Arrest in the murder of Donna Arsenault in Franklinton, Louisiana spotlights the power of true crime podcasts to hamstring police.
Criminology student helps police make arrest in Texas cold case
Criminology students at the University of Texas at Arlington shed tears after discovering a clue that could lead to an arrest in a cold case murder.
When Donna Arsenault’s naked body was found in a small Louisiana town in 2017, the local sheriff’s office quickly announced to the public that it was a suicide, even though a coroner’s report ruled it a homicide.
More than eight years after the 40-year-old mother of three was shot and killed, the town’s new sheriff is crediting a podcast by a member of Arsonow’s family for helping uncover the truth in the cold case and secure an arrest.
Freeze Frame, an eight-episode podcast released in 2024, takes an in-depth look at Arsonow’s life, the suspect in her murder, and why the case was solved. It’s just the latest example of how ordinary people, including Internet detectives, students in college criminology classes, and a former reality TV producer turned podcaster, can crack dormant cases in a big way.
“If it wasn’t for the podcast, we wouldn’t even know about this case,” Washington Parish Sheriff Jason Smith told USA TODAY. “When I saw the podcast and got interested and started watching it, I thought, ‘This can be solved. This is possible.'”
Last month, exactly one year after the last episode of the podcast aired, the sheriff’s office arrested Arsenault’s ex-boyfriend Scott Jordan. A grand jury indicted him on January 14 on charges of second-degree murder.
He maintains his innocence and vehemently maintains his innocence.
As Jordan and Alsoo’s family awaits his trial, USA TODAY looks at what happened to Alsoo, why the case was clearly mishandled, and how the podcast “Freeze Frame” changed everything.
What happened to Donna Arsenault?
On October 24, 2017, Scott Jordan and Arceneaux’s spiritual advisor called police that they found Donna Arceneaux dead in her home in Franklinton, a town of fewer than 4,000 people about 110 miles north of New Orleans.
When police responded, they found Arsenault naked on the floor next to his bed with a gunshot wound to the chest and a gun on the other side of the bed, former sheriff’s investigator Demi Rice said on the Freeze Frame podcast. Rice said there was evidence that someone had wiped up blood in the bathroom and that there was “minimal” blood in the bed area.
“There’s no way she would get out of bed, go to the bathroom, bleed out, put a bullet through the heart and clean up afterward,” Rice said on the podcast.
Sheriff Smith told USA TODAY that any reasonable investigator would reach the same conclusion: “This was clearly a homicide.”
But on February 7, 2018, five years before Smith was elected, the Sheriff’s Office told the public that was not the case. Ella Reeder of Franklinton reported, citing the sheriff’s office, “The latest autopsy results indicate a suicide, and it has been officially ruled a suicide.”
A coroner’s verdict of “homicide” indicates that someone’s death was caused by someone else. It does not necessarily mean murder, but it does rule out suicide.
“It was nothing short of murder,” Smith said.
Podcaster reveals autopsy report, pressures investigators
One of the biggest revelations on the Freeze Frame podcast was the coroner’s preliminary report that ruled Arsenault’s death a homicide. The report was dated three months before the sheriff’s office announced to the public that it was a suicide.
That’s exactly the kind of breakthrough Tucker Simmons, 33, was hoping for when he started working on a podcast about his Aunt Donna’s death.
“I called the coroner’s office and said, ‘We’re just confirming that this is real, it’s not in any way ruled a suicide,'” Simmons told USA TODAY this week. “He said, ‘Well, I was angry when it was reported as a suicide, because it was never ruled out as a suicide.’ And because of politics and small towns, it kind of faded away.”
Simmons began working on podcasts after becoming burnt out developing and producing reality shows in Los Angeles. When she moved to Nashville in 2020 and began working on “Freeze Frame,” Simmons said she knew she had to look directly at the authorities and renew attention to the case.
So Simmons spent about $1,000 erecting a provocative sign across the street from the sheriff’s office that read “A Murderer Among Us” and the coroner’s finding: “Official Verdict: Murder.”
Simmons said she spent several years interviewing dozens of people and spending six figures of her life savings to create a podcast that includes interviews with investigators, the former sheriff who was in charge at the time, and Arsenault’s family.
The podcast portrays Jordan as Arceneaux’s increasingly controlling and intermittently abusive boyfriend, at one point imposing three pages of rules on her to follow, including social media passwords and location sharing.
Simmons said the podcast leading up to Jordan’s arrest was “shockingly emotional.”
“This has been five years in the making,” Simmons said. “It’s weird to say I’m excited because Donna isn’t here yet, but that was the whole plan: to get law enforcement to do something about it.”
Who is Scott Jordan?
Scott Jordan is a 59-year-old radiology technician who was born and raised in the Franklinton area and has worked at the same local hospital for 35 years, his attorney Roy Burns told USA TODAY this week.
The podcast describes how Arceneaux became romantically involved with her after he moved in next door to her, and how he bought her house when she fell into financial difficulties. Their relationship deteriorated after that, and Ms Arsenault said she was trying to run away from Jordan and told others that he had a “stain” on him, the podcast said.
Jordan’s attorney, Roy Burns, told USA TODAY that his client categorically denies any involvement in Arsenault’s death and plans to vigorously fight the charges.
“This is a very defensible case,” Burns said. “This is just a circumstantial case.”
Sheriff Smith confirmed there was “no new evidence” leading to Jordan’s arrest. He said Scott’s investigators built the case by eliminating all other possible theories and suspects and reviewing previous interviews with the sheriff’s office, citing inconsistencies in Scott’s statements.
He declined to discuss a motive or share all the evidence they have, but said investigators are in close contact with prosecutors about what they need to prove to build a strong case.
Barnes successfully argued during a hearing this week to have Jordan’s bail reduced from $2 million to $500,000. Burns said Jordan was able to post bail and was released after several weeks in prison on the condition that he wear an ankle monitor and stay home unless going to work, his lawyer’s office or church.
He said there is a simple explanation for the accusation that Jourdan became controlling over Arceneaux, citing her history of infidelity with her partners, which he said the podcast fully investigated and acknowledged.
“He’s not happy about being arrested and having to hire a lawyer to defend him,” Burns said. “But he’s going to follow through. … He didn’t do that.”
Donna Arsenault’s sister solving case: ‘I’m starting to lose hope’
More than eight years after her sister’s death, Shelley Piggott told USA TODAY she feels relieved that the case is being handled by investigators dedicated to solving crimes.
When the incident first happened, she said, the sadness and pain increased even more when the sheriff’s office told the public that Arsenault’s death was a suicide.
“It hurt a lot,” she said. “We just couldn’t understand. ‘What is going on? Why is it being covered up like this? I started to lose hope.’
The sheriff in charge at the time, Randy Seale, did not respond to messages from USA TODAY. He told Simmons on the podcast that some investigators think it was a murder and others think it was a suicide, and that his way of managing people is to “let the people who know what they’re doing do their jobs and get out of the way.”
Mr. Seale told Mr. Simmons that he did not know why the public records were not amended to reflect that Mr. Arceneaux’s death had been ruled a homicide, but said his office was working hard on a “puzzling case.”
“I never stayed in power for 30 years with a dark heart,” Seal said. “Maybe the police response wasn’t good enough, maybe there was some kind of mistake, I don’t know. But I don’t think it was done intentionally.”
For Piggott, she said she regained hope that her sister’s murder would be solved when Simmons began working on the podcast and received a call from Sheriff Smith telling her investigators were re-examining the case.
“That’s all we wanted from the beginning: for someone to take a serious look at this case and treat Donna as a human being.”
