S1 Episode 2: “I’m a Murderer”

Kiah Penfield (00:00:00) - Welcome to Stand Our Ground. I'm your host, Kiah, and I'm so grateful that you've decided to join me as I investigate the murder of my cousin, Deanna Stevison. This podcast does discuss domestic violence and includes events and descriptions that some listeners may find triggering. So please listen with caution. If you need to talk with someone about the content of this podcast or something that it brings up for you, please call 988 in the United States to reach the mental health crisis line or text HOME to 741741. As a reminder, all individuals discussed in this podcast are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Today on Stand Our Ground, we'll begin to delve into the police interviews to get a better picture of what happened on June 8th, 2017, and the contradictions in the stories told by Meghan and Amy and Ollie Jane Plunkett in their interviews.

Ollie Jane Plunkett (00:01:05) - I'm a murderer.

Amy Plunkett (00:01:07) - Stop, stop.

Kiah (00:01:09) - The clip you just heard is from Ollie Jane Plunkett's police interview after investigator Jimmie Tatum had left and allowed Amy to come into the room to comfort her mother.

Kiah (00:01:17) - They had both already had DNA taken and their hands swabbed for gunshot residue. Although technically he did try to bring Amy to Ollie Jane before either of them had had that done. But before they spoke, they did have that done. Last week, I told you the story from the police interviews in my words. This week you're going to hear the story in their words. Now, I've taken clips from all three police interviews and compiled them together in a way that I think tells the story as authentically as possible, while allowing you to hear their words and their voices. I've compiled everything as chronologically as I can, although there are a couple places where their statements overlap, there's some places where their statements contradict. And at several points as you're listening to this, I'm going to interrupt and interject to comment on either if we have evidence about an assertion, to talk about a contradiction, to share my concerns, or at the beginning, just to let you know whose voice you're hearing. All of these interviews were obtained from Escambia County Sheriff's Office through a public records request, and have been appropriately redacted, according to Florida state law.

Kiah (00:02:21) - Just as a note, I have removed as much of Investigator Jimmie Tatum's voice as I can because we're going to be dealing with him in a later episode. Some of the things he says during the interviews, as well as leads that may or may not have been followed up on, and disciplinary action taken against him years after the murder. I do want to add a disclaimer that I'm aware that things happened very quickly in this situation. No matter what occurred, adrenaline would have been pumping, and it's hard to say whether or not some of the contradictions that we're going to hear are due to completely normal things that happen in the brain when you witness a violent crime, or if they are significant and tell us that there's something more going on, but we can't know because they were never interviewed again to see if their stories stayed consistent. They were never asked some basic questions, like how many gunshots there were, and there are many questions that arise from the interviews that were never followed up on, even after a later witness came forward with concerns about what she saw that morning.

Kiah (00:03:16) - There's a lot of raw emotion in these audio files, and I just want to make sure that we're respectful of the people who went through this, if indeed it was a terrible thing that happened. As well as being respectful of Deanna's family and friends who are now hearing, possibly for the first time, some of the audio of people recounting what happened the night that she was killed. If you're someone who was close to Deanna, please keep in mind that this episode may be especially triggering for you. Um, and listen with caution. With all that said, let's hear what was said just hours after the murder occurred on June 8th, 2017. The first voice you're going to hear is that of Meghan Wojdyla recounting her history with Deanna and the reasons that she filed a restraining order.

Meghan Wojdyla (00:03:59) - She would yell, scream, try and hit me. She had been abusive, had pushed me down, had grabbed me by the throat a couple of times.

Amy Plunkett (00:04:05) - And she was verbally, physically, mentally abusive.

Kiah (00:04:08) - That's Amy, Meghan's fiancée and former employee of Escambia County Sheriff's Office.

Amy (00:04:13) - And finally got to the point where it got so bad--because they have a house. But it got so bad with Meghan staying there that she moved in with me and my mom and has been there since the middle of February.

**Meghan ** (00:04:26) - Um, and so I just, I felt unsafe and, um, not safe in my home. So that's when I finally thought I was done with this. I need--something needs to happen.

Amy (00:04:37) - Meghan filed a restraining order against her.

Meghan (00:04:38) - I did the restraining order. Um, she went and stayed wherever she went and stayed. And then we went to court. And then it was... There wasn't enough evidence.

Amy (00:04:47) - Deanna's attorney, the only three things they talked about was whether Meghan was in a new relationship, my name, and if my car was at the house, you know, their house the morning of court. So nothing was talked about for the abuse or anything like that. So it was dropped.

