Victim slams true crime podcast for using her trauma as entertainment

• Sela Freuler attended a school for troubled girls that made headlines with the death of a student.
• When a true crime podcast used her story in an episode, she spoke out against the genre.
• She told Insider that she wishes true crime creators would be more considerate of survivors’ feelings.

Sela Freuler, a 30-year-old woman from Phoenix, Arizona, was the subject of an unexpected episode of the true crime podcast — and now she’s using her platform to speak out against the genre.

Freuler is a student at Lakeland College for Women in Florida, a college for at-risk teens closed earlier this year rear A 17-year-old girl named Naomi Wood has died 2020 under its care.

She was a student at the school from 2007 to 2009, was open to criticism of the school, and Publish paper online and talk to a few people information Outlets about how the school works.she also Made on TikTok Feelings about how she was ignored by the institution while she was a student there. But when the “Popcorn Murders” podcast used her experience as the basis for an episode, she wasn’t happy.

The 30-year-old TikToker told Insider that she thinks the true crime genre should focus more responsibly on platform crimes and tragedies, and respect the victims mentioned in the episodes.

Floyler said it was “very upsetting” to hear her story being retold without her consent

Douyin video In a Nov. 10 post, Freuler said several true crime podcasts tried to tell her story without contacting her, but she singled out one show she found particularly offensive, called “Popcorn.” Murder Stories” — a relatively small show featuring two named Emily and Megan (whose surnames have been withheld due to privacy concerns amid ongoing backlash) and 142 episode Back in 2019. The description for the show on Apple’s podcasts page describes it as a “mostly real” crime podcast.

In a recording of the episode in which Freuler reacts on her TikTok, the host can be heard describing Freuler as a “monster” and making untrue claims about her.

Some of the information in the podcast appears to have been pulled from Freuler’s TikTok videos, many of which discuss the situation with ease, but Freuler told Insider that the host added her own jokes, which made her uncomfortable, as if the host Did not take her story seriously. She also accused them of blaming the victim for her actions.

“It’s one thing for a victim or survivor to talk about their own experiences and use humor. But it’s a completely different thing when other people talk about your insecurities or your experiences with the same level of demeaning humor. It doesn’t make sense,” she said.

Freuler said the podcast host did not contact her for comment or to be interviewed for the episode, which was first released in late 2021 but was deleted shortly after she mentioned the podcast on TikTok about a year later.

“It’s frustrating to hear a complete stranger’s fictional account of your life,” she told Insider.

After Floyler’s video went viral, garnering 260,000 views, the “popcorn murder story” garnered a ton of attention. Negative comments on Apple Podcasts, as people called the show “immoral” and “disrespectful” of its victims. Its entire backend directory has been removed from all platforms.

On November 23, Freuler published a follow-up report video Says one of the podcast hosts apologized to her in a private email, a screenshot of which Insider has seen.

In a statement to Insider, Emily said she and Meghan intended to “amplify” the victim’s voice by discussing Floyler’s video, not to “sham her.”

“We take Sela’s concerns very seriously, so when we heard from her audience that she was unhappy with our coverage of Naomi’s case, we wanted to respect her plea for accountability,” she said, adding, “We tried to State the situation. It deserves careful thought, and when we did, it became clear that this was part of a wider conversation about whether humor is appropriate in the true crime arena – so in the spirit of harm reduction, we decided it would be best to also listen to the podcast at all decline.”

Freuler’s experience with the podcast is representative of a broader problem with the way true-crime content treats trauma as entertainment, she said.

Freuler said she sees the humor used in the “Popcorn Murders” episode as emblematic of true crime content increasingly blending entertainment and reality, pointing to recent trends such as Content creators are putting on makeup When explaining criminal events or using comedy to discuss them.

“It creates a kind of desensitization, so it feels more like they’re talking about horror movies that you can enjoy and watch with popcorn, rather than real life,” she said.

While “Popcorn Murder Stories” is a smaller show than many mainstream true-crime podcasts and TV shows, which largely adhere to higher standards of fact-checking, Freuler said she believes her incident with the podcast Suggests that there is a widespread lack of accountability for entire types of victims.

The life and crimes of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer came under fire recently for the Netflix adaptation, when relatives of the victims spoke go out be opposed to.Rita Isbell, sister of one of Dahmer’s victims, Errol Lindsey, said the show She was not contacted but described the scene of her making a statement impacting Dahmer’s sentencing in 1992. The show’s creator, Ryan Murphy, said his team contacted “about 20” families of the victims, but no one responded to them, In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

In this case, Freuler said, she believes true crime creators have a responsibility to weigh the impact of their content and do their best to ensure that the authentic voices of victims and survivors are heard.

“If you’re going to use someone’s real-life experience as a theme, you should really consider what they’re thinking and feeling,” she told Insider.

Freuler said she continues to use TikTok to share her story.

“I think being able to tell your own story in your own words and find a community through social media with people who have been through similar things is effective,” she said.

For more stories like this, check out coverage from Insider’s digital culture team here.