Webby Awards Submission: 'Unspeakable Crime: The Killing of Jessica Chambers' Podcast

In conjunction with its television docu-series about the case of Jessica Chambers, a 19-year-old former cheerleader who was burned alive in a small Mississippi town, Oxygen released a 7-part companion podcast called "Unspeakable Crime: The Killing of Jessica Chambers." Listen here.

Hosted by legal analyst Beth Karas, the podcast takes a deep-dive into the twists and turns of this mysterious case and brings the characters involved to life through interviews that are exclusive to the podcast as well as drawn from the television show.

Listeners hear first-hand accounts from Jessica Chambers' friends and family, the family of suspect Quinton Tellis, who is black, first-responders to the crime scene where Jessica was found still alive with burns on more than 90 percent of her body, FBI investigators, the defense team, prosecutors, and others. In addition to getting to know all of the key characters in the case, the podcast sheds light on how Jessica’s murder sparked a racial divide in the small town of Courtland, Mississippi, in part due to online sleuths around the country pointing fingers at who they considered to be potential suspects without any real knowledge of the investigation.

"Unspeakable Crime: The Killing of Jessica Chambers" podcast was able to go deeper than the television show, which ended with a hung jury of Quintin Tellis' first trial, by giving updates through the shocking end of his second trial -- and listeners appreciated Beth Karas' in-depth coverage and analysis. The podcast generated 205,000 streams without any paid media within its first two months of launching in September of 2018. “Unspeakable Crime” was also selected as one of the top true crime podcasts on Apple podcasts.