The desperate screams in the night" and "The horrific case of Anthony Todt

What this episode is about

The case of Anthony Todt reveals the tragic consequences of a deeply dysfunctional family, culminating in the shocking discovery of four bodies, including those of his wife and three children, in their Florida home following a police visit for fraud charges. This chilling narrative is rooted in Anthony's traumatic childhood, marked by his father's disturbing behavior, including an attempted murder of his mother, shaping the path to the horrific events that followed.

Key takeaways

• From idyllic to horrific: a perfect family can mask a lifetime of trauma lurking beneath the surface.
• In Florida’s dreamland, the American Nightmare unfolded; appearances of happiness often hide unseen horrors.
• Childhood trauma doesn’t just fade; it festers, as Anthony’s past proves—a dark legacy can rear its head.
• Even successful families can unravel swiftly; circumstances can shift from fairy tale to tragedy with shocking acceleration.
• Beneath suburban bliss lies potential for disaster—Anthony Todd’s story reminds us that even well-off families aren’t immune.

Who speaks in this episode?

• Anthony Todd (Host) · 6 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 3:00: Anthony Todd, Loretta Todd, Robert Todd, Megan Todd
2. 3:00 – 6:00: Connecticut, Megan Todd, Celebration, Florida, Alec Todd
3. 6:00 – 9:00: Anthony Todd, Connecticut, FBI
4. 9:00 – 12:00: Connecticut, Anthony Todd
5. 12:00 – 15:00: Anthony Todd, Celebration, Florida, Alec Todd, Tyler Todd
6. 15:00 – 18:00: Anthony Todd, Megan Todd, Lime Disease
7. 18:00 – 19:05: Anthony Todd

Notable quotes from "The desperate screams in the night" and "The horrific case of Anthony Todt"

• Three children and the killer wasn't any armed robber Hitman but Anthony Todd himself Anthony Todd was born on the 29th of September 1975 in Ben Salem Pennsylvania he did not…

  about Anthony Todd · at 0:27

• He went to his mother's room she was lying on the floor miraculously still alive although Loretta had been shot in the eye from Point Blank Range she survived the murder…

  about Loretta Todd · at 1:30

• Todd family was still in Connecticut meanwhile Tony's sisters told the local authorities that the family had been receiving disturbing messages from Tony and Megan's numbers…

  about Connecticut · at 10:03

• Identifiable it was the smell of a rotting human body the law enforcement officials were shocked to see the decomposing body of 42-year-old Megan and their two children Alec…

  about Alec Todd · at 11:02

• At times but seemed irritated whenever he objected in the middle of his answer he told the court that Megan was diagnosed with Lyme disease during her teen years he further…

  about Lime Disease · at 15:04

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Anthony Todd — Person · Primary subject (perpetrator/defendant) · 13 mentions · first at 0:07
  Central figure of the episode: a physiotherapist accused and convicted of murdering his wife and three children amid fraud and financial collapse.
• Megan Todd — Person · Primary victim; also alleged alternate perpetrator in defense narrative · 3 mentions · first at 0:25
  Anthony Todd’s wife and one of the victims; her Lyme disease and mental health struggles are presented as key context and later used in Anthony’s shifting explanations.
  Bodies found in Anthony Todd's house were not strangers but rather his own family including his wife Megan and three children and the killer wasn't any armed robber Hitman but…
• Alec Todd — Person · Victim (child) · 2 mentions · first at 3:27
  Oldest child of Anthony and Megan; identified among the bodies found and described in the confession narrative as stabbed.
• Tyler Todd — Person · Victim (child) · 2 mentions · first at 3:34
  One of the three children murdered; found deceased with Megan and Alec and referenced in both prosecution and confession accounts.
  Identifiable it was the smell of a rotting human body the law enforcement officials were shocked to see the decomposing body of 42-year-old Megan and their two children Alec…
• Robert Todd — Person · Background figure (father); catalyst in origin story · 2 mentions · first at 0:44
  Anthony Todd’s father; described as having affairs with students and orchestrating an attempted murder of Loretta, contributing to Anthony’s childhood trauma.
  While he was married to Loretta after hiding his Affairs and relationships Robert decided to permanently remove his wife from the equation and marry his fiance at this points…
• Loretta Todd — Person · Background figure (mother); attempted murder survivor · 3 mentions · first at 0:51
  Anthony Todd’s mother; survived a point-blank shooting arranged by Robert Todd, forming a major traumatic event in Anthony’s early life.

