May 5, 2025 • 45 mins
Madison Conradis had her life turned upside down when someone began posting naked photos of her online. Soon, the abuse intensified with anonymous messages and calls to her family, friends and even her boss…
The police didn’t seem to care, so Madison turned to her twin sister Christine for help. Together, they transformed into online sleuths, tracking the harasser across the country to get justice for Madison and other victims too.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, a quick heads up.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Our story today is about online harassment and cyberstalking and
includes a little bit of strong language. It also briefly
mentions sexual assault, including that of a minor. But despite
all of this, it's one epic story involving some incredible
online saluting.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I had just woken up, so I was laying in
bed scrolling my phone.
Speaker 4 (00:29):
Saw I had a message.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
There are moments that divide your life into before and after.
For Madison, that moment came one morning with an unexpected
message from someone she knew in college.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
Hey, I don't know if you know that your photos
are online, but there's some few nude photos of you
and they're asking for more and they're starting to give
out your information and asking people to obtain more. Immediately,
your heart dropped and you're like, what the fuck is
(01:04):
going on? You know? So I immediately was like, hey,
can you send me the links to whatever website you
saw it on?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
And that's when Madison sees it, a nude photo of
herself from a boudohile shoot, a photo she had never
expected to see out there on the internet. At first,
she just ignores it, but that single post quickly spirals
into something much much darker. It begins seeping into every
(01:32):
aspect of Madison's life, to.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
The point where, like when you googled my name, it
was popping up on the first page of Google. What's
the first thing people do when you meet someone, if
you start dating someone, if you become friends with someone,
you go home and google them.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Right When Madison turns to the police for help, she's dismissed,
told there's no crime here, and yet the harassment keeps mounting.
Her photos are reposted in the same thread thousands of times.
So she turns to the person who's literally always since
conception been at her side, her twin sister Christine. Together
(02:12):
they track down Madison's harasser and hold him to account
and free other women from his digital abuse. To I'm
Anison Field and from the teams at Novel and iHeart Podcasts,
this is the Girlfriend's Spotlight, where we tell stories of
(02:35):
women women today, Madison and Christine become digital detectives. Madison
(03:00):
and Christine Conradis are identical twins.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
I technically was born first. I wasn't supposed to be first,
but it's how it ended up shaking out.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
That's Madison speaking, and I'm gonna have to say this
a lot, because they are identical in voice as much
as they are in their looks.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
I am technically the older one, but Christine definitely has
more of like the older sibling qualities. She always like
kind of protected me as a kid, so she was
always kind of although we were, you know, one minute apart,
she was kind of like the more motherly concerned twin.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Both sisters are blonde and chipper.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
They share the same sense of humor and grew up
in Florida as you were like kind of getting older.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Did you guys remain close or were you ever at war?
Speaker 4 (03:44):
Was?
Speaker 3 (03:45):
No, we were pretty close. I mean, like all siblings fight.
Like I remember us getting into a fight in the
parking lot.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Of high school. That's Christine and getting in trouble, but.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
The principal calling our parents and being like, okay, they're sisters,
but if they weren't, they would probably be suspended. Like
you can't like hit someone even in the car in.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Your parking lot, you know.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
So you know, we've had our fights, like every sibling,
but we've always remained close.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Christine, naturally, was the first person Madison turned to when
she found out her nude photos had been posted on
some dodgy website, and it wasn't just photos, it was
also her personal details and a call out for other
people to send more pictures of her.
Speaker 3 (04:25):
It was like four Chan, and there was a few others.
I think it like motherless Me, so all the typical
sites that schedule shit happened.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Four Chan is a website where people can post photos
completely anonymously, and that means although the site is on
the open Web, there's some very dark stuff on there,
discussions of things like rape and murder and sexual images
of women taken without their consent.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
And they're cataloging them by area code, so like, for example,
Madison is in let's just make up an area code
in four two one, right, so it would be like
fourty one area code in the US, and you would
go into that sub category and there would be like
different women posted by different anonymous users with usually their
(05:13):
first name and maybe last initial and a photos. And
these people are almost utilizing it like baseball cards or
Pokemon cards that are like, hey, I have Madison C.
Anybody got more of her? Or I have Ashley S.
Does anybody have Christine C?
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Like yeah, like after I mean, it's sunk in really scary.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
You're like, what the fuck do I do? What did
you do? After you found out about these images?
Speaker 3 (05:43):
So I definitely kind of like creeped around the websites
a little bit, and I think we kind of both
were like, let's just wait it out, see what happens. Yeah,
I think at first the advice was kind of like, Okay,
take a beat, let's just ignore it. These type of people,
the more you give it attention gonna fuel the fire.
Just ignore it, it'll go away. Not that many people
(06:05):
on these websites like, it's not a medal, right.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
We hear the term revenge porn a lot in the
media and pop culture, but the more accurate way to
describe this kind of thing is non consensual pornography. And
in the early twenty tens, when Madison found her photos online,
the amount of this non consensual pornography being published to
sites like four Chan was really ramping up. In the beginning,
(06:29):
the sisters thought it might be something that could just
fizzle out, but it didn't.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
It only got worse.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
In this case, this person was posting several times a day,
by the end, one hundreds thousands of times a day,
and so this person was creating a collage, and in
the collage would be a picture of Madison from her
linked in profile picture and maybe like a Facebook page,
and then her nude photos. And then it was telling
everyone where she worked, what her home address was, what
(06:59):
her parents it's address was, all the contact information of
everyone that she knows and loves, and then there was
usually a call to action of like go harass her,
go call her work, And that's when it got really bad.
So I was getting anonymous messages along with our mother, father,
close friends of her actual nude photos.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I mean, Madison, you must have been terrified. That's so scary.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Yeah, it's definitely terrifying in the sense of I didn't
know who it was. So I think that's the most
terrifying aspect of it, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:35):
Is that it could be anyone.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
It could be a family member, it could be a friend,
It could be the person walking behind you, It could
be a receptionist at your dentist office. Like you have
no idea who it is. I would have a reoccurring
nightmare and a masked person with a hood in all black,
(08:01):
couldn't see the person's face, just like hovering over me,
and it was so realistic that there were many times
where I woke up like jumped up, screamed, slammed the door.
And it obviously that stemmed directly from my issues that
I was having dealing with this person harassing and stalking me,
(08:23):
not know who it was.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
The first thing Madison tried to do was figure out
who was behind this, but the photos themselves didn't offer
any clues about who posted them. She'd never shared them
with anyone. She had a signed contract with the photographer
that explicitly said pictures were not to be posted online
without prior consent, so either the photographer had given them
(08:46):
to this harasser, which seemed unlikely because that would be
a breach of the contract, or someone stole them from
the photographer's password protected online folder. Madison was inundated with
phone calls, tech messages, emails, Instagram dms, Facebook dms commenting
on the photos and demanding more of them. She changed
(09:08):
her phone number and email address, and deleted many of
her social media accounts to try and make the torments stop,
until eventually Madison decided to take this to the police.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
The first time I went into the Melbourne Police Department,
I was alone, so I walk in and I said, Hey,
I'm being harassed stopped. Is there's something you can do
to help me?
Speaker 4 (09:34):
I need?
Speaker 3 (09:34):
I would like to fill out a police report and possibly,
you know, try to find the person that's doing this.
I brought a few screenshots printed out on paper, and
he kind of just flipped through it and was like,
where did he get the photos or where did they
get the photos? I don't think this is a crime.
I'm not going to give you a police report to
fill out. Any sort of victim chreaming you can think of.
(09:58):
Was said, well, you shouldn't have take in those pictures,
et cetera, et cetera. So I kind of tail between
my legs walked out of the police office that day
and felt very defeated. Called Christine. That's when Christine was like, ah,
that's bullshit.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Oh and did I mention Christine's in law school and
she's got some new knowledge to flex.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
I kind of emailed them and just ripped them a
new one of like, Hey, if you need resources or training,
I'm sure I can find someone for you. I would
be happy to educate your police officers.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Christine had done some digging and found the Florida Statute
which specifically says that this is a crime.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
And this was a really new law at the time,
so I cited the law and was like, read it.
They didn't really take too kindly to that, but I
knew that would piss them off, and it did.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
But ultimately she did get a police report filed.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Nothing was done, but at least, you know, she was
given the privilege to fill that form out.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
And then nothing happened. But things seemed to die down.
