Ashley Flowers, Delia D’Ambra talk ‘CounterClock’ season 3 and the 1989 ‘Prom Night Murders’
An Indiana teenager was so angered by not being allowed to drive to his prom that he slaughtered his family.
The so-called “Prom Night Murders,” in which Jeff Pelley killed his parents and younger sisters in 1989, fuels the third season of the podcast “CounterClock,” which dropped early Thursday to the delight of true crime junkies.
Hosted by investigative journalist Delia D’Ambra, the 20-episode third installment of the Audiochuck podcast arrived on the 32nd anniversary of the slayings of Rev. Robert Pelley, Dawn Pelley and two of Dawn’s young daughters, Janel and Jolene. Pelley, who was 17 when he carried out the gruesome killings, was sentenced in 2006 to 160 years behind bars and currently hopes to have the infamous case retried.
“This case spans so much space, so much time, so many people, that it’s the reason we’re dropping it as a binge. Delia and I early on were like, this case is so complicated and there’s so many people that if you spread this out over weeks, like I’m afraid people will get lost,” Ashley Flowers, who founded Audiochuck and produces the podcast, told the Daily News Wednesday over Zoom.
“It’s one of these where you have to sit down and just like consume yourself in it the way Delia has been consumed in it for nine months,” said the Indiana native, best known for hosting Audiochuck staple “Crime Junkie” — a regular hit on the podcast charts.
The Pelley family was killed in Indiana, but had history in The Sunshine State, a connection for both podcasters that, for Flowers, “felt like it was meant to be.”
Unlike the previous seasons, D’Ambra found herself investigating a decades-old case in the midst of a global pandemic.
Though it sounds “backwards and paradoxical” with respect to the last year, D’Ambra told The News on that call that “the freezing of time kind of ... helped me investigate,” as people were home and, COVID-19 precautions aside, largely “more accessible.”
While Pelley remains in prison, she hopes the season leaves listeners “more enlightened” as it “lays out all of the acts and information that were not previously known.”
Whether or not you come away believing in Pelley’s guilt or innocence, Flowers feels his trial “was not fair,” citing the evidence presented against him. “I think he deserves another shot at a truly fair criminal proceeding.”
But, after three years of “Crime Junkie” — which explored the case in Monday’s episode and is currently number two on Apple’s podcast chart, just behind “CounterClock” — Flowers admits she’s “a little jaded about the criminal justice system.”
“I’m finding that often the story that people know is never the whole story,” said Flowers.
Will the season though present listeners with a clear cut ending?
“There is a resolution in the criminal justice system and that is that Jeff Pelley is a four-time convicted murderer,” said D’Ambra. “So that’s the resolution that’s on paper. I think the listener can come up with their own resolution that may be the same or different, based on all the facts in play.”
Meanwhile, D’Ambra is already exploring a case for a fourth installment, that she expects will release “in a reasonable timeframe.”
Less than a month into a breather from “CounterClock,” the journalist called up Flowers to let her know she was onto another case.
“She calls me and she’s like, ‘I was out riding dirt bikes in the woods and someone told me about a crime’ and now she’s like trying to solve it. She can’t stop. It’s in her blood,” laughed Flowers.
“CounterClock” season 3 will hit podcasting platforms Thursday
