Former CNN Anchor Susan Hendricks Spent 4 Months Lying To Turtleboy And Juror Paula Prado About Being Invited To Crime Con 

 

– Donate to the Turtleboy Legal Defense fund

–  Watch Framed 2 Video for Full Background on Canton Cover-Up Story

 

This is me and Susan Hendricks outside Norfolk Superior Courthouse on June 17 during jury deliberations in the Karen Read retrial.

Susan is a former news anchor for CNN who has become an “advocate for victims,” and recently published a book about the murders of 2 girls in Delphi, Indiana. She took the position that the defendant Richard Allen was guilty. I admittedly have not looked into that case as much as others, but there’s a lot of people I deeply respect (Attorneys Bob Motta, Allie Motta, and Andrea Burkhart) who firmly believe Allen is innocent. After the girls were murdered in 2017, Allen, an unassuming CVS employee with no history of violence, voluntarily went to police to offer his help. He told them that he was in the woods where they were found on the day they were killed. Five years later, without any new evidence, they arrested him and put him in solitary confinement, at which point he suddenly decided to confess to the murders to prison employees and his wife.

As a “victim’s advocate” many assumed Susan would take the position that Karen Read was guilty, because that’s what self-professed “victim’s advocates” like Julie Grant have done. However, Susan reached out to me in April of 2025 and told me she felt that Karen was being framed. She admittedly hadn’t watched the first trial, but watched every minute of the second trial, and was clearly a fan of my work. She interviews people at the annual Crime Con convention, and invited me to this year’s Crime Con in Denver on September 6. She said she wanted me to be on the main stage, since I was at the center of the biggest true crime story of the the year.

 

She had me on her show that was published after closing arguments on her YouTube channel:

She seemed legit. I had never heard of Crime Con before, but after looking into it it seemed like a good professional opportunity. Apparently people pay hundreds of dollars to go to this thing and meet attorneys, journalists, victims’ families, and true crime commentators. Susan told me that they would be flying me out there, putting me up in a hotel, and were so excited to have the guy on the main stage who helped spawn the biggest social movement in the country that ended with the acquittal of a framed woman.

On April 29 Susan told me that she had spoken with Crime Con and that I would be on the main stage on Saturday.

We had many conversations on the phone, and she appeared to be a big supporter of my work. She also had the professional bio to back it up, and claimed to have spoken with the decision makers at Crime Con, so I assumed I was going. This is during the school year so I made arrangements for child care, but kept it a secret because Susan told me that Crime Con wanted to make the big announcement themselves.

In the meantime, we continued to talk as the trial progressed, making fun of the anti-KR trolls who were attacking her for the crime of supporting Turtleboy and Karen Read.

On May 11 I asked her when Crime Con was going to make the announcement, since I wanted to tell my supporters. I knew that if I was going that hundreds, maybe even thousands of people would buy tickets who otherwise wouldn’t have gone. These people needed time to plan and make travel arrangements as well. Susan told me that she was going to speak with Kelly the producer and would let me know when I could announce. I specifically asked her if there was a chance that I wouldn’t be going to Crime Con because I didn’t wanna waste my time or get my hopes up. She told that she 100% believed it would be happening.

I didn’t hear back from her about her talk with Kelly, so on May 11 I asked her if she had heard from Crime Con. She called me after I texted and told me that it was a done deal but that I had to hold off on the announcement.

On May 27 I texted her again and asked if I could make the announcement since Crime Con hadn’t made any announcements yet. She specifically told me that I would be able to make the announcement some time in June, and once again reiterated that I was invited and would be on the main stage doing an interview with her. I told her that I’d had my chain jerked before and didn’t understand why they weren’t announcing it. Her reply spoke volumes:

“It’s not an empty promise!! I wouldn’t do that to you!”

Remember that one.

We continued to discuss the case as it progressed. She told me she was flying to Boston during jury deliberations and was going to be there for the verdict.

 

Susan witnessed firsthand the atmosphere outside of court. She interviewed several supporters, all of whom said that the reason they were there and knew about the case was because of Turtleboy. She saw what happened when I walked out of the courthouse after the verdict.

 

She agreed with me that Crime Con had just gotten a lot better.  On June 19 we spoke and she asked me if I could get Karen Read and her attorneys to come with me to Crime Con. I told her I’d bring it up with them in a few days once things settled down.

But after speaking with Karen it was clear that she wanted to lay low for a while and wouldn’t be doing any interviews. Shows and magazines were offering her a lot of money left and right, so she obviously wouldn’t be flying to Denver to speak for free at Crime Con.

Meanwhile, Susan continued to tell me about how she got close with the victims’ families in Delphi, and asked if she could send me her book. She also urged me to write a book and tried to hook me up with her editor.

 

 

 

Meanwhile, on June 23 she wrote an email to me that she wanted me to forward to Karen, inviting her to Crime Con. She included a reel that you can watch here, which turned out to be a rather cringe self-promotional video entirely about how awesome she was.