Kiah (00:05:01) - If you recall from last week's episode, we read through Meghan's statement on the restraining order, and there's specifics included in this interview that weren't included on that form, which is the reason that it was dropped.

Kiah (00:05:12) - Which makes me wonder if Meghan had those specific instances that she could point to of Deanna being abusive. Why did she not document them for the court in order to protect herself through the restraining order? Amy also mentions that Deanna's lawyer focused on other things rather than the abuse, which is exactly what a lawyer should do if they're defending Deanna. But what about Meghan's representation? Did Meghan have representation? I, I don't know. I know that her family had money and that it was within her means to obtain a lawyer if she needed one, if she did, or even if she didn't, why was her side not bringing up the abuse? Why was her side not telling these specific stories that she tells in these interviews? Now it is worth mentioning that I don't have any records from this hearing in which the order for protection was dismissed, but I have been to a hearing about whether or not to allow an order of protection for domestic violence to continue, and it is not possible to make that decision without allowing for some opportunity for evidence and testimony of the alleged domestic violence to take place.

Meghan (00:06:11) - So then it was thrown out, and then she stayed in the house. And I didn't say back in the house after that, and I know she worked last night. And the last thing she I talked to her, she had asked me to go feed the dogs, um, that are at our house. Her two dogs, um, and I told her, okay, I wasn't going to be able to make it. Then her mom said she was going to go do it. So I put my house key at her mom's house, and that was the last I had talked to her.

Amy (00:06:35) - She was mad because Meghan wouldn't go to the house and feed Deanna's dogs. And then it went downhill from there.

Amy (00:06:43) - I shouldn't say downhill. They just... She called her a couple of times and then she quit. She quit calling after she hung up, after Deanna hung up on Meghan.

Kiah (00:06:51) - At this point, we're going to move into the events of the morning of June 8th, and you're going to hear from Amy first. But the next voice you're going to hear is going to be Ollie Jane Plunkett. That's Amy's mom. That's the person whose name is on the lease for the apartment that this all occurred at.

Amy (00:07:04) - We were we were all sleeping.

Ollie Jane Plunkett (00:07:07) - I was sleeping on my couch like I always do. The doorbell rang. And... I woke Amy up, I think.

Amy (00:07:15) - My alarm was going off. I have to be at work at six, and I was, um, just getting out of bed, about to get out, and my mom knocks on the bedroom door and ask us. She wakes us. Well, I'm already getting up and asks if we're expecting anybody. I said no, why? "Somebody is knocking and banging on the door."

Meghan (00:07:35) - I was sleeping and I heard Amy's mom come in and say, someone's at the door.

Amy (00:07:41) - So naturally, I grabbed my gun. It's still dark outside, and I go to the door and it's Deanna, my fiancée's ex. I mean, the car was still running, and she... Was she drunk? I think she was drunk.

Kiah (00:07:54) - You're gonna hear Deanna's blood alcohol level questioned a few times, so let's go ahead and just address it now. I had a forensic scientist who works in applied consent, which is the section of toxicology that deals with drinking and driving look at the toxicology report done on Deanna. They estimate based on the blood levels reported in her--or sorry, the alcohol levels reported in her blood and her vitreous humor that she was around 0.15 or 0.17 at the time that the incident occurred, which would have been about 3 or 4 beers or six shots if four hours had passed before the first drink. Now that would have been a normal drinking level. Not an unusual level. Definitely not something you should drive at, but something that would have made her easy to subdue.

Amy (00:08:35) - First she starts asking, is this where Amy Plunkett lives? Because it's still dark? I don't know, because I have the door cracked about this much. So my gun is beside me and I was like, you need to leave.

Amy (00:08:44) - You know you're not welcome here. You need to leave. "I'm not leaving. Where's Meg?" I was like, she's not coming out. You need to leave. So I shut the door and I lock it, and, uh, and I walk off and she starts ringing the doorbell, continuously banging back on the door. So I come back over and I set my gun on the TV stand or whatever that's by the front door, by the TV.

Kiah (00:09:08) - Not once in this investigation is Amy asked why she chose to put her gun down. Now, police and military training, which Amy has tell you not to lay your weapon down when this situation is occurring. But I don't need to tell you that because probably without any police or military training, you have the idea that this is a bad decision to set your gun down when someone is at your house that you are not expecting, they're there in the early hours of morning. They appear to be intoxicated. They're asking for an individual who has tried to get an order of protection against them for alleged domestic violence, and not only does Amy put the weapon down, she puts it on the table between the front door and the TV.