The photos weren't being posted as regularly, and Madison tried
to move on, tried to put it behind her. Around
this time, she also started dating a guy. It was
a long distance relationship and for a little while at
least life almost felt like normal again.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
We had fun, we went out, went to sporting events,
hockey games, basketball games, football games, just you know, a
typical fun twenties relationship. He was my best friend at
that time, besides Christine.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
Obviously, not long after they got together, her new boyfriend
brought it up. He had seen those nude photos of
Madison and asked her about them, and so she told
him about the years of harassment that she had endured,
and he was the perfect boyfriend about it. Angry on
her behalf outraged that this had happened. He told her
(11:58):
that he wanted to help, he wanted to protect her.
But you know the unsettling calm after a storm. Yeah,
that's the trick, because the storm is far from over,
not even close. One day, seven years after the harassment started,
(12:20):
Madison saw new photos being posted on those sites again.
This time these photos were recent ones, and there's only
one person who could be behind it.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
There was no doubt in my mind it was him,
like he was the only one that had those photographs
and videos.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
It looks like her best friend, her boyfriend of more
than three years, has betrayed her in the most brutal
way imaginable. After the break, Madison confronts her boyfriend.
Speaker 5 (13:03):
Glad you have got you, gat you, I've got you.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
In twenty eighteen, Madison's worst nightmare came true. The anonymous
online harasser had obtained new, more intimate photos of her.
These were images she had only ever shared with her boyfriend.
Their relationship was up and down, on and off by
this point, but when she found these photos online, she
broke up with him immediately.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
I definitely knew one hundred percent that he had sent
photos to this person. I kind of just called him
up and I was like, what the fuck are you thinking?
Like why?
Speaker 4 (13:40):
How?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Who?
Speaker 4 (13:42):
He again was justifying like, oh, I'm trying to help.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
I was just like, no, I don't think that, Like
this is like a stereotypical look up the dictionary revenge porn.
You're man that I'm moving on and you knew this
could hurt me.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Madison's ex boy friend admitted in letters and texts that
he had sent these private photos to the anonymous harasser.
He said he was trying to help her to find
out who it was, But this is when things take
an even darker turn.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Up.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
Until this point, the online harasser had been posting about Madison,
just Madison, but also every now and then asking for
nude pictures of Christine, her twin. Along with these requests,
they posted regular photos taken from Christine's Facebook, just her
normal holiday snaps and pictures with friends. And while it
(14:37):
was annoying to see Christine targeted, the sisters were reassured
that the harasser didn't seem to have anything on her,
and then nude photos of Christine got posted.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
I didn't even know these existed, and I'm seeing them
on four Chan, and I was very involved in my
sister's experience, and obviously I'm very empathetic towards my sister.
And so that was, you know, shocking, sad, all the feelings.
But nothing prepares you for when you see your own
nude body on the internet, right, And so, like Madison described,
(15:09):
your kind of stomach just drops.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
There were now two photographs circulating of Christine that she
didn't even know existed. These were from the same boudoir
photo shoot back in college, the one that Madison did.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
The photographer is taking a ton of photos at a
time to think of like a photogo and click click,
clack click, it's going that fast, and that's just to
get like natural movements or whatever. And in that there
were thousands of photos and two were of my breast
and my nipple.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Did it change things when it was suddenly targeting the
two of you as twins, you know, like you're both
up there that that feels like that would change something?
Speaker 3 (15:48):
So for me, I had an insane amount of guilt, right,
like I brought her into this, she you know, had
bullets being at her now all because.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
Of helping me.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
Essentially, in my mind, I just felt so guilty, Like,
I obviously love my sister. She's one of my favorite
people in the entire world, and something that I did
was helping.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
To hurt her.
Speaker 4 (16:15):
That is true.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Like I kind of always thought like, wow, man, I'm
just getting punished for helping, but like that's the point
of what they They're attacking me. So you don't have resources,
you don't have someone to help, and let's be honest,
like I was very motivated to help you, but it's
nothing's more motivating than your own boobs being on the internet.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
I bet. I bet.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Madison and Christine believed that the only way these new
photos of Christine could have ended up with the harasser
was through Madison's ex. During that original photo shoot, both
Madison and Christine had chosen their photos, and the photographer
gave them all the raw footage on a CD. Years later,
Madison backed it up in a secure drop box folder.
(17:00):
Madison claims that her ex had access to those files,
and she believes he went through hundreds of proofs and
found the two nude photos of Christine. By now, the
sisters had graduated, Madison was working in marketing and Christine
was a young lawyer, and yet the harassment continued. An
anonymous profile would share Madison's nude photos on her professional
(17:22):
Facebook business page, and her workplace would get these panicked
phone calls telling them about the photos.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
It was relentless.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
We started looking into the sites, and we were keeping
track a bit more because they were increasing, right, and
so we were just constantly monitoring these pages and getting
things taken down.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
The sisters filed a police report against the ex boyfriend,
but the local police department decided not to bring charges.
They said there wasn't enough evidence to prove that he
intended to harm them. Madison's ex boyfriend has never been
charged with any crimes relating to Madison or Christine. Feeling frustrated,
they decided to turn their attention back to the harasser
(18:06):
himself and take a different route, filing a civil lawsuit
to try and de anonymize him. The case was filed
as Christine Comradis and Madison Conradis versus John Doe. This
would then give them subpoena powers, which would allow them
to track down the harass's IP address and hopefully figure
(18:27):
out where they were hiding.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
We were applying subpoenas to Facebook, Google, Snapchat, where the
first round of subpoenas you get a location of where
the person could be sending these messages from. Yeah, you're
plugging it into an IP surgery, typically getting just like
a general area. But once you get that ipaddress, in
order to get the identifying information, you then have to
(18:49):
subpoena the Internet service provider, which is not quite as easy,
and so that took a lot of time.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
From the start, Christine and Madison were meticulous, determined, and smart.
They kept detailed records of everything that happened.
Speaker 3 (19:05):
Even from the very beginning, my very first few harassing
messages and whatnot, I was taking screenshots and copies of
everything and foldering it in a folder on my computer.
Four Chan disappears after a while, like forty eight hours
or something, but there are websites that archive this, and
so by this time we're catching it live on four
(19:28):
Chan and getting it taken down immediately and screenshotting. But
we can go back through years and years and years
of these archive websites, which is good and bad because
we're now having to hit multiple websites, including Google Images
and all these archive websites to get these photos taken down.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Madison and Christine had to move fast. As soon as
they spotted a post, they'd take a screenshot, file it
and try and get a subpoena to trace the IP address.
Then they would file to take down the photo using
copyright legislation because the fact is the law didn't want
to recognize this as a crime of harassment, but would
(20:06):
address the breach of the photographer's copyright and you work
with what you've got. This was turning into a full
on homegrown investigation.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
We caught him our bread cramp map and we had
you look at like Law and Order, one of those
crime shows, and you have the murdered board the murder boarder.
We had you know, like strings and this and that
basically that but in a digital form.
Speaker 4 (20:32):
Has millennials I would love to see.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
So there was just so many like small clues that
we started piecing together.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
And the anonymous harasser when these photos were posted, obviously
it's anonymous, but did he have a user name?
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So again fourteen is anonymous. You do not need to
have a username or anything for that. But as he's
posting these photos of both Madison and I, he's saying
kick me at an insert usernames.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
Kick Messenger, or just kick is an instant messaging app
with a focus on user anonymity. It lets people sign
up without needing a phone number or a valid email address.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
We can track this person because he's dumb enough to
leave kicknames as clues essentially, and then he also had
this like very strange way of typing where he would
do this thing where it would be like dot space,
dot space, dot space, and just had a very weird
tone about his writing. People don't do dot space, dart space,
(21:34):
dot space. They do dot dot dot if they're gonna.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
Do that, right, Madison and Christine were piecing together everything
like a digital puzzle. They were collecting clues connecting the
dots space dots. There was the recurring Kick username and
the distinct writing style. But then they noticed something far
more sinister.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
Another picture of a completely different girl. Oh yeah, so
we're seeing him post other girls, and we're like, okay,
who are these girls?
