrible and sad when you hear about this, but you hear about people that would do this to their own parents or to someone in their family that they know that they have access to. But the idea that a complete stranger is literally hunting and preying on an elderly woman that they don't even know. This lady has nothing to do with these two people, and they just picked her randomly and were like, that one, let's just bleed her dry and take everything she owns and scam this woman.

Speaker 2:
[27:22] What? I know. It's old on old crime too, which you don't hear about that a lot.

Speaker 1:
[27:28] That's true. You don't hear a lot of elderly on elderly crime. Once Kenneth Kimes Jr was living inside that townhouse, the pace of the plan stayed pretty controlled. There wasn't this sense of urgency. They weren't trying to hurry it up. Instead, they are just slowly gathering information and just making their presence feel like normal to this lady. Kenny's access to the home gave him insight into Irene's daily life that really would have been difficult to obtain any other way if he was on the outside. At this point, he's able to learn her routines. When is she home? When does she leave? Who does she interact with regularly? And how does she kind of move around her own house? And those details are helping them. They're able to anticipate, you know, how to act without disrupting her routines or raising any suspicion with her. At the same time, Sante focused on the legal and financial side of things. Transferring ownership of this townhouse required documentation that could withstand scrutiny, which means that creating a paper trail means really doing it right and making it look legitimate. And that meant preparing forged documents and arranging for them to be validated in a way that wouldn't immediately raise concerns. All of this actually just seems like so much work. I just wouldn't like.

Speaker 2:
[28:40] I know, like, I feel like just getting a job would be a lot easier than all of this. For sure. And less risky. And also remember, she married like a millionaire. She has kids.

Speaker 1:
[28:52] You don't have to do this. Like, why are you doing this?

Speaker 2:
[28:55] Yeah, like you've already burned enough houses down. Why don't you just use that money for something?

Speaker 1:
[29:00] Yeah. So Sante, though, took things, of course, a step further and she presented herself as Irene in front of a notary. She wore a disguise for this that included a wig and clothing that was consistent with Irene's appearance. And she was able to complete that interaction without being challenged in any way and the process just continued on. Yeah. And what makes that even more unsettling, of course, is how committed she was to that. Like I said, this is like she's going full on wearing a disguise, going to a bank and getting a notary to sign paperwork that she has forged. I mean, there's multiple crimes that have happened in a 30-second span. Like in this story, it's absolutely crazy. But she understood that if she could make that interaction feel normal, then most people won't really question it and won't really push past it. The stuff that she was doing here, I thought of earlier reminded me of the case of Barry Minkow that we covered a couple of weeks back and I forgot exactly what they were doing, but they were running a scam that they had set up in a warehouse, they made it look like a complete construction business was going on in there.

Speaker 2:
[30:04] For a day?

Speaker 1:
[30:05] For one day, they hired a whole crew and all that. But that was what we talked about in that episode too, is if people are expecting to see an operating business and you take them to a place that looks like a legitimate operating business, people are going to question it. Why would you question it? That's the same principle that Sante was using in this story. We have more to get into after a quick break to hear a word from this week's sponsors.

Speaker 2:
[30:29] If you're a parent, you know how much brain space that swim safety takes up, especially when you live somewhere like we do, where water is literally just everywhere. When my kids were little, I kept thinking, okay, we have to figure this out. That's how we ended up at Goldfish Swim School with my son when he was little. Let me tell you, he was not into it at first.

Speaker 1:
[30:48] That's actually so normal. We both had our kids in swim lessons and you realize really quickly it's not just about learning to swim, it's about helping them feel safe and confident in the water.

Speaker 2:
[30:59] Exactly, and what I loved about Goldfish is how they meet kids where they are. It's super kid-friendly, the pools are warm and they have this play-based approach that actually works. I remember the moment it really clicked in for my son. He went from being terrified to just jumping in over and over and over again like he owned the place.

Speaker 1:
[31:17] That's the best feeling and having something that supports them at their pace like that instead of forcing it makes a huge difference, not just for the kids but also for us parents.