Kiah (00:09:48) - That's a table where she is putting the gun in between Deanna and herself, in between Deanna and Meghan directly at the entrance to the apartment where if Deanna is going to be able to enter, she will have access to that weapon.

Amy (00:10:02) - And I opened the door.

Ollie Jane (00:10:03) - When she opened the door something, or if somebody tried to come charging in.

Amy (00:10:09) - And I'm like, you need to leave. You know you're not welcome here. I don't know why you're here. I'm not leaving until maybe to come out about that time. Meghan comes out, like from the bedroom and comes out the front door, and then she gets real close and gets up in my face. Deanna does, okay? Meghan's still behind me because I'm not letting her out in the doorway.

Meghan (00:10:31) - And they started screaming and yelling. And then Deanna said, take me home, take me home. So I was trying to calm her down because I believe she was drunk. I'm not really sure, but she reeked.

Jimmie Tatum (00:10:41) - Did Deanna step up into the door?

Amy (00:10:43) - She stepped up to the door.

Amy (00:10:45) - At this point, Meghan had--we had stepped out onto the stoop and then, um, she grabbed Meghan and was like, come on, take me home. And I'm like, get your hands off of her. And I snatched Meghan back, and about that time she shoved my face and then it was all over from there. We fought all over. Um, she was punching me. We fell. I hit my head on the windowsill, the big window.

Meghan (00:11:11) - She. I got in between her and Amy because they were screaming at each other. And I said, you need to leave. You need to go get in your car and go.

Ollie Jane (00:11:20) - And she was screaming at her to get out. Get off the porch, get away. The girl, I don't know, she just started beating on everybody.

Meghan (00:11:29) - And then she jumped through me and was attacking Amy and grabbing Amy by the neck and was choking her.

Ollie Jane (00:11:34) - And then I went out there to try to help them.

Amy (00:11:37) - My mom is trying to come out and I tell her we're telling her to get back in. I'm trying to tell Meghan to get back in. She's trying. She's trying to get in between Deanna and I.

Ollie Jane (00:11:45) - She started beating on me.

Meghan (00:11:47) - I believe she went after her mom.

Ollie Jane (00:11:49) - I was half in my house and half on the porch. She was pulling me out. Just started punching, and had me--got me in a corner and started. She, I don't I honestly, I don't know. She had me at one point... I don't know. She tore my glasses off my face and broke my phone.

Kiah (00:12:13) - It's worth noting that Ollie Jane's glasses were found in the corner that she says she was in at this point. But they weren't broken. There weren't even any scratches on the lenses. All three of the phones Ollie Jane's, Meghan's, and Amy's were found in the residence undamaged. Ollie Jane's was found sitting on a living room end table. So in order to believe that the phone was taken by Deanna and thrown, we have to also believe that between this event and the police arrival, someone picked it up and just set it neatly on the table.

Ollie Jane (00:12:40) - And I was hollering somebody call the police.

Amy (00:12:42) - And she's just steadily swinging. And by this point, she has got me in a chokehold where I can't breathe like she's got me down and pinned to where I can't breathe. And digging into.

Meghan (00:12:53) - Like, her arms wrapped around her neck. And Amy was falling down.

Amy (00:12:55) - I started, like, blacking out and she wasn't stopping. Meghan was screaming for her to stop. My mom was screaming.

Kiah (00:13:04) - Now admittedly, I am not a forensic investigator. I don't have any medical training, but I have seen images before of people who have been choked and the images of Amy's neck do not match the wound pattern. Now they do match two necklaces being torn off of her neck, which you will testify happens. There's, um, kind of a rope burn type of wound. Um, some red marks around it, but there's no bruising. There's no there's nothing to indicate that a sustained, strong effort was made around the circumference of her neck. And if you are somebody who has that training and you'd like to look at them, please contact me.

Kiah (00:13:42) - I would love to get your opinion on it.

Amy (00:13:43) - Like she was not letting go and we had already called the police, but...

Meghan (00:13:47) - I don't know if it was like this or if her hand. I believe her hand was like this and the other arm was around it like this.

Amy (00:13:54) - She was beside me, but Meghan was trying to break us up, so she had it through there.

