134: The Kidnapping of Jeremy London & a House Fire

Published: Aug. 5, 2020, 11:30 a.m.

Cameron Todd Willingham woke up to his two-year-old daughter screaming \u201cDaddy, Daddy!\u201d He sat up in bed, but was surrounded by smoke so thick he could barely see. He made his way out of the burning house and yelled for his neighbors to call the fire department. His two-year-old daughter and one-year-old twins were\xa0 trapped inside the home. Cameron dropped to his knees and cried. Firefighters arrived on the scene, but they couldn\u2019t save the children. All three of the Willingham children died in the fire. It was a tragedy, plain and simple. But a few days later, when arson investigators reviewed the scene, they were certain that the fire was set intentionally. Cameron had set the fire. But years later, certainty waned. Were those arson experts really experts, after all? \xa0\n
\n\nThen Brandi tells us a bizarre story about Seventh Heaven star Jeremy London. In 2010, Jeremy claimed that a group of men abducted him after they helped him change his flat tire. They forced him to do drugs and drink alcohol at gunpoint. He told them he was in recovery, but they didn\u2019t care. For twelve hours, they forced him to take drugs. He finally got free when one of the kidnappers took pity on him. Jeremy reported his story to the police, but he faced skepticism -- namely from his mom and twin brother. They thought his story sounded fishy. Perhaps Jeremy made the story up in order to cover up a relapse?\xa0\n
\n\nAnd now for a note about our process. For each episode, Kristin reads a bunch of articles, then spits them back out in her very limited vocabulary. Brandi copies and pastes from the best sources on the web. And sometimes Wikipedia. (No shade, Wikipedia. We love you.) We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the real experts who covered these cases.\n
\n\nIn this episode, Kristin pulled from:\nThe article \u201cTrial by Fire\u201d by David Grann in The New Yorker\nThe Frontline episode, \u201cDeath by Fire\u201d\xa0\n\u201cCameron Todd Willingham,\u201d entry on Wikipedia\n
\n\nIn this episode, Brandi pulled from:\n\u201cJeremy London: \u2018I Was So Scared\u2019\u201d by Michelle Tauber, People\n\u201cJeremy London Survives Bizarre Kidnapping Incident\u201d by Ken Lee, People\n\u201cJeremy London kidnapped, forced to do drugs, buy booze at gunpoint: report\u201d by Michael Sheridan, New York Daily News\n\u201cEXCLUSIVE: Hollywood Actor Jeremy London Kidnapped; Held At Gun Point, Robbed & Forced To Smoke Drugs\u201d Radar Online\n\u201cIs Jeremy London\u2019s Kidnapping Story Falling Apart?\u201d by Josh Grossberg, E! Online\n\u201cJeremy London\u2019s Mom: I Don\u2019t Want to Bury Another Child\u201d by Natalie Finn and Ken Baker, E! Online\n\u201cEXCLUSIVE JAILHOUSE INTERVIEW: Man Accused Of 'Kidnapping' Jeremy London Says 'We Partied All Night' -- He Took Ecstasy and Xanax\u201d Radar Online\n\u201cJeremy London: I\u2019m Vindicated in Kidnapping Case\u201d by Johnny Dodd, People