Speaker 2:
[31:27] If you're ready to take the next step, Goldfish Swim School has a special offer just for listeners, waived membership and your first lesson free at participating locations. Head to goldfishswimschool.com free, find your local school and use promo code free to enroll. It's an easy way to get started with lessons that focus on safety, confidence and real progress in the water. Now back to the episode. Before the break, we talked about how Sante and Kenny Kimes Jr. worked their way into Irene Silverman's life, gaining access to her home and building a plan to take control of her property. Kenny established a presence inside the house while Sante handled the paperwork behind the scenes. By early July of 1998, everything Sante Kimes and Kenneth Kimes Jr. had been working towards inside Irene Silverman's townhouse was already in motion. They had access to her home, a working understanding of her daily life, and the beginnings of this paper trail designed to shift control of her property. And then on July 5th, Irene Silverman disappeared. In the immediate aftermath, there was nothing inside the home that suggested a violent event had taken place. There were no signs of forced entry and no clear indication that anything had been disturbed. From the outside, it looked like a situation that could be explained in a number of ways, none of which immediately pointed to homicide. As investigators would later piece together the timeline, the working theory became that Sante and Kenny used a stun gun to incapacitate Irene before killing her, most likely by strangulation. And that sequence is based on the evidence they were able to recover later, along with statements made by Kenny, but without a body, there's no way to confirm every detail with certainty. What is certain is that Irene was never seen again. At one point, Kenny would later claim that Irene's body had been transported out of New York and left at a construction site in New Jersey. But despite searches and follow-up investigation, her remains were never recovered, and that detail remains one of the most unresolved parts of this case. And because no one really knew what happened, this lack of clarity really worked in Sante and Kenny's favor. There's no immediate collapse of this plan, there's no instant connection between Irene's disappearance and the people who were living inside her home. So from their perspective, the situation really didn't seem to be unraveling at all.

Speaker 1:
[33:48] In the days following Irene's disappearance, Sante and Kenny Jr. didn't behave like people who were trying to disappear or distance themselves from what had just happened. Their actions suggest they believed that everything they had done and this whole structure they built was still completely intact and that they could just continue moving forward without anyone really paying attention to them. So they gathered the documents and materials they had been working with, including Irene's ID and financial records, along with the forged paperwork connected to the townhouse. They packed those items together and moved with them as they prepared to leave the state of New York. Now, when they left, there wasn't this dramatic attempt to vanish or escape, but they just kept things very calm and they continued moving in the same way that they had been before, really. They're just moving about, moving locations, maintaining their same underlying approach, and not really setting off any alarm bells. But what they didn't anticipate in this case was how quickly things would change once Irene's absence was noticed by the people around her. Friends and associates began to realize that they hadn't heard from her, and that was unusual given her usual routines. Before too long, that led to a missing person report being filed. Once the authorities started looking into things and finding out who had access to her home, attention quickly turned to the tenant who had been living there under the name Manny. And when they traced that identity, it led to some inconsistencies, which eventually pointed directly back to Kenny Kimes Jr. At the same time, in a completely separate sequence of events, law enforcement in Utah encountered Sante and Kenny during a traffic stop connected to a stolen Lincoln Town car and a bad check that was used in the process of obtaining this car. And at that moment, officers involved had no reason to connect the people in front of them to this missing persons case in Manhattan, but that connection would come later once all the information started to move through jurisdictions.

Speaker 2:
[35:44] The traffic stop in Utah marked the point where two unrelated situations began to converge. From the perspective of local law enforcement, the stop was tied to a financial issue involving a stolen vehicle and fraudulent payment. It was a contained situation with a clear set of charges that did not require a broader investigation. Sante and Kenny were detained based on what appeared to be a pretty straightforward case. What was not immediately visible was the significance of what they had with them. Inside the vehicle, investigators found a black bag containing items that would later become central to the case. Among those items were documents belonging to Irene Silverman, along with materials that raised questions about how those documents had been obtained and why they were being transported across the country. At the time of the stop, those details didn't carry the weight they would later have. Without the context of Irene's disappearance, the presence of those items really did not immediately point to a larger crime. Back in New York, however, the investigation into Irene's disappearance was gaining traction. As authorities worked through the people connected to her, the name associated with the tenant in her home became increasingly important. Once that identity was actually linked back to Kenny, the distance between the two investigations began to shrink. What had started as a missing person case and separate financial arrest began to align.

Speaker 1:
[37:06] So as they started looking into all of these details more, the contents of that black bag became really significant once they understood everything going on. Items that may have not seemed connected to each other on their own were now pointing to this direct link between Sante, Kenny, and Irene. In addition to her personal documents, that bag contained syringes, there were drugs associated with incapacitation, and other materials that suggested a level of preparation beyond just financial fraud. Why do you need medications for incapacitation or financial fraud? These just weren't items that you could easily explain away as part of any legitimate activity. As investigators continue to work through this evidence, another piece of the case started to emerge. Sante had been keeping detailed records, and those records provided insight into how she approached the planning and execution of all this. They weren't just a simple list of actions, but it reflected the whole structured way of thinking that they were focused on anticipating obstacles and accounting for different variables in advance, very much premeditated. So that level of documentation adds another layer to the case because it shows that there's not just a single impulsive decision, this is like literally a process that Sante has developed over time. And once they had both the physical evidence and these written records to work from, the picture started to come into focus.

Speaker 2:
[38:29] As investigators continued working through the evidence by Sante and Kenneth, the physical items recovered from the vehicle were only part of the picture. They of course established that connection to Irene, but they didn't fully explain how the plan had been structured or how long it had been in motion.