Companies & orgs

• FBI — Company · Investigator · 1 mention · first at 7:25
  The FBI was investigating Anthony Todd's fraudulent activities, which led to the discovery of the family's murder.
  Ever since leaving Connecticut to spend Thanksgiving with his family in Florida an FBI agent was parked outside the family's house in celebration when he noticed Anthony…

Concepts & topics

• Lime Disease — Concept · Health issue · 2 mentions · first at 4:59
  Megan Todd's Lyme disease played a significant role in the family's mental and physical health decline, contributing to the tragic outcome.

Places & events

• Celebration, Florida — Place · Setting · 3 mentions · first at 0:07
  The location where the tragic events involving the Todd family took place, including the discovery of the bodies.
  On January 13th 2020 officials from law enforcement agencies went to Anthony Todd's home in Celebration Florida to issue him a warrant related to fraud charges but they were all shocked to.
• Connecticut — Place · Previous residence · 8 mentions · first at 3:10
  The state where the Todd family lived and ran their physiotherapy business before moving to Celebration, Florida.

Full transcript with timestamps

0:04 on January 13th 2020 officials from law enforcement agencies went to Anthony Todd's home in Celebration Florida to issue him a warrant related to fraud charges but they were all shocked to discover four badly decomposing human bodies as well as the body of a dog the bodies found in Anthony Todd's house were not strangers but rather his own family including his wife Megan and three children and the killer wasn't any armed robber Hitman but Anthony Todd himself Anthony Todd was born on the 29th of September 1975 in Ben Salem Pennsylvania he did not have a normal childhood like other kids in his school and Social Circle it was surrounded by dysfunction growing up his father Robert Todd was a high school teacher who had a disturbing taste for girls a lot younger than him Anthony's mother Loretta Todd was a housewife who had no idea that her husband was having secret Affairs and sexual relationships with 16 and 17

1:00 yearold girls from his class the problem was more serious than it looked Robert was engaged to a nurse at the same time and had a relationship with one of his students and this all was happening while he was married to Loretta after hiding his Affairs and relationships Robert decided to permanently remove his wife from the equation and marry his fiance at this points Anthony Todd was just four years old one nights he woke up the sound of his mother screaming from her bedroom shortly after that Anthony Tony Todd heard a gunshot when he went to his mother's room she was lying on the floor miraculously still alive although Loretta had been shot in the eye from Point Blank Range she survived the murder attempt as the investigation began it was soon discovered that Robert Todd Anthony's father wasn't as devastated as a normal husband would be after such a shocking incident rather he seemed irritated and

1:52 disappointed at the fact that his wife had survived the law enforcement authorities soon knew that Robert had something to do with the murder attempt on his wife this was proven right when further investigation into the matter revealed the shocking truth that Robert Todd had offered to pay one of his mentally Disturbed students $900 in exchange for a special assignment killing his wife Loretta Robert wanted the murder to look like a case of home invasion he gave the student the keyw house a pistol and instructions about where to find the bedroom where his wife would be sleeping the incident took a serious mental toll on Tony and he found it hard to recover from it all after getting a divorce from her husband Loretta remarried and tried her best to help her son get out of the trauma but Tony's mental health was permanently damaged ever since he had heard about his biological father trying to kill his

2:39 mother despite his mental health issues Anthony Todd was an extremely well-mannered and hardworking kid in school it was because of this that he was voted to be the president of his class in both his Junior and senior years it was during high school that Tony met Megan for the first time with time Tony and Megan grew close and even decided to pursue similar degrees after graduating from high school just a few months after graduating from college Tony and Megan decided to tie the knot soon after marrying each other the couple moved from Pennsylvania to Connecticut and set up their own Physical Therapy business there they both practiced Physiotherapy and worked together to grow their business until ma for a couple of years Megan found out that she was pregnant with the couple's first child this forced Megan to stop working as a physiotherapist and the couple welcomed their first child Alec

3:30 after a couple of more pregnancies and some unfortunate miscarriages the Todd family comprised Anthony Megan and their three children Alec Tyler and Zoe it was a perfect American family and Tony was the best father and husband anyone could have asked for he was faithful to Megan and committed to providing for his children not only this he made sure he was there for his kids on important occasions like school events and sports practices Megan who had now become a housewife full-time was equally dedicated to her children the Todds were a well-respected family in the community but part of this was because of Anthony's Physical Therapy business which had grown significantly over time when the money started coming in abundance the couple decided to buy a condo in Celebration Florida a master planned Community located near Walt Disney World Resort it was the perfect place for the Todd family to move