Speaker 4 (22:05):
What do we all have in common? It's clearly the
same person that's posting all of these.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
We had already had all this different evidence, so we
just started adding new folders of this victim, this victim,
this victim. We went back through all these archive websites
and four chan Live to see who he was posting,
and kind of figured out there was what five really
six I guess different girls and women that he was.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
Targeting six victims.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
Madison and Christine added these women to the growing digital
board of clues, and then another big clue.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Here's Madison.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
I had gone to Key West, and in key West
they celebrate the sunset every day. They have street performers
and street art. So I snapped a photograph of just
the sunset, not a picture of me, and I posted
(23:04):
it on my Snapchat. Almost immediately, I look down and
I have a text message and it was, oh, that's
a beautiful sunset that you just saw, And I was
immediately was like, okay. The only place I'd posted on
it is Snapchat. Snapchat has a log of who've seen
(23:26):
your stuff, so I nearly went and screenshot it. It
was so new that I think only thirty nine people
had seen it.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
It was a text message from an unknown number, so
it must be either the harasser themselves or someone from
four chan who had been encouraged by the harasser. But
Madison's social media pages were all completely private. Only people
she knew in real life could actually follow her. One
of these thirty nine people who had viewed her snapchat post.
(23:55):
One of these thirty nine people who Madison knows must
be linked to the harasser, connecting the dots like pins
on a court board. They needed a way to narrow
down these thirty nine suspects, so they decided to have
another look at the other victims. If there was something
(24:15):
someone connecting these six women, that would be their suspect.
And well, one of the six victims was shockingly young,
and while in her photo she was always fully clothed,
there was another clue.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Here's Madison again.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Well, the underage girl ended up having a Catholic school
uniform on it was a photograph of her fully clothed
in her Catholic uniform and just like post of like
soliciting someoneuder raper he wants to watch someone rape her
this and that just really bad. Perse And again she
was underage, So we zoomed in on the photograph.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Christine's husband, Dana, a auto shop wiz, helped them shop
in the photo.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
So he zoomed in, did his little magic, and he
ended up being able to reap the school location, which
is terrifying. If we can figure out where this young
girl is going to school and find her, like any
creep on the internet could, right, because he's posting again
a photo of her in her school uniform with calls
(25:25):
of action to rape and harm her. So that was
kind of the second clue, breadcrumb clue that we had.
And so we're trying to at the time piece together
who all these people are. And then Dana went on
Facebook and like cross reference like mutual friend, bam, mutual friend,
mutual and so he was like, holy shit, it is him.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
Dana discovers he has a Facebook friend in common with
all of these women, a man called Chris.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
We figured out one's an ex girlfriend, one's a family member,
and ones a family friend when there were lots of
other like little like Madison said, breadcrumbs.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
There was also that strange way of typing the dot
space dot space method. They cross referenced it with Chris's
posts on Facebook. It's how he wrote too. It had
to be him. Chris had mutual friends with all six
women and family in the same city where the schoolgirl lived.
And one final check.
Speaker 3 (26:21):
So that snapchat story ended up being one of our
bread crumb clues that we pieced together, and he was
the last person that had viewed the story.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
Madison and Christine finally found the culprit behind the years
of harassment, the years of paranoia and fear and stress
and extortion, Someone both of them knew, but neither of
them had thought about in years, Someone who had even
been a guest at Christine and Dana's wedding, Christopher Juanacorps.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
We both went to college with him. He was I
would say, a friend of my husband's by the end.
They were probably I would say friends in college, acquaintances
later on in life, but still invited to our wedding.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
It sounds like the other women and this girl that
he harassed were much kind of closer to him, Like
why would he pick you guys?
Speaker 4 (27:18):
Like the only thing I can think of is maybe
he like had a crush on Madison.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Like Madison and him never had a romantic relationship, never
went on a date, never did anything physical. Yeah, nothing,
Like I don't even think I ever like hugged him
in like a social setting, Like I don't. Again, it's like,
was I two night? You know, like you always like
as a victim xpessily in the society, you're always questioning like, well,
(27:43):
what did I do. And it's like, at the end
of the day, you as a victim to d Doude nothing.
It doesn't matter what you're wearing, it doesn't matter what
you look like, it doesn't matter anything. It's the person
doing it to you. That's whose fault it is.
Speaker 2 (27:56):
And the moment when you realized that it was him,
can you just kind of describe that feeling.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
It was the biggest relief in my opinion, like weight
off of my shoulder. I can, you know, start trying
to trust people around my life a little bit more
since I know that they're not trying to hurt me.
And then it was also like excited a little bit again.
Weird emotion, but we had worked so hard, spent countless hours,
(28:26):
countless sleepless nights working till three, four or five am
on this stuff. But it was it was nice to
see some of the hard work paying off.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
So they found that guy, but now they needed justice.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
The sisters faced another daunting challenge, turning their digital detective
work into a case that law enforcement couldn't ignore. After
the break, Madison and Christine go off to Discovering Christopher
(29:19):
Bonacorp's identity was a major win for Madison and Christine,
but knowing who he was didn't make him any less dangerous.
To stop his harassment, they would need an air type
case that even the most dismissive police officers wouldn't turn away.
And they had a responsibility to the other six victims.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
And so we contacted them all individually and then ultimately
got like a group chat going, and every single one
of them was very receptive and helpful. Right.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
One of the women was Chris's ex girlfriend.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
And some of the photographs that were being posted of her,
she didn't even know were being taken of her. So yeah,
it's so creepy, like truly voyeurism where she was getting
changed and he would like post photos of her and
things like that.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
And then there was an ex girlfriend who he attacked
a lot.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
As they talked to the victims, they learned that two
of the other women had already confronted Chris directly about
his harassment. To one, he apologized and promised to stop,
but with the other his response was much more callous.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
I think he said, good luck, called the cops. They're
not going to do anything. And it was a complete
asshole to her about it. And so she had filed
a police report in Orlando, Florida area years prior and
had just set idle for years and years and years.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
These girls, with nothing in common except the man who
had violated their privacy, united against Chris. They started sharing
their stories and pooling their resources.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
The pack was forming and it was a to hunt.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
There is a strength in numbers when you're reporting crimes.
They can ignore one person, they might be able to
ignore two people, but once you start getting more and
more people involved, I think it helps elevate the seriousness
of the crime. Yeah, so we're joining forces with all
of the girls and we're like, Okay, there's so many
(31:22):
of us, Like, they cannot ignore us.
Speaker 4 (31:25):
This is a bigger issue.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
This is a societal issue, not like a one person
fighting with one person issue. We were scattered all over
the country too, but kind of in a stance of unity,
we decided like, on this day, we are all going
to the police department and we're going to get a
police report.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
This is when Christine, the lawyer of the group, really
comes into her own.
Speaker 3 (31:46):
I had compiled a print out of all of our
circumstantial evidence, a breadcrumb map. I emailed this to all
the girls all over the country. I had listed out
any law of this might be breaking if you were
in New York. I looked up your New York laws
and your local laws, and I added all the federal
statutes like cybersocking that I thought it might fall into.
(32:07):
If you were in Florida, I included the non consensual
pornography law. Like I included everything that I think that
I could point to with a straight face and be like, listen,
this is illegal. I had some screenshots of all the
different types of harassing messages, including some of the more
egregious ones, like the call to action to harm. Specifically
Madison and the other age women.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
Christine essentially created a fifty nine page legal roadmap that
the victims could take to their local police departments.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
I definitely did a lot of like the piecing together
like visually, yeah, I think it was kind of like
the dream team, between Dana being like our in house
tech guru, me being in house counsel, and then Madison
kind of piecing together everything like parelel work like she's doing.
I was kind of learning from the best aka Christine.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
The girlfriend's planned a coordinated appro all of them would
go into their respective police departments. On the same day
and asked a file of police report against Christopher Buanacorp.
But despite having these huge files of evidence, most of
them were turned away. Only Madison and the mother of
the underage girl actually managed to put in the reports.
(33:20):
Even legal expert Christine was dismissed, which again was.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Just absolutely mind boggling to me because of all the
work that we had put into to give them like
this perfect little with a bow wrapped on top evidence
in a summary for them. And personally, I went into
my police department and I can't even fill out a
police report. It blew my mind, Like how they treated me.
(33:45):
I mean, he asked all the questions right, like how
do they get the photos? This isn't a crime, If anything,
it's a misdemeanor. Do you really want to go through
all this? A jury is never going to understand this.
Those are some of the things that actual quotes of
this man.
