The WORST episodes of People Magazine Investigates
Every episode of People Magazine Investigates ever, ranked from worst to best by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The worst episodes of People Magazine Investigates!
Investigation Discovery and People magazine partner to re-examine some of the most high profile crime cases in recent history. The one-hour series brings viewers tales of betrayal, buried secrets and unsung heroes, ripped from the pages of one of the nation's top weekly magazines. These stories transcended news and became part of pop culture, revealing shocking twists, new evidence, and unexpected resolutions. Interlaced within every episode are exclusive interviews with People's journalists, archival footage, re-creations, and firsthand accounts by those closest to the investigations.
#1 - Gone in the Night
Season 6 - Episode 9 - Aired 8/8/2022
When a young woman goes missing, a rookie police officer's intuition leads to an intense investigation, as they race against the clock to find her.
#2 - Star Crossed Killers
Season 7 - Episode 10 - Aired 9/11/2023
When a single mom tells her 14-year-old daughter to break off a relationship with a 19-year-old man, the young lovers murder the girl's mom, setting off a manhunt and culminating in a trial replete with finger-pointing and betrayal.
#3 - Dead in Bed
Season 7 - Episode 9 - Aired 9/4/2023
When a 19-year-old girl is found murdered in her boyfriend's bed in a small Texas town, everyone is a suspect. The case goes cold until a new sheriff comes to town who sheds fresh light on some old evidence, but will it be enough to bring her killer to justice?
#4 - Held Captive
Season 7 - Episode 8 - Aired 8/28/2023
A 14-year-old girl finds herself lost and unloved following her parents' divorce and a move to a new town, providing a perfect opportunity for someone to lure her away. For 10 years she's held captive, until she makes her escape.
Watch Now:Apple TV
#5 - Who Killed Our Girls?
Season 7 - Episode 7 - Aired 8/21/2023
Four teenage girls are brutally murdered in a yogurt shop in North Austin, Texas, in 1991, in what becomes the biggest mass murder in Austin history. The investigation that follows drags on for years, and even when police make an arrest, justice is not guaranteed.
Watch Now:Apple TV
#6 - Brighton Ax Murder
Season 7 - Episode 6 - Aired 8/14/2023
In 1982, in an upscale suburb of Rochester, New York, a Kodak executive returns home and finds his wife dead with an ax in her head. People believed a mad man was on the loose, so 40 years later when police make an arrest, everyone is stunned at who stands trial for the murder.
#7 - The Strange Disappearance of Karlie Gusé
Season 7 - Episode 5 - Aired 8/7/2023
In 2018, a 16-year-old girl vanishes into thin air the morning after attending a high school party in an isolated California mountain town. The bizarre mystery leads to speculation by internet sleuths that her parents are somehow involved due to inconsistencies in their story. But now exclusive new details have been provided to PEOPLE MAGAZINE INVESTIGATES in an effort to dispel rumors and redirect everyone's attention to what is important, finding the right lead that will bring the teen home, hopefully alive.
Watch Now:Apple TV
#8 - Final Rodeo
Season 7 - Episode 4 - Aired 7/31/2023
A 16-year-old cowgirl goes missing in Nevada. Three days later her body was found draped under a blue tarp that had been dumped among the tumbleweeds. As police search for her killer, the investigation takes a sudden turn towards the boy she called "brother."
#9 - Where is Mark Himebaugh?
Season 7 - Episode 3 - Aired 7/24/2023
In 1991, a young boy leaves home to check out a local brush fire that was capturing his neighborhood's attention and never returns home. Decades have passed and police continue to look for his abductor(s), while his mother is still waiting for him to find his way home.
#10 - The I-70 Killer
Season 7 - Episode 2 - Aired 7/17/2023
An unknown shooter unleashes carnage from Indianapolis to Wichita, Kansas, killing six in the spring of 1992 at various retail stores near 1-70, a major east-west highway that runs through the very heart of the Midwest. A sketch of the suspect is developed from various eyewitness accounts, but police are at a loss ... until one victim survives.
#11 - Girl Scout Murders
Season 7 - Episode 1 - Aired 7/10/2023
PEOPLE MAGAZINE INVESTIGATES delves into the 1977 brutal assault and murder of three Oklahoma Girl Scouts away at summer camp: Lori Lee Farmer, Doris Denise Milner and Michele Heather Guse. The case dominated national headlines for more than a year as law enforcement scrambled to find answers. PEOPLE's reporting team takes viewers through the twists and turns of this case, from how local authorities zeroed in on a suspect (a prison escapee with a dangerous past), the all encompassing manhunt to track him down and the subsequent trial that led to heartbreak for the victims' families and many unanswered questions. Featuring an exclusive emotional, new interview with Lori Lee Farmer's parents and siblings, as well as testimony from jurors on the trial and experts close to the case.
#12 - Candy and Betty
Season 6 - Episode 13 - Aired 9/5/2022
When neighbors find a young teacher axed to death on Friday the 13th, a sleepy suburb fears a psychopath is loose; the bloody crime scene leads police to a most unlikely suspect, unfolding a story people still have to see to believe 40 years later.
#13 - Infamous Pam Hupp
Season 6 - Episode 12 - Aired 8/29/2022
In 2011, a husband returns home to find his wife dead on the living room floor; he tells first responders she committed suicide, but it was murder; police zero in on the husband and what unfolds is one of the most outrageous tales in recent history.
#14 - Natural Born Killers
Season 6 - Episode 11 - Aired 8/22/2022
In May 2002, a couple goes missing in Ocean City, Maryland, almost as if they vanished into thin air, until a random, late-night burglary leads police to discover a tale of deception, brutality and savagery.
#15 - Darkness in the Desert
Season 6 - Episode 10 - Aired 8/15/2022
A 19-year-old coed leaves her apartment and never returns; when her body is found in a desert river basin, police and internet sleuths wonder if she was a victim of an alleged killer known as the Zombie Hunter.
#16 - The Times Square Killer
Season 7 - Episode 11 - Aired 9/18/2023
In the '60s and '70s, a serial killer stalks young women in New Jersey; at the same time, three women in New York City are sadistically murdered; no one expects that one man is causing the mayhem, let alone a seemingly ordinary father of three.
#17 - The Grudge
Season 6 - Episode 8 - Aired 8/1/2022
In January 2020, a Mennonite woman goes missing from her small religious community. They find her body, but forensic evidence leads them to a dead end, stymieing law enforcement. Detectives get creative in an effort to find their suspect.
Watch Now:Apple TV
#18 - American Nightmare
Season 6 - Episode 7 - Aired 7/25/2022
One family's American dream goes up in flames. As they try to rebuild what's left, they vow never to extinguish their search for justice.
#23 - Mother's Orders
Season 6 - Episode 2 - Aired 6/13/2022
A mother's bond to her daughter is put to the ultimate test when one of them shoots a man dead.
#25 - Bible Belt Massacre
Season 5 - Episode 12 - Aired 6/7/2021
Two days before the new millennium in the rural town of Welch, Oklahoma, Danny and Kathy Freeman are found dead after a neighbor spots the family trailer engulfed in flames. Police soon determine their cause of death was not the fire, but a gunshot. The case adds another layer when it is discovered that the Freeman's daughter Ashley and her best friend Lauria Bible are nowhere to be found. Nearly two decades later, police finally discover what happened to them, the truth is almost too dark for words.