Speaker 1:
[38:45] And we have more to get into after a quick break to hear a word from this week's sponsors.

Speaker 2:
[38:50] I am not even kidding. I am counting down the days until my stupid phone contract is over so I can switch to Mint Mobile because I'm so tired of overpaying for things I don't even use. Every time my bill comes in, I'm confused all over again. I'm like, what am I even being charged for at this point?

Speaker 1:
[39:08] For real, it's like your phone bill shows up and you just accept it because you don't even want to deal with figuring it out.

Speaker 2:
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Speaker 1:
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Speaker 2:
[39:32] If you like your money, Mint Mobile is for you. Shop plans at mintmobile.com/moms and Mysteries. That's mintmobile.com/moms and Mysteries. Upfront payment of $45 for three month, five gigabyte plan required equivalent to $15 a month. New customer offer for first three months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile for details. And now back to the episode. So before the break, we learned that after Irene disappeared, investigators connected the traffic stop, the black bag and Sante's journals into a larger picture. The evidence pointed to a planned operation rather than the simple financial ones. At this point, this focus has shifted to proving what actually happened. So as this case developed, attention began to turn towards Kenny and what role he would ultimately play in the investigation. Up until this point, he had operated alongside his mother, carrying out tasks that supported the larger plans that she put in place. He had been present for multiple events that were now under scrutiny, and his knowledge of those events made him a key figure in understanding what had happened across several different cases. At some point, though, that position began to change. Kenny started speaking to investigators, providing information about incidents that had never been fully resolved, including the deaths of Elmer and Syed. His statements helped fill in gaps that had existed for years, offering explanations for disappearance that had previously been treated as isolated or unexplained. That cooperation, however, was not consistent. In 2000, while in custody, Kenny took part in an incident that added another layer of complexity to the case. During his interview with a reporter, which by the way, these two love to talk, he took the reporter hostage in what appeared to be an attempt to gain leverage and disrupt the legal process surrounding his mother. The situation was eventually resolved without fatalities, but it reinforced just how unstable his position had become. At different points, he appeared to be willing to provide information that implicated both himself and his mother. But at other times, it was like he was trying to protect her or influence the outcome of her case. That inconsistency made him both valuable and unpredictable as a source of information. Imagine the prosecutors in this case. And they're like, we have this guy who will tell us that his mom did all these things, but he might also change his mind. Also, he could try to take you hostage. TBD, we don't know what's going to happen. But all it did was really reflect the dynamic that had been established long before any of this reached the courtroom. The dynamic was actually visible even before trial. In interviews, including one with 60 Minutes, the two of them presented themselves as unusually close, often side-by-side, holding hands and speaking in a way that suggested a united front. I watched that 60 Minutes interview. Creepy doesn't begin to describe it. They're not just holding hands, but they're interlocking like girlfriend, boyfriend. It was so weird and so gross. Then also in the interview, they screen over to attorneys. There's five attorneys sitting in the corner to tell them to shut up when they're saying anything, including at one point, they just interviewed the attorneys and say, where was Sante born because we don't even know. The attorneys sat there silent like little dummies, and then they were like, we don't know what that has to do with the investigation. You can't even answer one question like where she was. It was so creepy and weird, and the son kept saying, cut. If he said something wrong, much like we say edit in our episodes, that he would say something dumb or whatever and he'd be like, cut. I'm like, they're not going to listen to you.

Speaker 1:
[43:07] No.

Speaker 2:
[43:08] But the tone of their interactions did not match the severity of what they were accused of, which made this relationship even weirder and harder to interpret. His involvement in these events was not something that developed independently. It was something that was shaped over time, influenced by the environment he had been raised in and the role he had been taught to play. By the time the case moved towards trial, investigators had assembled a combination of physical evidence, documented planning, and witness statements that pointed in the same direction. But what they didn't have was a body.

Speaker 1:
[43:40] The absence of Irene Silverman's body did become one of the central challenges of the trial. In most homicide cases, the body provides critical evidence. It can establish the cause of death, it helps narrow down the timeline, and it offers other forensic details that can confirm or contradict other elements of the investigation. But without it, prosecutors are then required to build their case in a different way and they have to rely on any totality of the evidence rather than just one single definitive source. In this case, that meant presenting a narrative that connected behavior, documentation, and physical evidence into a coherent sequence of events. So they focused on the timeline leading up to Irene's disappearance, including the fact that Kenneth Jr was living in her home and the steps that were taken to assume control over Irene and her property. They introduced the materials recovered from the vehicle, including Irene's personal documents, and they connected those items to the actions that were taken after she was last seen. The journals also played a significant role in establishing intent. They showed that the actions attributed to Sante were consistent with a broader pattern of planning and execution. Kenny's statements, even though they did have plenty of inconsistencies, provided additional context for events that had previously been pretty unclear. All of those elements allowed prosecutors to argue that Irene had been intentionally killed and that her disappearance could not be explained by any alternative scenario that fit the evidence they had.