4:22 because the place promised happiness peace and more importantly safety but they soon moved to a house nearby when the condo started Ed feeling small for their family the Todds were living a happy family life going on dayong trips to Disney World visiting the beach playing games attending piano recital and participating in different sports since Tony's business was based in Connecticut he would return to work on his own while Megan and the kids stayed behind until this point it was a picture perfect life for the Todd family until 2011 when everything changed when Megan was a teenager she was bitten by a tick which developed into Lyme disease which is a bacterial infection Lyme disease normally stays dormant for years and doesn't cause any health issues until something triggers it and ignites its symptoms that's what happened in the case of Megan in 2011 after a trip to Disney World Megan told her husband that

5:16 she had been bitten by a bug initially the couple thought that the infection would go away after a few days as in most of such cases however it quickly turned into serious health problems Megan was soon diagnosed with tonsilitis hepatitis and several other diseases these health problems affected Megan mentally as well and her personality completely changed with time sometime after her health issues began Megan was diagnosed with depression which only worsened when she had another miscarriage since Tony was in Connecticut to run the business the whole week and could only be in celebration on weekends it made things extremely hard for Megan to make things worse she didn't have the kind of community support the family had enjoyed while they were in Connecticut The only positive in the whole situation was Tony's physiotherapy business which Megan thought was going really well except it wasn't at all the company

6:05 hadn't been making a profit for some time and Anthony Todd was the main reason behind that he had been using the company funds to buy condos across the country and intended to R them out of vacationers but those properties didn't make the desired profit and most of them were running at a loss the little money that the physiotherapist business now made wasn't enough to run two houses in different states and cover Megan's medical bills and tonus airfares as the financial problems increased Anthony Todd decided to take out a small loan to make 's meet but couldn't pay off the repayment while the time came so he took another loan to repay the first loan and the cycle continued things quickly worsened before they knew it Tony was under $100,000 of personal debt he also owed money in terms of company debts and two mortgages for the family's houses in Connecticut and Florida until this point Anthony had been hiding the

6:56 financial problems from Megan but thought it was now time to tell his wife exactly what was going on and he decided to keep it that way to make things worse he thought it was a good idea to repay their debts by committing fraud Anthony started sending invoices to different health insurance companies and the Medicaid Program for physiotherapy treatments that he had never delivered to his clients when the money came in Anthony repaid the smaller of nearly 20 different loans amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars after some time the insurance companies started to grow suspicious and the FBI began an investigation into the matter in 2019 when the FBI agents interviewed Tony's patients they complained that their insurance companies were billing them for five sessions a week when in reality they had seen their physiotherapist once or twice a week in some cases the patients had moved out of the state and

7:42 hadn't seen Tony in months these discoveries prompted the FBI investigators to secretly check the documentation of the two clinics Tony had been operating and they immediately noticed discrepancies there were invoices for therapy sessions on days when the clinics weren't even open on the day of the surveillance Tony build insurance companies for the therapy sessions of 16 different patients despite the fact the clinic remained closed that day the authorities decided to bring Anthony Todd in for questioning he initially denied knowledge of any wrongdoing but direct testimonies from several of his patients left nothing for him to convince investigators of his version of events he eventually admitted to frond but insisted that his wife didn't know anything about his fraudulent activities he also agreed to plead guilty to any future charges if Megan was left out of it in September 2019 Tony was stripped

8:32 of his physiotherapy license and both of his clinics were suddenly closed without any prior notice to his employes despite his admission Anthony wasn't under arrest yet in November 2019 he told the investigators that he was going to visit his family in Florida and would be back in Connecticut in the first week of December he was allowed to travel to Celebration but never returned to Connecticut when Christmas came Anthony's sisters informed the police in celebration that she hadn't heard from the family in weeks which which was quite unusual because they regularly kept in contact she told the authorities that she was particularly worried about her brother because she knew he was involved in a fraud investigation she also said that during the last call with her brother Anthony told her that Megan and the kids had gotten ill and hadn't gotten out of bed in a few days since Tony never called after that it made her