Speaker 4 (33:59):
Said to me.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
And so finally I demanded to fill out a police
report and said, listen, Bud, like you're behind a desk,
like why don't you let the actual detective decide if
this is a crime. Just give me the form and
pass it on. If the detective wants to rip it up.
That's on him.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
Eventually the police officer gave in and handed Christine the
report to fill out.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
It did get to the detective. The detective determined okay,
this is bad, and then was like, okay, we also
don't have the resources to do anything about this.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
I'm going to afford this on to the FBI.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Finally, someone in law enforcement saw this situation for what
it was. As for the police departments that had dismissed
the other women, well, Christine wasn't letting that slide. She
made calls, pushed back, found the right people to talk to.
All that paid off an additional two of the victims
walked back into their local police departments and filed reports.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
At that point, we know who it is, but in
the eyes of the law, it's circumstantial evidence, right, and
so we knew that we needed to get solid proof,
which means IP addresses connecting.
Speaker 4 (35:14):
To a person.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
Through the civil lawsuit they had filed, they were now
getting information about IP addresses the harassmer was using.
Speaker 3 (35:22):
But some of them were coming back to like the
New York area, the Greater New York area, and so
we're like, ok, hey, this is good.
Speaker 4 (35:27):
This is good, This is good.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
Guess who lived in New York.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Chris Buanacorps sort of saving all these IP addresses and everything.
But when you go to subpoena the Internet service providers,
that actually alerts the user and gives them the opportunity
to fight it.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
And Madison and Christine were firing off subpoenas every few
hours every day, new post online subpoena, another picture subpoena,
and on and on.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
During this time. Obviously, the ISP was alerting him and
he was like, oh shit, who whatever. But it's funny
seeing in the background, like the FBI was doing their thing,
and he still had no idea that the FBI was
cracking down on him.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
The FBI and the sisters were closing in on Chris
from all sides, until finally, after a decade of piecing
together breadcrumbs, they had enough to take him to court
and press charges. In March of twenty twenty, the civil
lawsuit Christine Conradis and Madison Conradis versus John Doe was
(36:30):
officially amended to name Christopher Buanacorps. In a separate criminal case,
he was charged with six counts of cyberstalking to avoid
trial and get a lighter sentence, he pleaded guilty.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
We encourage as many of the women to go as
possible because I think it's great for the judge to
see that this affects real life people. And so we
were there from eight until after five because of their
were so many victims that wanted to tell him and
the judge how we felt. We get to the next
(37:09):
morning and they're reading this sentence out and ultimately the
judge agreed with us that this was abhorrent behavior and
not suitable for society and sentenced him to fifteen years
in federal prison.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Wow, how did that feel?
Speaker 3 (37:28):
I personally felt very emotional. Just getting up and having
to speak and talk about the impact of his actions
was scary enough.
Speaker 4 (37:40):
And to think about.
Speaker 3 (37:44):
Having one judge decide the fate of what you've worked
so hard to try and do, which was put him
in prison, It was so scary because like how many
men told me throughout this whole process that like, it
wasn't a crime, or you're not gonna get anything out
(38:05):
of it. So when the time came and they read
out the sentence, it was like, there's no explanation. It
was just like emotional and.
Speaker 4 (38:19):
Relieving. Yeah, i'd say, like validating.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
Right, You're told in the beginning, this isn't a crime,
a jury will never believe this. This is a misdemeanor
of that, and then you're sitting there years later realizing
that this person just got fifteen years in federal prison
and just feels good. Fun fact too is we thought
it was very like poetic that the FBI agents, all
(38:46):
the victims, the prosecutor, it was a team of all women.
So we thought it was kind of cool and poetic.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
Oh wow, And did you talk to any of the
other victims after that?
Speaker 3 (38:58):
Yeah? Yeah, we still I've talked to them sometimes. That's
what was so strange about this whole situation and who
he chose as victims, Like, none of us besides Christine
and I obviously have much in common from location to
interest to where we're at in life like ages, like
literally nothing besides that were females and happened to somehow
(39:20):
run into Christopher at some point in our lives.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
This nightmare stretched for almost ten years, from that first
post on four Chan in twenty eleven to finally naming
Chris Bonicor in the Civil lawsuit.
Speaker 1 (39:36):
And then getting him a conviction.
Speaker 2 (39:39):
Ten years of looking over your shoulder, of feeling exposed,
hunted and dismissed. But it was also ten years of
grit and determination. It took a decade to say this
is finally over. Well, I hope you guys feel a
(39:59):
sense of I don't know ease.
Speaker 4 (40:02):
Yeah I do.
Speaker 3 (40:03):
And I really think that we really liked that we
could help other people around this too. And that was
my last sentence of my victim impact statement was the
lone Wolf dies, but the Pack survives. And it hits
me every time because I couldn't have done this without
every single one of those girls, and they couldn't have
(40:25):
done it without us. We survived because we stayed within
a pack. The lone wolf dies, but the pack survives.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Thanks to Christine and Madison for joining our girlfriend's pack
here too. Hope you know that you've got a big
group of us rallying, howling around you.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Now.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
God, if you've enjoyed this conversation and you can find
loads more incredible women on our feed, do check them out,
and please do spread the word and tell your friends
about us. We want as many people as possible to
(41:09):
be part of the girlfriend's gang. Next time on the
girlfriend's spotlight at least runs the ball barn.
Speaker 4 (41:19):
He WILLO got a question for you. How hard are
orchae actomies. The orchaectomies are removal of the testicles. Have
you ever done what?
Speaker 3 (41:28):
No? Would you like to?
Speaker 2 (41:38):
Hey, it's Anna. You've reached the girlfriend's hotline. Leave your
story after the tone, Okay, gotta go.
Speaker 1 (41:46):
Love you.
Speaker 5 (41:48):
So a few years ago, my nanny passed away, my
mom's moms, my grandma. We were very close, but also
my mom and my nanny were very close, and I'm
very close with my mom. So there was a lot
tangled up grief and secondary grief and seeing my mom
souff for and not being able to be there. I
(42:09):
couldn't travel back in time for the funeral. It was
near the end of COVID. I think in twenty twenty one.
It's making me feel better. My friends all came over
and let me perform blind a karaoke for them, and
they would sing to me, and one friend in particular
(42:30):
brought out her piano from her room, which is very heavy,
and played every song that I love.
Speaker 4 (42:37):
And let me sing along. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (42:39):
I really can't sing, so you know they loved me
with them tolerating sixty minutes of me just like how
like Adele.
Speaker 2 (42:51):
If you have your own story like the one you
just heard, and you'd like the whole Girlfriend's Gang to
hear it, then please send it to us. You can
record it as a voice memo under ninety seconds please
and email it straight to the Girlfriends at novel dot Audio.
Please don't include your name, We're keeping things a little anon.
(43:12):
We want stories like say that one time you faked
an emergency on an awful date and your bestie bailed
you out with a phone call we love her. Or
that time when all of your girls showed up on
your doorstep with five pizzas, two tups of ice cream,
and three bottles of saven your blanc because the man
of your dreams just dumped you. I want stories that
(43:34):
are meaningful or silly.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
I want big, I want small.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
I'm desperate to hear them, so send them over. This season,
The Girlfriend's Spotlight is supporting the charity Womankind Worldwide. They
do amazing work to help women's rights organizations and movements
to strengthen and grow. If you'd like to find out
more or donate, to help them secure equal rights for
(43:59):
women and girls across the globe. You can go to
womankind dot org dot UK. The Girlfriend's Spotlight is produced
by Novel for iHeart Podcasts. For more from Novel, visit
novel dot audio. The show is hosted by me Anna Sinfield.
(44:23):
This episode was written and produced by al Shay Barney.
Our assistant producer is Lucy Carr. Our researcher is Seyana Yusuf.
The editor is Hannah Marshall. Max O'Brien and Craig Strachan
are executive producers.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
Production management from.
Speaker 2 (44:40):
Joe Savage, Sharie Houston and Charlotte Wolfe.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
Sound design, mixing.
