When TikTok Beef Turns Deadly: The Durhams vs The Lathams

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You've got one neighbor with a loud truck and a TikTok account, and another with a corrections

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officer job and absolutely no patience for nonsense.

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Toss in some viral videos, a pandemic that shuts down the courts, and a teenager who treats

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harassment like a content strategy, and yeah, things are going to escalate.

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Fast.

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Today's episode is about Zachary Latham, a kid who thought going viral was worth just

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about anything, including the kind of attention you usually get from a homicide detective.

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Before we get started, if you like your true crime brief and bingeable, you're in the

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right place.

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Hit follow so you don't miss the two new episodes I drop every week.

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This is 10 Minute Murder.

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Let's get into it.

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Let's be clear.

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This isn't some medieval tale of night's defending family honor.

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It's not epic.

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It's not noble.

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It's suburban, south, jersey in 2020.

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The only armor involved is probably car heart.

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And instead of swords, it was cell phones and pickup trucks.

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On one side of the property line, you've got the Durham's, a tight-knit family led by

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51-year-old William Durham, a corrections officer who didn't exactly shy away from

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confrontation.

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Husband, father, not the kind of guy to let things slide.

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On the other side, the Lathams, and their 18-year-old son, Zachary.

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Loud truck, louder personality, and a TikTok account that basically doubled as a digital

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middle finger to anyone who didn't find him hilarious.

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Spoiler, the Durham's did not find him hilarious.

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They thought he was a shithead.

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Zachary liked to peel around the neighborhood like it was his own personal racetrack.

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The noise was obnoxious, sure.

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But it was the way he drove.

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Fast, careless, like anyone else's safety was an afterthought that pushed people past

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annoyed and straight into worried.

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Especially the Durham's.

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And from that, a neighborly standoff started brewing.

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On phone camera, one viral video, and one ego at a time.

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At first it felt like things might cool off.

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The Durham's did what any decent neighbors would do.

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They walked over and told the Lathams, "Hey, your kids driving like a maniac.

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Our families live here too."

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That night, Zachary showed up at the Durham's door, probably dragged thereby his parents,

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to offer what we can only assume was a half-ass apology.

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And on the surface, that should have been the end of it.

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Except Zachary didn't drop it.

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He stued, and then he did what any teenage ego wrapped in Wi-Fi and validation does.

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He picked up his phone and turned it into petty content.

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He started recording his interactions with the Durham's.

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Confrontations, insults, whatever he could provoke and posted them to TikTok.

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And the algorithm, aided up, one clip of him harassing Mrs. Durham, over 3 million views.

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Comments poured in, cheering him on, encouraging him to go even further.

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So he did.

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Zachary wasn't just being obnoxious anymore.

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He was building an audience, one aggressive encounter at a time.

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He'd see the Durham's in their yard and walk up just to tell Mrs. Durham her face had

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gone viral.

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The Durham's, meanwhile, were stuck. They tried going to the police, filed complaints.

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But this was 2020, and the courts were closed thanks to COVID.

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No hearings, no restraining orders, no progress.

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Just more views for Zachary and more fear for the Durham's.

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And still, no one could stop him.

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May 4, 2020.

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Things hit a new level of reckless.

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Zachary Latham was behind the wheel of his truck when he swore toward the Durham's

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17-year-old son.

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He was just riding his bike down the street.

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He didn't hit him, but he came very close, way too close.

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The kid made it home, rattled, and told his parents what happened.

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That's when William Durham had enough.

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He parked his own truck in a way that blocked Zachary from getting into the Latham driveway.

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A silent message that basically said, "We're done playing games here."

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Zachary did not take that well.

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He stormed over to the Durham's house, ready to escalate.

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William wasn't home, but his wife was, and she did something smart.

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She started recording.

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She knew by now how fast this kid could twist things, which she didn't know, Zachary was

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already recording, too.

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The video that went up on Zachary's TikTok later showed him screaming at Mrs. Durham

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about his truck, then violently elbowing her and knocking the phone out of her hand.

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Real tough guy energy.

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Obviously, the kind of guy that would refer to himself as an alpha.

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He managed to get his truck out of the block driveway and speed off toward his house.

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But when William Durham got home and found Zachary had physically attacked his wife, he

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didn't wait.

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He grabbed his sons and went straight to the Latham house.

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This time, the Lathams were the ones recording.

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On the video, you can hear them repeatedly tell the Durham's to leave their property,

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but the Durham's did not back down.

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And then it happened.

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Zachary stepped in front of William and fired a stun gun at him.

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He didn't stop him.

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So Zachary pulled the knife, slashed once and ran into the garage.

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It did not in there.

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The fight kept going.

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Zachary kept firing the stun gun, kept slashing.

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The whole thing escalated in seconds.

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When it was over, William Durham had been stabbed multiple times.

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One of those wounds went under his arm and punctured his lung.

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He did not survive.

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Right after the stabbing, the Lathams claimed self-defense.