9:19 wonder if the illness was more serious than what her brother had told her on December 29th 2019 police officers knocked on the Todd's home to do a welfare check no one answered the Bell and there were no signs of anyone occupying the house either the sheriff's department in celebration noted its report that the family had probably gone back to Connecticut it took two more weeks to find out that the entire Todd family had been inside their celebration home the whole time on January 13th 20120 investigators from the Department of Health and Human Services and police officers from the aola sheriff's department visited the Todd family's house they knocked on the front door for 3 days but didn't receive any response from the inside there was also eviction notice posted in the front of the house which convinced the authorities that the Todd family was still in Connecticut meanwhile Tony's sisters told the local

10:07 authorities that the family had been receiving disturbing messages from Tony and Megan's numbers this was around the same time when the FBI agent who was investigating Anthony Todd's fraud case followed him to Celebration this was because he had failed to report back ever since leaving Connecticut to spend Thanksgiving with his family in Florida an FBI agent was parked outside the family's house in celebration when he noticed Anthony stepping out of the the house and briefly sitting on the patio before going back inside the agent immediately informed the local sheriff's department and officers arrived at the house within minutes to arrest Anthony Tot but the police also had the responsibility to check on the welfare of Megan and the kids because of the official request by the couple's families when the officers asked Tony about Megan and the kids he told them that Megan was sleeping and that the

10:52 kids were at a sleepover but the officers knew they had to search the house because of an unusual smell when the officers entered the master bedroom the smell became overwhelming and was identifiable it was the smell of a rotting human body the law enforcement officials were shocked to see the decomposing body of 42-year-old Megan and their two children Alec and Tyler the family dog was also lying dead in the room as for the four-year-old Zoe she was nowhere to be found it was clear that the bodies had been there for several weeks what was even more disturbing was that Stony had been sleeping beside his dead wife the whole time when the forensic experts started removing the bodies they discovered that Zoe was also in the rim her remains were so badly decomposed that they had melted with those of her mother Anthony was immediately arrested and interrogated about what had happened at his house

11:43 meanwhile the victim's autopsy report revealed that all of the victims except Zoe had been stabbed in the abdomen the medical examiners also wrote in the report that they were murdered around Christmas in late December 2019 Anthony initially denied having any knowledge of his wife and kids deaths but later he told the authorities that Megan had made a death paact with him because of their shared fear of an imminent apocalypse he also said that Megan supported him when he went into each of his children's bedrooms to murder them he suffocated Zoe while stabbing Alec and Tyler according to Anthony Megan then stabbed herself in the stomach and took her own life Anthony Todd was charged with four counts of first-degree murder and prosecutors indicated that they would be seeking the death penalty for the heinous crime he had committed the authorities had both the murderer and his confession but sometime before the

12:32 trial began Tony changed his story for this he sent a 26 page letter to his father and shared a new version of exactly what happened in their celebration home the new perpetrator in Tony's revised vision of the events was none other than his deceased wife Megan in the letter he wrote that he was completely innocent of all the charges against him and his wife was the one responsible for the death of their children she gave them badro separated them and then stabbed them one by one he also said in the letter that on the night of the incidents he had taken the family van to their nearby condo to do some repairs and collected a necklace for his daughter he further added that he even played basketball with the boys on the driveway before leaving while Megan was baking a pie for the kids he said he never returned to the house that night and decided to sleep in the van because the oils Megan used to help with

13:22 her symptoms irritated his sinuses when he woke up the next morning the van Wen starts so he had to to walk back to the house according to Anthony Todd when he went back to the house the next morning he found the half-eaten blueberry pie on the kitchen counter which smelled strange he wrote in a letter that Megan told him that she had had a vision of the end of the world and had killed her children after that Megan stabbed and killed herself despite him begging her not to hurt herself Tony portrayed himself as a helpless bystander throughout the letter and even wrote that he tried to contact law enforcement authorities as well but there wasn't any working phone in the house he said he put all the bodies in the master bedroom and covered them with blankets to comfort them he also shared several other versions of the incident with his sister while in jail awaiting his trial during one call he told his sister that