Speaker 2 (44:45):
And scoring by Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson. Music supervision
by Jako Taievich, Nicholas Alexander and Annasinfield. Original music composed
by Louisa Gerstein and Jemma Freeman. The series artwork was
de signed by Christina Lemcol. Willard Foxton is creative director
of Development. Special thanks to Katrina Norvel, Carrie Lieberman and
(45:08):
Will Pearson at iHeart Podcasts, as well as Carl Frankel
and the whole team at WM
Hey, a quick heads up.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Our story today is about online harassment and cyberstalking and
includes a little bit of strong language. It also briefly
mentions sexual assault, including that of a minor. But despite
all of this, it's one epic story involving some incredible
online saluting.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I had just woken up, so I was laying in
bed scrolling my phone.
Speaker 4 (00:29):
Saw I had a message.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
There are moments that divide your life into before and after.
For Madison, that moment came one morning with an unexpected
message from someone she knew in college.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
Hey, I don't know if you know that your photos
are online, but there's some few nude photos of you
and they're asking for more and they're starting to give
out your information and asking people to obtain more. Immediately,
your heart dropped and you're like, what the fuck is
(01:04):
going on? You know? So I immediately was like, hey,
can you send me the links to whatever website you
saw it on?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
And that's when Madison sees it, a nude photo of
herself from a boudohile shoot, a photo she had never
expected to see out there on the internet. At first,
she just ignores it, but that single post quickly spirals
into something much much darker. It begins seeping into every
(01:32):
aspect of Madison's life, to.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
The point where, like when you googled my name, it
was popping up on the first page of Google. What's
the first thing people do when you meet someone, if
you start dating someone, if you become friends with someone,
you go home and google them.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Right When Madison turns to the police for help, she's dismissed,
told there's no crime here, and yet the harassment keeps mounting.
Her photos are reposted in the same thread thousands of times.
So she turns to the person who's literally always since
conception been at her side, her twin sister Christine. Together
(02:12):
they track down Madison's harasser and hold him to account
and free other women from his digital abuse. To I'm
Anison Field and from the teams at Novel and iHeart Podcasts,
this is the Girlfriend's Spotlight, where we tell stories of
(02:35):
women women today, Madison and Christine become digital detectives. Madison
(03:00):
and Christine Conradis are identical twins.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
I technically was born first. I wasn't supposed to be first,
but it's how it ended up shaking out.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
That's Madison speaking, and I'm gonna have to say this
a lot, because they are identical in voice as much
as they are in their looks.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
I am technically the older one, but Christine definitely has
more of like the older sibling qualities. She always like
kind of protected me as a kid, so she was
always kind of although we were, you know, one minute apart,
she was kind of like the more motherly concerned twin.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Both sisters are blonde and chipper.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
They share the same sense of humor and grew up
in Florida as you were like kind of getting older.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Did you guys remain close or were you ever at war?
Speaker 4 (03:44):
Was?
Speaker 3 (03:45):
No, we were pretty close. I mean, like all siblings fight.
Like I remember us getting into a fight in the
parking lot.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Of high school. That's Christine and getting in trouble, but.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
The principal calling our parents and being like, okay, they're sisters,
but if they weren't, they would probably be suspended. Like
you can't like hit someone even in the car in.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Your parking lot, you know.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
So you know, we've had our fights, like every sibling,
but we've always remained close.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Christine, naturally, was the first person Madison turned to when
she found out her nude photos had been posted on
some dodgy website, and it wasn't just photos, it was
also her personal details and a call out for other
people to send more pictures of her.
Speaker 3 (04:25):
It was like four Chan, and there was a few others.
I think it like motherless Me, so all the typical
sites that schedule shit happened.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Four Chan is a website where people can post photos
completely anonymously, and that means although the site is on
the open Web, there's some very dark stuff on there,
discussions of things like rape and murder and sexual images
of women taken without their consent.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
And they're cataloging them by area code, so like, for example,
Madison is in let's just make up an area code
in four two one, right, so it would be like
fourty one area code in the US, and you would
go into that sub category and there would be like
different women posted by different anonymous users with usually their
(05:13):
first name and maybe last initial and a photos. And
these people are almost utilizing it like baseball cards or
Pokemon cards that are like, hey, I have Madison C.
Anybody got more of her? Or I have Ashley S.
Does anybody have Christine C?
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Like yeah, like after I mean, it's sunk in really scary.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
You're like, what the fuck do I do? What did
you do? After you found out about these images?
Speaker 3 (05:43):
So I definitely kind of like creeped around the websites
a little bit, and I think we kind of both
were like, let's just wait it out, see what happens. Yeah,
I think at first the advice was kind of like, Okay,
take a beat, let's just ignore it. These type of people,
the more you give it attention gonna fuel the fire.
Just ignore it, it'll go away. Not that many people
(06:05):
on these websites like, it's not a medal, right.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
We hear the term revenge porn a lot in the
media and pop culture, but the more accurate way to
describe this kind of thing is non consensual pornography. And
in the early twenty tens, when Madison found her photos online,
the amount of this non consensual pornography being published to
sites like four Chan was really ramping up. In the beginning,
(06:29):
the sisters thought it might be something that could just
fizzle out, but it didn't.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
It only got worse.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
In this case, this person was posting several times a day,
by the end, one hundreds thousands of times a day,
and so this person was creating a collage, and in
the collage would be a picture of Madison from her
linked in profile picture and maybe like a Facebook page,
and then her nude photos. And then it was telling
everyone where she worked, what her home address was, what
(06:59):
her parents it's address was, all the contact information of
everyone that she knows and loves, and then there was
usually a call to action of like go harass her,
go call her work, And that's when it got really bad.
So I was getting anonymous messages along with our mother, father,
close friends of her actual nude photos.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I mean, Madison, you must have been terrified. That's so scary.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Yeah, it's definitely terrifying in the sense of I didn't
know who it was. So I think that's the most
terrifying aspect of it, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:35):
Is that it could be anyone.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
It could be a family member, it could be a friend,
It could be the person walking behind you, It could
be a receptionist at your dentist office. Like you have
no idea who it is. I would have a reoccurring
nightmare and a masked person with a hood in all black,
(08:01):
couldn't see the person's face, just like hovering over me,
and it was so realistic that there were many times
where I woke up like jumped up, screamed, slammed the door.
And it obviously that stemmed directly from my issues that
I was having dealing with this person harassing and stalking me,
(08:23):
not know who it was.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
The first thing Madison tried to do was figure out
who was behind this, but the photos themselves didn't offer
any clues about who posted them. She'd never shared them
with anyone. She had a signed contract with the photographer
that explicitly said pictures were not to be posted online
without prior consent, so either the photographer had given them
(08:46):
to this harasser, which seemed unlikely because that would be
a breach of the contract, or someone stole them from
the photographer's password protected online folder. Madison was inundated with
phone calls, tech messages, emails, Instagram dms, Facebook dms commenting
on the photos and demanding more of them. She changed
(09:08):
her phone number and email address, and deleted many of
her social media accounts to try and make the torments stop,
until eventually Madison decided to take this to the police.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
The first time I went into the Melbourne Police Department,
I was alone, so I walk in and I said, Hey,
I'm being harassed stopped. Is there's something you can do
to help me?
Speaker 4 (09:34):
I need?
Speaker 3 (09:34):
I would like to fill out a police report and possibly,
you know, try to find the person that's doing this.
I brought a few screenshots printed out on paper, and
he kind of just flipped through it and was like,
where did he get the photos or where did they
get the photos? I don't think this is a crime.
I'm not going to give you a police report to
fill out. Any sort of victim chreaming you can think of.
(09:58):
Was said, well, you shouldn't have take in those pictures,
et cetera, et cetera. So I kind of tail between
my legs walked out of the police office that day
and felt very defeated. Called Christine. That's when Christine was like, ah,
that's bullshit.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Oh and did I mention Christine's in law school and
she's got some new knowledge to flex.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
I kind of emailed them and just ripped them a
new one of like, Hey, if you need resources or training,
I'm sure I can find someone for you. I would
be happy to educate your police officers.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Christine had done some digging and found the Florida Statute
which specifically says that this is a crime.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
And this was a really new law at the time,
so I cited the law and was like, read it.
They didn't really take too kindly to that, but I
knew that would piss them off, and it did.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
But ultimately she did get a police report filed.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Nothing was done, but at least, you know, she was
given the privilege to fill that form out.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
And then nothing happened. But things seemed to die down.