Tatum (00:13:58) - Did she have you--did she have you by her hand?

Amy (00:14:01) - Yeah, by her hand. And then she I guess she had from I was looking up, you know, I was trying to calm it to where I could breathe because I couldn't breathe.

Ollie Jane (00:14:12) - I seen her, she would go from one to the other. She had she had one of them down with, with her arm around her neck and they were gasping.

Amy (00:14:26) - And um, by this point we had the chair was everywhere, we had fallen and we had went to the ground at some point.

Meghan (00:14:32) - And then they were falling. So then I was trying to pry Deanna off of her, and I was telling her stop, stop.

Kiah (00:14:37) - It's also worth noting that there are no wounds on Deanna's body or in the autopsy report that would indicate somebody has been trying to pull her off of someone, that she might be choking, which at the very least, Meghan has said she has done Ollie Jane doesn't seem to remember, but definitely tried to get in between them or stop it in some way before she ended up doing what we're going to hear next.

Ollie Jane (00:14:59) - I broke loose and I was going in the house.

Meghan (00:15:03) - And I don't know who got the gun, I don't know, I don't know if her mom got it out or if Amy got it out before then. I'm not really sure.

Ollie Jane (00:15:11) - I didn't want to hurt anybody. So I picked up the gun and shot a warning shot.

Kiah (00:15:19) - Ollie Jane is going to repeatedly say that she shot a warning shot, but witnesses who called 911 at the time said that they heard three shots back to back to back, and four bullet casings were found on location, one in the apartment and three outside on the porch.

Ollie Jane (00:15:35) - I really did, and I don't know if it ricocheted through the storage door or not.

Kiah (00:15:45) - So the shot that went towards the storage door went all the way through the door and hit the wall at the back of the storage area. We have evidence of that. The bullet was lodged in there. There are also two bullets lodged in Deanna's body, and there's one that seems unaccounted for. Now, what's interesting to me is that Ollie Jane is so distraught through all of this. She keeps saying she doesn't really know what happened, but she knows to say that perhaps the bullets ricocheted, which is not something that the majority of people would think of when they're trying to figure out what happened. But Amy is going to later, when she speaks with her mother, bring up that they may have ricocheted. Which leads me to believe that perhaps they had a conversation before the police arrived in which Amy told her the bullets ricocheted. The bullets ricocheted because Ollie Jane knew to say that exact word during her police interview.

Amy (00:16:35) - And then I heard the shots, and I woke up and my mom had shot her because we were on the ground.

Amy (00:16:41) - She still had her hand around my throat.

Meghan (00:16:43) - I never saw it. I had no clue who even had it.

Ollie Jane (00:16:46) - I don't remember, I remember... I don't remember doing it. I remember firing a shot at the door thinking that will scare her off. That'll do it. Hell, I was more scared of shooting it than anything--her beating on me.

Kiah (00:17:02) - The next clip you're going to hear is very quiet. I've increased the volume as much as I can. Um, it does take place after Ollie Jane and Amy's interviews have already occurred. It's while Amy is speaking with Ollie Jane in the interview room, and you hear her explaining to Ollie Jane that the bullets may have ricocheted. This is the conversation that I referenced previously, and which is why I think that perhaps Amy had this conversation with her mom before the police picked her up and is reminding her of the story. Um, it's also interesting to me that Ollie Jane asks if it's even possible for the bullets to ricochet.

Kiah (00:17:38) - Um, I suppose right, that could be due to being in shock of of you've just you've just killed someone and not meant to. But with all of the other details of this case, it's a lot harder for me to give that innocent explanation to it.

Ollie Jane (00:17:51) - But I don't remember shooting her or anything.

Amy (00:17:54) -Mm, they ricocheted. That's what happened, you didn't shoot at her.

Amy (00:18:00) - They ricocheted off the door.

Ollie Jane (00:18:02) - I just looked down and I seen the gun in my hand.

Amy (00:18:07) - But I've already told them that they're gonna probably start harassing us.

Ollie Jane (00:18:14) - Maybe the bullets did ricochet off the metal doors.

Kiah (00:18:18) - That they that you hear Amy reference here is Deanna's family. Before Deanna's family can even be notified that she's deceased, Amy is already telling the police they are going to harass us.

Amy (00:18:30) - After I heard the shots. Um. I was...

Amy (00:18:33) - She stopped fighting. I looked down and then I started rendering aid to Deanna. I told mom to go sit down and put the gun up, you know, because I looked up when she stopped and I had seen a little bit. But I didn't know right then that she was, you know, she was shot.