14:10 he didn't remember anything about the murders of his family at all when it was time to enter his plea Anthony Todd pleaded not guilty of the charges of four murders when the trial began the prosecutors told the court that Tony didn't kill his family because of an apocalypse or because he wanted to free their souls but rather he murdered them because his fraudulent Financial activities were about to be brought to light Tony's family also provided insights into his mental health issues according to his sister the family was close to the community in Connecticut but things completely changed when they moved to Celebration Florida in those two years Tony had put on a lot of weights and was diagnosed with diabetes she told the court that he also started keeping his work in financial details secret from others when the time for Tony's testimony came he pretended to be a grieving husband who was devastated by

14:58 the the loss of his wife and three children when he was asked to talk about Megan's medical history he was tearful at times but seemed irritated whenever he objected in the middle of his answer he told the court that Megan was diagnosed with Lyme disease during her teen years he further added that before he met Megan she was diagnosed with a heart issue as well he also shared how Megan developed a drug induced hepatitis throughout his testimony he maintained that he was completely innocent and his wife Megan was responsible for the murder of their children he also told the jury Megan had become heavily influenced by a religious group when the traditional medications failed to help her with her symptoms according to Tony his wife met this group online and soon developed a strong belief that the afterlife was better because she would be free of all diseases and physical ailments he said that Megan regularly

15:47 attended the meetings of the religious group through Skype and he sometimes sat with her too according to him Megan was given different prayers to pray to help her with all the problems she was facing in life he shared that Megan had started believing in a phenomenon called family lineage Karma burning she had faith that each afterlife was connected to the previous lives and burning the family karma in the current life would help her family reach a Salvation in which they would be reincarnated to a better life Tony said the purpose of Megan's connection with the religious group was better health and better relationships with people who had abused her and verbally or otherwise affected her life when it came to telling the jury how the murders happened Anthony Todd shared the same version he had written in the letter to his father but he also blended it with the story he told his sister he

16:36 said he wasn't in the house when the murders happened and didn't recall giving any recorded confession to the authorities he said when he entered the house the next morning Megan brought him into the room and told him that she had murdered their kids he also added that he was so shocked by all of what had happened that he fell down the stairs smacked his head on the stairs and fractured his neck he told the jury he didn't remember what happened next until he woke up and jail when asked about the recorded confession he said he had no knowledge of it and saw the video for the first time in the court but in his recorded confession he had told the investigators that he and Megan had collectively made the plan to kill their children and the kids were also well aware of their imminent deaths because Megan and him had gotten their consent before murdering them although surprisingly he denied responsibility

17:21 for murdering the family dog courted confession he also answered the question about when he had killed his family 2 days before Christmas of 2019 he told the jury when he saw his wife and children dead he wanted to take his life and be with them for that he cut his wrists and took multiple doses of benad and at several points even tried hanging himself he further added to his version by saying that his wife had all the phones in the house so he yelled from the window to get help when no one arrived to help him he visited a local store to buy a gun and tried taking his own life in his recorded confession he also told the investigators about the suicide note he and Megan had written together according to the note they as a family had decided to end their lives for several reasons they wrote that they were seeing the end of the world prophecy coming true and chose to not suffer and be subjected to foreseen

18:13 tortures cataclysmic demise and continued Agony the note also referenced that through death Megan would be free of pain because of the ultimate goal was to be together without pain and suffering when it came to discussing his wife's death Anthony Todd told the court that she had stabbed herself twice in the stomach after consuming a large amount of badril but according to the autopsy reports the downward angle of the stab would strongly indicate that someone else was responsible for killing her in 2022 the jury unanimously found Anthony Todd guilty of four counts of murder he was sentenced to four lives in prison without the possibility of parole the judge in an unusual move added one year to Anthony's sentence for animal cruelty charges stemming from him having killed the family dog

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "The desperate screams in the night" and "The horrific case of Anthony Todt"?

Anthony Todd (Host).

What is "The desperate screams in the night" and "The horrific case of Anthony Todt" about?

The case of Anthony Todt reveals the tragic consequences of a deeply dysfunctional family, culminating in the shocking discovery of four bodies, including those of his wife and three children, in their Florida home following a police visit for fraud charges. This chilling narrative is rooted in Anthony's traumatic childhood, marked by his father's disturbing behavior, including an attempted…

What is mentioned in this Casefile True Crime episode?

10 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Anthony Todd, Megan Todd, Celebration, Florida, Alec Todd, Tyler Todd, FBI. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "The desperate screams in the night" and "The horrific case of Anthony Todt"?

The episode runs 19 min; the transcript is about 3,669 words in 23 timestamped sections.

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