The photos weren't being posted as regularly, and Madison tried
to move on, tried to put it behind her. Around
this time, she also started dating a guy. It was
a long distance relationship and for a little while at
least life almost felt like normal again.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
We had fun, we went out, went to sporting events,
hockey games, basketball games, football games, just you know, a
typical fun twenties relationship. He was my best friend at
that time, besides Christine.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
Obviously, not long after they got together, her new boyfriend
brought it up. He had seen those nude photos of
Madison and asked her about them, and so she told
him about the years of harassment that she had endured,
and he was the perfect boyfriend about it. Angry on
her behalf outraged that this had happened. He told her
(11:58):
that he wanted to help, he wanted to protect her.
But you know the unsettling calm after a storm. Yeah,
that's the trick, because the storm is far from over,
not even close. One day, seven years after the harassment started,
(12:20):
Madison saw new photos being posted on those sites again.
This time these photos were recent ones, and there's only
one person who could be behind it.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
There was no doubt in my mind it was him,
like he was the only one that had those photographs
and videos.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
It looks like her best friend, her boyfriend of more
than three years, has betrayed her in the most brutal
way imaginable. After the break, Madison confronts her boyfriend.
Speaker 5 (13:03):
Glad you have got you, gat you, I've got you.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
In twenty eighteen, Madison's worst nightmare came true. The anonymous
online harasser had obtained new, more intimate photos of her.
These were images she had only ever shared with her boyfriend.
Their relationship was up and down, on and off by
this point, but when she found these photos online, she
broke up with him immediately.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
I definitely knew one hundred percent that he had sent
photos to this person. I kind of just called him
up and I was like, what the fuck are you thinking?
Like why?
Speaker 4 (13:40):
How?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Who?
Speaker 4 (13:42):
He again was justifying like, oh, I'm trying to help.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
I was just like, no, I don't think that, Like
this is like a stereotypical look up the dictionary revenge porn.
You're man that I'm moving on and you knew this
could hurt me.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Madison's ex boy friend admitted in letters and texts that
he had sent these private photos to the anonymous harasser.
He said he was trying to help her to find
out who it was, But this is when things take
an even darker turn.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Up.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
Until this point, the online harasser had been posting about Madison,
just Madison, but also every now and then asking for
nude pictures of Christine, her twin. Along with these requests,
they posted regular photos taken from Christine's Facebook, just her
normal holiday snaps and pictures with friends. And while it
(14:37):
was annoying to see Christine targeted, the sisters were reassured
that the harasser didn't seem to have anything on her,
and then nude photos of Christine got posted.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
I didn't even know these existed, and I'm seeing them
on four Chan, and I was very involved in my
sister's experience, and obviously I'm very empathetic towards my sister.
And so that was, you know, shocking, sad, all the feelings.
But nothing prepares you for when you see your own
nude body on the internet, right, And so, like Madison described,
(15:09):
your kind of stomach just drops.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
There were now two photographs circulating of Christine that she
didn't even know existed. These were from the same boudoir
photo shoot back in college, the one that Madison did.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
The photographer is taking a ton of photos at a
time to think of like a photogo and click click,
clack click, it's going that fast, and that's just to
get like natural movements or whatever. And in that there
were thousands of photos and two were of my breast
and my nipple.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Did it change things when it was suddenly targeting the
two of you as twins, you know, like you're both
up there that that feels like that would change something?
Speaker 3 (15:48):
So for me, I had an insane amount of guilt, right,
like I brought her into this, she you know, had
bullets being at her now all because.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
Of helping me.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
Essentially, in my mind, I just felt so guilty, Like,
I obviously love my sister. She's one of my favorite
people in the entire world, and something that I did
was helping.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
To hurt her.
Speaker 4 (16:15):
That is true.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Like I kind of always thought like, wow, man, I'm
just getting punished for helping, but like that's the point
of what they They're attacking me. So you don't have resources,
you don't have someone to help, and let's be honest,
like I was very motivated to help you, but it's
nothing's more motivating than your own boobs being on the internet.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
I bet. I bet.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Madison and Christine believed that the only way these new
photos of Christine could have ended up with the harasser
was through Madison's ex. During that original photo shoot, both
Madison and Christine had chosen their photos, and the photographer
gave them all the raw footage on a CD. Years later,
Madison backed it up in a secure drop box folder.
(17:00):
Madison claims that her ex had access to those files,
and she believes he went through hundreds of proofs and
found the two nude photos of Christine. By now, the
sisters had graduated, Madison was working in marketing and Christine
was a young lawyer, and yet the harassment continued. An
anonymous profile would share Madison's nude photos on her professional
(17:22):
Facebook business page, and her workplace would get these panicked
phone calls telling them about the photos.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
It was relentless.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
We started looking into the sites, and we were keeping
track a bit more because they were increasing, right, and
so we were just constantly monitoring these pages and getting
things taken down.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
The sisters filed a police report against the ex boyfriend,
but the local police department decided not to bring charges.
They said there wasn't enough evidence to prove that he
intended to harm them. Madison's ex boyfriend has never been
charged with any crimes relating to Madison or Christine. Feeling frustrated,
they decided to turn their attention back to the harasser
(18:06):
himself and take a different route, filing a civil lawsuit
to try and de anonymize him. The case was filed
as Christine Comradis and Madison Conradis versus John Doe. This
would then give them subpoena powers, which would allow them
to track down the harass's IP address and hopefully figure
(18:27):
out where they were hiding.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
We were applying subpoenas to Facebook, Google, Snapchat, where the
first round of subpoenas you get a location of where
the person could be sending these messages from. Yeah, you're
plugging it into an IP surgery, typically getting just like
a general area. But once you get that ipaddress, in
order to get the identifying information, you then have to
(18:49):
subpoena the Internet service provider, which is not quite as easy,
and so that took a lot of time.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
From the start, Christine and Madison were meticulous, determined, and smart.
They kept detailed records of everything that happened.
Speaker 3 (19:05):
Even from the very beginning, my very first few harassing
messages and whatnot, I was taking screenshots and copies of
everything and foldering it in a folder on my computer.
Four Chan disappears after a while, like forty eight hours
or something, but there are websites that archive this, and
so by this time we're catching it live on four
(19:28):
Chan and getting it taken down immediately and screenshotting. But
we can go back through years and years and years
of these archive websites, which is good and bad because
we're now having to hit multiple websites, including Google Images
and all these archive websites to get these photos taken down.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Madison and Christine had to move fast. As soon as
they spotted a post, they'd take a screenshot, file it
and try and get a subpoena to trace the IP address.
Then they would file to take down the photo using
copyright legislation because the fact is the law didn't want
to recognize this as a crime of harassment, but would
(20:06):
address the breach of the photographer's copyright and you work
with what you've got. This was turning into a full
on homegrown investigation.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
We caught him our bread cramp map and we had
you look at like Law and Order, one of those
crime shows, and you have the murdered board the murder boarder.
We had you know, like strings and this and that
basically that but in a digital form.
Speaker 4 (20:32):
Has millennials I would love to see.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
So there was just so many like small clues that
we started piecing together.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
And the anonymous harasser when these photos were posted, obviously
it's anonymous, but did he have a user name?
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So again fourteen is anonymous. You do not need to
have a username or anything for that. But as he's
posting these photos of both Madison and I, he's saying
kick me at an insert usernames.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
Kick Messenger, or just kick is an instant messaging app
with a focus on user anonymity. It lets people sign
up without needing a phone number or a valid email address.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
We can track this person because he's dumb enough to
leave kicknames as clues essentially, and then he also had
this like very strange way of typing where he would
do this thing where it would be like dot space,
dot space, dot space, and just had a very weird
tone about his writing. People don't do dot space, dart space,
(21:34):
dot space. They do dot dot dot if they're gonna.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
Do that, right, Madison and Christine were piecing together everything
like a digital puzzle. They were collecting clues connecting the
dots space dots. There was the recurring Kick username and
the distinct writing style. But then they noticed something far
more sinister.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
Another picture of a completely different girl. Oh yeah, so
we're seeing him post other girls, and we're like, okay,
who are these girls?
