This Feels Criminal: A True Crime Podcast (Formerly Killer Queens)19 Elo

Lauren McCluskey: Can We Tell Which Relationships Will Turn Deadly? (Part 1)

When 21-year-old University of Utah student Lauren McCluskey ended a brief relationship, she had good reason to believe she'd caught the warning signs early.

The man she'd been dating had lied about his name, his age, and his criminal history. Lauren ended the relationship immediately.

But he didn't leave her alone.

What followed was a terrifying escalation of stalking, harassment, extortion, and repeated attempts to get help — ending less than three weeks later with Lauren's murder on the campus where she lived and went to school.

Lauren's case leaves behind an agonizing question: when we look back after someone has been killed, the warning signs can seem painfully obvious. But are they actually obvious before the violence happens?

In Part 1, we begin Lauren's story and ask a much bigger question: Can we tell which abusive relationships are most likely to turn deadly?

Because if we can identify danger before someone is killed, that changes the question of what we should be doing about it.

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