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They pointed to the video.

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They told the Durham's to get off their property multiple times.

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The Durham's did not listen.

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But the Durham family had their own story.

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They said this wasn't about a property line.

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It was about a months-long campaign of harassment that Zachary had been building like a playlist.

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All of it centered on one thing.

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Attention!

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They believed he wanted to be famous and William's death was the final performance in a string

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of viral content.

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Zachary's own videos didn't help his case.

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The TikToks he'd posted where he harassed, provoked, and escalated things were now evidence

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against him.

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He was arrested for murder.

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He made bail, then left the state.

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In Florida, he picked up the whole new charge, allegedly flashing a gun at another driver

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and trying to ram their car.

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Using his vehicle as a weapon, again.

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The case sat pending while New Jersey's courts finally reopened post-COVID, started

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looking into the killing of William Durham.

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And here's where it gets sticky.

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Yes, Zachary stabbed William.

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Yes, William died.

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But the law isn't always about what happened.

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It's about how it happened.

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The Durham's were unarmed, but they were on the Latham's property and they'd been warned

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to leave.

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The New Jersey's law that made it a great area.

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A self-divine claim wasn't impossible to argue.

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The jury didn't find enough to convict him.

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Zachary was acquitted.

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He packed up and went back to Florida like none of it had ever happened.

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Except it didn't stop there.

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He was arrested again, this time on charges of aggravated stalking, sexual voyeurism,

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and violating a restraining order.

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The victim's identity hasn't been released, which sparked speculation that it could be,

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Mrs. Durham.

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But that theory doesn't hold up.

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With entire states between them and everything that had already happened, it's almost impossible

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to imagine she'd have anything to do with him again.

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In Florida, the story picked up right where it left off, just with the new victim and

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a different kind of cruelty.

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According to the latest case against him, Zachary secretly recorded himself having

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sex with a woman he was in a relationship with.

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When she later broke things off, he didn't just take the loss and move on.

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He sent the video to her parents, and at least one other person.

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That was the pattern.

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And Zachary's world, rejection meant war.

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After sending the video, he started stalking and harassing her.

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It escalated quickly, enough for her to get a restraining order, but a court order didn't

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matter much to Zachary.

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He just kept going.

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One detective later wrote that Zachary willfully, maliciously, and repeatedly followed

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and harassed the victim.

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Even while the domestic violence and junction was active, one encounter was especially disturbing.

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The woman was at a store, checking out at the register.

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When Zachary walked up behind her and started rubbing her back.

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She panicked and ran to hide in the bathroom.

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He followed her.

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She tried to get into her car.

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He followed her again, forced his way into the back seat and told her to drive somewhere.

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She eventually managed to escape when he got out of the vehicle, but that moment was enough

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to land him right back in jail.

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And even then, he didn't stop.

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From behind bars, Zachary tried calling her 26 times over four days.

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She'd already blocked the jail's number, so she didn't pick up, obviously, but the calls

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kept coming.

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Because for Zachary, lay them, the rules never seemed to apply.

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But in New Jersey, not in Florida, not in court, and apparently not even in jail.

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Zachary lay them didn't start with violence.

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He started with TikTok.

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He liked the attention, the comments, the views.

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And when that attention came from harassing his neighbors, he leaned into it.

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That should have been the red flag, but no one stepped in.

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Not fast enough.

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He filmed the Durham's.

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He mocked them.

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He shoved a camera in their faces and called it content.

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William Durham is dead.

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And Zachary, he walked away, moved states, kept spiraling.

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Different city, same behavior.

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The people around him changed, but the pattern didn't.

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Even a jail cell didn't shut it down.

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He kept calling his victim 26 times in four days.

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You'd think that would be rock bottom, but with this guy, there never seems to be one.

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Some people get a wake-up call.

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Others just double down.

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If you're still wondering how far someone will go to stay relevant, this is your answer.

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Thanks for listening to this episode of 10 Minute Murder.

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I'm Joe, the host, and if you're a brand new listener, welcome, first of all.

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And second, make sure you hit subscribe right now, wherever you're listening to this podcast,

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hit the follow button.

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And then check the show notes of this episode.

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You'll see links to where you can follow me on social media, which feels a little bit

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weird asking you to do that in an episode where I just basically trashed the guy that was

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using TikTok to get all the attention and whatnot.

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It's ironic and it's not lost on me, but still you can go into the show notes of this and

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find the link to follow me on TikTok.

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As well as Facebook and Instagram, all those places.

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And if you really wanted to know more about the show, get involved and see what we've done

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episodes on in the past and see pictures and all the things, contact me 10minutemurder.com.

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That's a website.

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You can go to it, 10minutemurder.com.

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And that's going to do it.

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That's your episode for today.

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If you're off to binge more episodes, I highly encourage it.

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Don't let me slow you down.

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Keep right on going.

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If not, hope you have a great day and enjoy whatever it is that you're doing today or if it's

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a sleepy time for you.

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Good night.