Speaker 4 (22:05):
What do we all have in common? It's clearly the
same person that's posting all of these.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
We had already had all this different evidence, so we
just started adding new folders of this victim, this victim,
this victim. We went back through all these archive websites
and four chan Live to see who he was posting,
and kind of figured out there was what five really
six I guess different girls and women that he was.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
Targeting six victims.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
Madison and Christine added these women to the growing digital
board of clues, and then another big clue.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Here's Madison.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
I had gone to Key West, and in key West
they celebrate the sunset every day. They have street performers
and street art. So I snapped a photograph of just
the sunset, not a picture of me, and I posted
(23:04):
it on my Snapchat. Almost immediately, I look down and
I have a text message and it was, oh, that's
a beautiful sunset that you just saw, And I was
immediately was like, okay. The only place I'd posted on
it is Snapchat. Snapchat has a log of who've seen
(23:26):
your stuff, so I nearly went and screenshot it. It
was so new that I think only thirty nine people
had seen it.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
It was a text message from an unknown number, so
it must be either the harasser themselves or someone from
four chan who had been encouraged by the harasser. But
Madison's social media pages were all completely private. Only people
she knew in real life could actually follow her. One
of these thirty nine people who had viewed her snapchat post.
(23:55):
One of these thirty nine people who Madison knows must
be linked to the harasser, connecting the dots like pins
on a court board. They needed a way to narrow
down these thirty nine suspects, so they decided to have
another look at the other victims. If there was something
(24:15):
someone connecting these six women, that would be their suspect.
And well, one of the six victims was shockingly young,
and while in her photo she was always fully clothed,
there was another clue.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Here's Madison again.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Well, the underage girl ended up having a Catholic school
uniform on it was a photograph of her fully clothed
in her Catholic uniform and just like post of like
soliciting someoneuder raper he wants to watch someone rape her
this and that just really bad. Perse And again she
was underage, So we zoomed in on the photograph.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Christine's husband, Dana, a auto shop wiz, helped them shop
in the photo.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
So he zoomed in, did his little magic, and he
ended up being able to reap the school location, which
is terrifying. If we can figure out where this young
girl is going to school and find her, like any
creep on the internet could, right, because he's posting again
a photo of her in her school uniform with calls
(25:25):
of action to rape and harm her. So that was
kind of the second clue, breadcrumb clue that we had.
And so we're trying to at the time piece together
who all these people are. And then Dana went on
Facebook and like cross reference like mutual friend, bam, mutual friend,
mutual and so he was like, holy shit, it is him.
Speaker 2 (25:44):
Dana discovers he has a Facebook friend in common with
all of these women, a man called Chris.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
We figured out one's an ex girlfriend, one's a family member,
and ones a family friend when there were lots of
other like little like Madison said, breadcrumbs.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
There was also that strange way of typing the dot
space dot space method. They cross referenced it with Chris's
posts on Facebook. It's how he wrote too. It had
to be him. Chris had mutual friends with all six
women and family in the same city where the schoolgirl lived.
And one final check.
Speaker 3 (26:21):
So that snapchat story ended up being one of our
bread crumb clues that we pieced together, and he was
the last person that had viewed the story.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
Madison and Christine finally found the culprit behind the years
of harassment, the years of paranoia and fear and stress
and extortion, Someone both of them knew, but neither of
them had thought about in years, Someone who had even
been a guest at Christine and Dana's wedding, Christopher Juanacorps.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
We both went to college with him. He was I
would say, a friend of my husband's by the end.
They were probably I would say friends in college, acquaintances
later on in life, but still invited to our wedding.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
It sounds like the other women and this girl that
he harassed were much kind of closer to him, Like
why would he pick you guys?
Speaker 4 (27:18):
Like the only thing I can think of is maybe
he like had a crush on Madison.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
Like Madison and him never had a romantic relationship, never
went on a date, never did anything physical. Yeah, nothing,
Like I don't even think I ever like hugged him
in like a social setting, Like I don't. Again, it's like,
was I two night? You know, like you always like
as a victim xpessily in the society, you're always questioning like, well,
(27:43):
what did I do. And it's like, at the end
of the day, you as a victim to d Doude nothing.
It doesn't matter what you're wearing, it doesn't matter what
you look like, it doesn't matter anything. It's the person
doing it to you. That's whose fault it is.
Speaker 2 (27:56):
And the moment when you realized that it was him,
can you just kind of describe that feeling.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
It was the biggest relief in my opinion, like weight
off of my shoulder. I can, you know, start trying
to trust people around my life a little bit more
since I know that they're not trying to hurt me.
And then it was also like excited a little bit again.
Weird emotion, but we had worked so hard, spent countless hours,
(28:26):
countless sleepless nights working till three, four or five am
on this stuff. But it was it was nice to
see some of the hard work paying off.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
So they found that guy, but now they needed justice.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
The sisters faced another daunting challenge, turning their digital detective
work into a case that law enforcement couldn't ignore. After
the break, Madison and Christine go off to Discovering Christopher
(29:19):
Bonacorp's identity was a major win for Madison and Christine,
but knowing who he was didn't make him any less dangerous.
To stop his harassment, they would need an air type
case that even the most dismissive police officers wouldn't turn away.
And they had a responsibility to the other six victims.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
And so we contacted them all individually and then ultimately
got like a group chat going, and every single one
of them was very receptive and helpful. Right.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
One of the women was Chris's ex girlfriend.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
And some of the photographs that were being posted of her,
she didn't even know were being taken of her. So yeah,
it's so creepy, like truly voyeurism where she was getting
changed and he would like post photos of her and
things like that.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
And then there was an ex girlfriend who he attacked
a lot.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
As they talked to the victims, they learned that two
of the other women had already confronted Chris directly about
his harassment. To one, he apologized and promised to stop,
but with the other his response was much more callous.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
I think he said, good luck, called the cops. They're
not going to do anything. And it was a complete
asshole to her about it. And so she had filed
a police report in Orlando, Florida area years prior and
had just set idle for years and years and years.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
These girls, with nothing in common except the man who
had violated their privacy, united against Chris. They started sharing
their stories and pooling their resources.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
The pack was forming and it was a to hunt.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
There is a strength in numbers when you're reporting crimes.
They can ignore one person, they might be able to
ignore two people, but once you start getting more and
more people involved, I think it helps elevate the seriousness
of the crime. Yeah, so we're joining forces with all
of the girls and we're like, Okay, there's so many
(31:22):
of us, Like, they cannot ignore us.
Speaker 4 (31:25):
This is a bigger issue.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
This is a societal issue, not like a one person
fighting with one person issue. We were scattered all over
the country too, but kind of in a stance of unity,
we decided like, on this day, we are all going
to the police department and we're going to get a
police report.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
This is when Christine, the lawyer of the group, really
comes into her own.
Speaker 3 (31:46):
I had compiled a print out of all of our
circumstantial evidence, a breadcrumb map. I emailed this to all
the girls all over the country. I had listed out
any law of this might be breaking if you were
in New York. I looked up your New York laws
and your local laws, and I added all the federal
statutes like cybersocking that I thought it might fall into.
(32:07):
If you were in Florida, I included the non consensual
pornography law. Like I included everything that I think that
I could point to with a straight face and be like, listen,
this is illegal. I had some screenshots of all the
different types of harassing messages, including some of the more
egregious ones, like the call to action to harm. Specifically
Madison and the other age women.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
Christine essentially created a fifty nine page legal roadmap that
the victims could take to their local police departments.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
I definitely did a lot of like the piecing together
like visually, yeah, I think it was kind of like
the dream team, between Dana being like our in house
tech guru, me being in house counsel, and then Madison
kind of piecing together everything like parelel work like she's doing.
I was kind of learning from the best aka Christine.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
The girlfriend's planned a coordinated appro all of them would
go into their respective police departments. On the same day
and asked a file of police report against Christopher Buanacorp.
But despite having these huge files of evidence, most of
them were turned away. Only Madison and the mother of
the underage girl actually managed to put in the reports.
(33:20):
Even legal expert Christine was dismissed, which again was.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Just absolutely mind boggling to me because of all the
work that we had put into to give them like
this perfect little with a bow wrapped on top evidence
in a summary for them. And personally, I went into
my police department and I can't even fill out a
police report. It blew my mind, Like how they treated me.
(33:45):
I mean, he asked all the questions right, like how
do they get the photos? This isn't a crime, If anything,
it's a misdemeanor. Do you really want to go through
all this? A jury is never going to understand this.
Those are some of the things that actual quotes of
this man.
Speaker 4 (33:59):
Said to me.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
And so finally I demanded to fill out a police
report and said, listen, Bud, like you're behind a desk,
like why don't you let the actual detective decide if
this is a crime. Just give me the form and
pass it on. If the detective wants to rip it up.