Speaker 2:
[45:07] The defense approached the case from the opposite direction, focusing on the absence of direct physical proof. Without a body, they said, there's no way to definitively establish how Irene died or even to prove with absolute certainty that she was dead. This gap, of course, created space for alternative interpretations, which the defense used to challenge the prosecution's narrative and raise questions about whether the conclusions being drawn were supported by the available evidence. They argued that the case really relied too heavily on circumstantial connections and on statements that could not be independently verified. They pointed to the lack of forensic confirmation and suggested that the prosecution was asking the jury to make assumptions about what happened based on incomplete information. But despite those arguments, the overall weight of the evidence worked against that position. The combination of Irene's sudden disappearance, the presence of her personal documents in Sante and Kenny's possession, as well as the efforts to transfer ownership of her property, is really difficult to reconcile with any explanation that doesn't involve foul play. In the end, the jury reached a decision. Sante Kimes was convicted of murder. Later, she would also be convicted in connection with the killing of David Kazdin.

Speaker 1:
[46:17] After the trial, Sante was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. She spent the remainder of her life in custody, maintaining a level of composure that was consistent with exactly how she had presented herself throughout the investigation and trial, and really her whole life. There was no change in the way that she described her own actions or how she viewed the events that led to her conviction. In 2014, she died in prison at the age of 79. Kenneth Kimes Jr. also received a life sentence and remains in prison. His role in the case continues to be viewed through a really complicated lens. As we've been saying, on one hand, he was directly involved in these events that led to multiple deaths, but on the other hand, his life had been shaped from an early age by this environment that his mom had created and those expectations that she placed on him. Of course, that doesn't really absolve him of responsibility, and it doesn't resolve this question about whose fault is this, but it does add something to the context of how he came to be in this whole situation.

Speaker 2:
[47:21] This was really interesting as you were saying because of the dynamic of the mother and son. And even that she really did choose to start this life of crime with one of her sons and not the other, I found that to be really interesting. One thing her son did say in one of the documentaries is that, the son that's not in prison, is that he had no idea where his mom was from, where she lived, where she grew up. He knew nothing true about her. And he found out through a genealogy thing, a cousin reached out to him, and he found out, and I thought this was important in the story, that she had actually grown up on the streets in Los Angeles. So to survive, she was having to steal and stuff like that, but she was so jealous of these people that just had all these things and didn't understand why she couldn't. And so that kind of started from a very young age, her like obsession with having more, and it really carried her into adulthood, into prison, and eventually to killing people.

Speaker 1:
[48:15] Yeah, I just cannot really get my head around this one. This is definitely one of the stranger stories, I feel like, that we've covered. And one of the stranger cases I've ever heard of, is that it just really is stomach-churning to think about a mom getting her child involved in this, and especially that he's ended up in prison. I'm like, what kind of a monster, literally monster, would do this to their child? It's crazy. I mean, it's one thing for her to be involved in all this, but totally a different thing to involve your kid and everything that you're doing. So yeah, very, very interesting story.

Speaker 2:
[48:49] Agree.

Speaker 1:
[48:49] All right, guys, thank you so much for listening to this week's episode. We will be back next week. Same time, same place, new story.

Speaker 2:
[48:57] Have a great week.

Speaker 1:
[48:58] Bye.

Speaker 3:
[49:14] Ever open up your podcast app, scroll forever, and still not know what to listen to? And there are millions of podcasts, and most of them, they just don't grab you. That's why I created Something You Should Know. Every episode is built around surprising, useful, and fascinating ideas. We're consistently ranked in Apple's Top 200, with thousands of five-star reviews. But more importantly, people come back because they learn something interesting every time. If you're tired of searching, and you just want something good to listen to, try one episode of Something You Should Know, right here on the platform you're listening on right now.

Speaker 4:
[49:52] Life moves too fast. Scrolling, swiping, headlines, soundbites. Nobody's really seen. Even the people everyone thinks they know. I'm Evelyn, I'm a television producer and director, and I've spent decades behind the camera creating shows with people everyone knows. On the podcast Repin, I sit down with actors, creators and changemakers to hear their full story. The risks they took, the moments everything almost fell apart, and the lessons they live by. These are real conversations. No headlines and no soundbites. Just stories that show the human behind the success and gives you insights you can actually use in your own life. Every conversation is jammed packed with inspiration and practical lessons. Repin is about courage. It's about grit. It's about being human first. Listen to Repin wherever you get your podcasts.