 

 

 

It seemed like a done deal. Quinn Hemphill from Crime Con sent her a speaker’s agreement for me, which explicitly stated that I was invited to Denver to be a speaker.

 

On July 1 Susan asked me if she could get juror #11 Paula Prado’s contact after my interview with her, because she wanted to invite Paula to be on the stage with me at Crime Con. I spoke with Paula and vouched for Susan, and she agreed to speak with her. It was difficult for Paula because she has 4 young children, but she worked out a childcare situation and accepted the offer from Susan.

 

On July 11 I once again asked her if I could make the announcement about Crime con. She spoke to me on the phone that night, once again told me that Crime Con was 100% happening, and that Paula was going to be joining us. I told her that unfortunately Karen and her team wouldn’t be able to attend, which she understood.

 

On July 14 she asked me for Bill and Nathan Read’s contact, hoping that maybe they could join us. I once again asked her if I could make the announcement soon, since Crime Con was a month and a half away. She told me in clear terms that I would be able to announce by Friday, July 18.

 

Then on July 17 she told me not to announce yet, because she had a “good update” and wanted to speak with on the phone.

 

By this point I was starting to get frustrated but didn’t wanna take it out on Susan, who seemed like she really liked and supported me. I spoke with her on the phone and told her I had been screwed over before by a lot of people, and that Crime Con needed to stop playing games. I told her I wanted to hear something definite from them so I didn’t get my hopes up. She once against reassured me in her response:

“I understand….that’s not me.”

On July 22 I once again texted her and asked her for an update on Crime Con. She blew me off by saying she was in Idaho for the Bryan Kohberger sentencing. All I wanted to know at this point was, am I going to Crime Con? This required a lot of planning on my part and she should have the decency to tell me. We didn’t end up speaking until after I got back from my vacation in Truro. But she told me specifically that Crime Con would be making the announcement on Monday, August 4, that I would be on the main stage at Crime Con with Paula Prado.

 

Susan didn’t call me on Monday so I reached out to her to find out what was going on. Once again, all I wanted to know was – am I invited?

 

As usual, she gave me the runaround all day Tuesday. I finally reached my breaking point and told her I was done playing these games and needed an answer. Despite blowing me off constantly, she told me she wasn’t blowing me off, then blew me off some more. She told me she’d call me at 4:15, but of course never did.

 

When I told her I was just going to announce that I was going to Crime Con at 7:30 she finally got back to me. She told me she was on the phone with Kelly from Crime Con and would be calling me back when she was done with her.

When we spoke Susan told me that I wasn’t going to Crime Con. She told me that they wanted Karen, or her lawyers, which is laughable that Crime Con thought they were relevant enough to get the first unpaid interview with the most sought after defendant in the world. Instead of apologizing to me Susan blamed Crime Con, and said “I know, I know” when I told her that I bring my own crowd and that Crime Con should be thanking their lucky stars that I would grace them with my presence. I have no idea what Susan had said to Kelly from Crime Con or how hard she tried to advocate for me. Hell, I didn’t even know if she had ever actually asked them if I could go. She may have just been a fan of mine who has nothing to do with inviting guests to the event, but overstepped her boundaries.

For that reason I asked her to get me in touch with Kelly directly. I could talk her into it, or at the very least find out if I had ever been invited in the first place. Susan told me that she would set up a 3 way text to introduce me. I have not heard from her since.

\

One of the following scenarios is likely what happened:

1. Susan was told by the Crime Con people to invite me as bait to try to get Karen Read to Crime Con, which they then cancelled when Karen said no.
2. Susan was a big fan of mine who wanted me to attend, but never actually spoke with anyone from Crime Con about me going, and instead lied to me for months because she assumed they wouldn’t be stupid enough to not want me there.

If it was the former, I’d expose Crime Con for lying to Susan and me about their motives. If the latter I’d be upset with her for lying to me for months, but she could at least apologize and we could move on.

Susan ignoring me the last 3 days gave me no choice. I didn’t wanna blast her like this because she was always nice to me. But at some point you have to stand up for yourself and you can’t allow other people to disrespect you like this. Blatantly ignoring me instead of trying to make this right is an extremely shitty thing to do to another person. Telling two parents that they are going to a conference 2000 miles from home, watching them rearrange their lives to make it happen, and then not having the dignity to respond to them when it all falls apart, speaks volumes about her character. She didn’t have to say these things:

“It’s not an empty promise!! I wouldn’t do that to you!”

“I understand….that’s not me.”

But she did. And she owed me an apology, which I would’ve accepted because people make mistakes. Unfortunately she didn’t have the dignity to do that because she’s a coward.

Truth be told, I would never have told this story at all if Susan had just responded to me. All I wanted was an apology and/or an explanation about everything that happened. But people like Susan are gutless, so they don’t have it in them to face the people they’ve wronged. So I’m publishing this story in case anyone else ever has the misfortune of dealing with her in a professional capacity, so that they can know what kind of person she truly is.