That's on him.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
Eventually the police officer gave in and handed Christine the
report to fill out.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
It did get to the detective. The detective determined okay,
this is bad, and then was like, okay, we also
don't have the resources to do anything about this.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
I'm going to afford this on to the FBI.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Finally, someone in law enforcement saw this situation for what
it was. As for the police departments that had dismissed
the other women, well, Christine wasn't letting that slide. She
made calls, pushed back, found the right people to talk to.
All that paid off an additional two of the victims
walked back into their local police departments and filed reports.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
At that point, we know who it is, but in
the eyes of the law, it's circumstantial evidence, right, and
so we knew that we needed to get solid proof,
which means IP addresses connecting.
Speaker 4 (35:14):
To a person.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
Through the civil lawsuit they had filed, they were now
getting information about IP addresses the harassmer was using.
Speaker 3 (35:22):
But some of them were coming back to like the
New York area, the Greater New York area, and so
we're like, ok, hey, this is good.
Speaker 4 (35:27):
This is good, This is good.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
Guess who lived in New York.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Chris Buanacorps sort of saving all these IP addresses and everything.
But when you go to subpoena the Internet service providers,
that actually alerts the user and gives them the opportunity
to fight it.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
And Madison and Christine were firing off subpoenas every few
hours every day, new post online subpoena, another picture subpoena,
and on and on.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
During this time. Obviously, the ISP was alerting him and
he was like, oh shit, who whatever. But it's funny
seeing in the background, like the FBI was doing their thing,
and he still had no idea that the FBI was
cracking down on him.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
The FBI and the sisters were closing in on Chris
from all sides, until finally, after a decade of piecing
together breadcrumbs, they had enough to take him to court
and press charges. In March of twenty twenty, the civil
lawsuit Christine Conradis and Madison Conradis versus John Doe was
(36:30):
officially amended to name Christopher Buanacorps. In a separate criminal case,
he was charged with six counts of cyberstalking to avoid
trial and get a lighter sentence, he pleaded guilty.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
We encourage as many of the women to go as
possible because I think it's great for the judge to
see that this affects real life people. And so we
were there from eight until after five because of their
were so many victims that wanted to tell him and
the judge how we felt. We get to the next
(37:09):
morning and they're reading this sentence out and ultimately the
judge agreed with us that this was abhorrent behavior and
not suitable for society and sentenced him to fifteen years
in federal prison.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Wow, how did that feel?
Speaker 3 (37:28):
I personally felt very emotional. Just getting up and having
to speak and talk about the impact of his actions
was scary enough.
Speaker 4 (37:40):
And to think about.
Speaker 3 (37:44):
Having one judge decide the fate of what you've worked
so hard to try and do, which was put him
in prison, It was so scary because like how many
men told me throughout this whole process that like, it
wasn't a crime, or you're not gonna get anything out
(38:05):
of it. So when the time came and they read
out the sentence, it was like, there's no explanation. It
was just like emotional and.
Speaker 4 (38:19):
Relieving. Yeah, i'd say, like validating.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
Right, You're told in the beginning, this isn't a crime,
a jury will never believe this. This is a misdemeanor
of that, and then you're sitting there years later realizing
that this person just got fifteen years in federal prison
and just feels good. Fun fact too is we thought
it was very like poetic that the FBI agents, all
(38:46):
the victims, the prosecutor, it was a team of all women.
So we thought it was kind of cool and poetic.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
Oh wow, And did you talk to any of the
other victims after that?
Speaker 3 (38:58):
Yeah? Yeah, we still I've talked to them sometimes. That's
what was so strange about this whole situation and who
he chose as victims, Like, none of us besides Christine
and I obviously have much in common from location to
interest to where we're at in life like ages, like
literally nothing besides that were females and happened to somehow
(39:20):
run into Christopher at some point in our lives.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
This nightmare stretched for almost ten years, from that first
post on four Chan in twenty eleven to finally naming
Chris Bonicor in the Civil lawsuit.
Speaker 1 (39:36):
And then getting him a conviction.
Speaker 2 (39:39):
Ten years of looking over your shoulder, of feeling exposed,
hunted and dismissed. But it was also ten years of
grit and determination. It took a decade to say this
is finally over. Well, I hope you guys feel a
(39:59):
sense of I don't know ease.
Speaker 4 (40:02):
Yeah I do.
Speaker 3 (40:03):
And I really think that we really liked that we
could help other people around this too. And that was
my last sentence of my victim impact statement was the
lone Wolf dies, but the Pack survives. And it hits
me every time because I couldn't have done this without
every single one of those girls, and they couldn't have
(40:25):
done it without us. We survived because we stayed within
a pack. The lone wolf dies, but the pack survives.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Thanks to Christine and Madison for joining our girlfriend's pack
here too. Hope you know that you've got a big
group of us rallying, howling around you.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Now.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
God, if you've enjoyed this conversation and you can find
loads more incredible women on our feed, do check them out,
and please do spread the word and tell your friends
about us. We want as many people as possible to
(41:09):
be part of the girlfriend's gang. Next time on the
girlfriend's spotlight at least runs the ball barn.
Speaker 4 (41:19):
He WILLO got a question for you. How hard are
orchae actomies. The orchaectomies are removal of the testicles. Have
you ever done what?
Speaker 3 (41:28):
No? Would you like to?
Speaker 2 (41:38):
Hey, it's Anna. You've reached the girlfriend's hotline. Leave your
story after the tone, Okay, gotta go.
Speaker 1 (41:46):
Love you.
Speaker 5 (41:48):
So a few years ago, my nanny passed away, my
mom's moms, my grandma. We were very close, but also
my mom and my nanny were very close, and I'm
very close with my mom. So there was a lot
tangled up grief and secondary grief and seeing my mom
souff for and not being able to be there. I
(42:09):
couldn't travel back in time for the funeral. It was
near the end of COVID. I think in twenty twenty one.
It's making me feel better. My friends all came over
and let me perform blind a karaoke for them, and
they would sing to me, and one friend in particular
(42:30):
brought out her piano from her room, which is very heavy,
and played every song that I love.
Speaker 4 (42:37):
And let me sing along. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (42:39):
I really can't sing, so you know they loved me
with them tolerating sixty minutes of me just like how
like Adele.
Speaker 2 (42:51):
If you have your own story like the one you
just heard, and you'd like the whole Girlfriend's Gang to
hear it, then please send it to us. You can
record it as a voice memo under ninety seconds please
and email it straight to the Girlfriends at novel dot Audio.
Please don't include your name, We're keeping things a little anon.
(43:12):
We want stories like say that one time you faked
an emergency on an awful date and your bestie bailed
you out with a phone call we love her. Or
that time when all of your girls showed up on
your doorstep with five pizzas, two tups of ice cream,
and three bottles of saven your blanc because the man
of your dreams just dumped you. I want stories that
(43:34):
are meaningful or silly.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
I want big, I want small.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
I'm desperate to hear them, so send them over. This season,
The Girlfriend's Spotlight is supporting the charity Womankind Worldwide. They
do amazing work to help women's rights organizations and movements
to strengthen and grow. If you'd like to find out
more or donate, to help them secure equal rights for
(43:59):
women and girls across the globe. You can go to
womankind dot org dot UK. The Girlfriend's Spotlight is produced
by Novel for iHeart Podcasts. For more from Novel, visit
novel dot audio. The show is hosted by me Anna Sinfield.
(44:23):
This episode was written and produced by al Shay Barney.
Our assistant producer is Lucy Carr. Our researcher is Seyana Yusuf.
The editor is Hannah Marshall. Max O'Brien and Craig Strachan
are executive producers.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
Production management from.
Speaker 2 (44:40):
Joe Savage, Sharie Houston and Charlotte Wolfe.
Speaker 1 (44:43):
Sound design, mixing.
Speaker 2 (44:45):
And scoring by Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson. Music supervision
by Jako Taievich, Nicholas Alexander and Annasinfield. Original music composed
by Louisa Gerstein and Jemma Freeman. The series artwork was
de signed by Christina Lemcol. Willard Foxton is creative director
of Development. Special thanks to Katrina Norvel, Carrie Lieberman and
(45:08):
Will Pearson at iHeart Podcasts, as well as Carl Frankel
and the whole team at WM
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