Amy (00:18:48) - I looked and I seen the one in the shoulder and then this one, and I immediately covered them and started rendering aid.

Tatum (00:18:56) - Okay. Even though she had just attacked you?

Amy (00:18:59) - Even though she had just attacked me.

Tatum (00:19:01) - What was Meghan doing at this time?

Ollie Jane (00:19:03) - Meghan was saying: call an ambulance, call an ambulance.

**Meghan ** (00:19:06) - After that, Amy knelt down by her and was trying to cover her up. Um, and then there was blood everywhere, obviously. And then she yelled to me, go get a towel, go get a towel. So I went and got a towel for her.

Amy (00:19:17) - Trying to get my mom to sit down and calm down and, you know, pacing, getting me a towel. They got me--she got me a towel to put on her to cover the wounds. And you know, this is all new to her, right? So she was doing whatever I was, you know, trying to get mom to calm down because mom was just pacing back and forth with, you know, she was in shock.

Meghan (00:19:36) - And then she was doing that. And then I was outside the whole time after that, just waiting. I oh, I called 911.

Kiah (00:19:43) - So Ollie Jane reports that Meghan was calling for someone to call an ambulance. Amy says that Meghan was following her lead and providing aid, but never mentions the 911 call. And Meghan says that she was outside the entire time and then spontaneously adds, oh, I called 911. My public records request provided me with four, 911 calls, two from before the incident occurred and two from after. None of them were were by Meghan. Um, I did email the Escambia County Sheriff's Office about this to try and get Meghan's 911 call, and this is their response: "The Escambia County Sheriff's Office is not the 911 call center. Therefore, if Meghan would've called 911, it would initially go through the emergency communications center. Then either the call would be transferred to our agency, or EMS would contact us directly in order for law enforcement assistance to be provided. In this case, per the computer Aided Dispatch report, it looks as though EMS contacted our agency. Any calls held by our agency were previously provided."

Kiah (00:20:41) - After that, they give me the contact information for the 911 communication center. When I contact them, they tell me that after a year they delete 911 calls so they don't have a copy. Now, what this email means is that if Meghan did call 911, the Escambia County Sheriff's Office did not find it pertinent to their investigation and therefore did not obtain a copy of it. I find that extremely concerning. The only other possibility is that Meghan did not call 911, which means she lied in her interview with Jimmie Tatum, and this was never followed up on or questioned, which I also find extremely concerning. I don't have any answers on this, so I guess I'm going to have to leave you here. Now, after listening to those police interviews, I was left with a lot more questions than answers. Chief among them, did Meghan actually call 911? And if she did, what happened to that call? How many gunshots were there? Was there a warning shot? Why were they back to back to back if there was a warning shot? Did the bullets actually ricochet? Because if so, there's no evidence of them that I can find.

Kiah (00:21:54) - Why did Amy lay down her gun before things went south? And finally, what is going on in this investigation? Next week on Stand Our Ground, we're going to be looking at the testimony of witness Skipper, who called 911 and reported seeing Amy moved Deanna's body, but wasn't interviewed by police until after Deanna's family contacted the police about a post that they had seen on social media through a mutual friend. I was able to connect with Skipper through text recently, so we'll also hear about investigator Jimmie Tatum's response to the information she provided and whether or not she feels that his investigative report accurately characterizes the statement that she gave him. Now, as a reminder, all individuals discussed in this podcast are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. I'd also like to thank all of you for listening. If you can spare the time to share this podcast, you leave a review. It could help bring more attention to Deanna's case, which I would personally really appreciate. If you have any questions or you have any information that's worth sharing, please contact me at Stand Our Ground podcast at gmail dot com.

Kiah (00:22:57) - All references for this episode can be found in the show notes. As a reminder, you're going to hear Deanna's voice at the beginning of the outro, giving her traditional family and friends toast. Here's Deanna and thanks for listening.

Deanna (00:23:09) - Here's to you, here's to me. Friends and family we shall always be. If we ever disagree, fuck you, and here's to me.

Kiah (00:23:16) - Stand Our Ground is written and produced by Kiah Penfield. Our theme music is Lifelike by Alexi Action Background Music. You can find us on social media by going to at Stand Our Ground on TikTok or searching Stand Our Ground podcast on Facebook. You can also email us at Stand Our Ground podcast at gmail dot com.