The Trial Of Donna Adelson | The Murder Of Dan Markel

The Donna Adelson case contains a remarkable written record of how she inserted herself into Wendi Adelson’s fight with Dan Markel. After the court rejected Wendi’s relocation request, Wendi testified that Donna proposed using the boys’ religion as leverage, dressing them in Hitler Youth uniforms, and offering Markel $1 million to allow the children to move to South Florida. 

Those ideas were presented at Donna’s 2025 murder trial alongside testimony about her broader role in the family. Wendi told the jury that Donna “micromanaged my life.” Robert Adelson said his mother was controlling, had strong ideas about how her...

Eighty-six calls. Two thousand one hundred eighteen minutes. More than thirty-five hours in a single week. That's the phone record between Donna Adelson and her son Charlie in the days between his murder conviction and her arrest in November 2023.

On one of those calls, after Charlie dropped off the line, Donna kept talking without realizing the recording was still running. She told Harvey she wanted to go to sleep and not see her son again. She said they could do it together. Leave a note. Same conversation, she was looking up Vietnam and researching extradition treaties for...

Robert Adelson hadn't spoken to his mother in nine years when he walked into a Tallahassee courtroom on August 25, 2025. First time he'd testified in any of the four trials connected to the murder of Dan Markel. He didn't raise his voice. He didn't perform. He described the machine — a mother who demanded compliance and discarded anyone who chose differently. He told the jury she ran the show. That she had fixed ideas about who her children married and what they did for a living. And that he never heard a single negative word about Dan Markel until after Wendi mo...

Donna Adelson's 2025 trial in the Dan Markel murder case put a handwritten jailhouse script in front of the jury. Drina Bernhardt testified that Donna wrote questions and answers she wanted Bernhardt to memorize for false testimony about Katherine Magbanua. FDLE handwriting analyst Kate Butler testified that Donna wrote the script after comparing it with known samples. 

Bernhardt said Donna promised $10,000 and a grand piano, along with other help, if she cooperated. Donna's defense attacked Bernhardt's credibility and argued her own criminal case gave her a reason to seek leverage with prosecutors. Patricia Byrd, another jailhouse witness, separately t...

A judge ruled that Wendi Adelson couldn't move her sons away from their father, FSU law professor Dan Markel. That ruling is where prosecutors say this case actually begins. Donna Adelson, Wendi's mother, allegedly offered Markel a million dollars to make it go away. He said no. Months later, two men drove five hours from Miami in a rented Prius and shot Markel twice in the head in his own garage — the same morning he'd dropped his two sons at preschool and gone to the gym. He was 41 years old. What investigators found next wasn't a confession. It was a...

A judge told Wendi Adelson she couldn't move her children to South Florida. Her mother Donna allegedly offered Dan Markel a million dollars to change his mind. He said no. Prosecutors say the family's answer was a contract killing — two hitmen from Miami, a payment trail through the dental office, and a grandmother who signed every check and allegedly washed the cash.Five people are now in prison for the murder of FSU law professor Dan Markel. The shooter and the driver. The woman who connected the hitmen to the money. Charlie Adelson, who took the stand and told a...

Jeffrey Lacasse testified under oath that five days before Dan Markel was shot, Wendi Adelson told him her brother Charlie had looked into hiring a hitman for about fifteen thousand dollars. He called the statement "chilling." Wendi denied it under oath at four separate trials. One of them committed perjury, and the answer determines whether the woman who gained the most from Dan Markel's death knew it was coming.Three weeks before the murder, Wendi was calling Dan an "STD" and an "emotional terrorist." The day before the killing, she asked Lacasse about his Friday travel route near Dan's...

Donna Adelson was on the jet bridge at Miami International Airport with a one-way ticket to Vietnam when officers arrested her — one week after her son Charlie's conviction for the murder of Dan Markel. Vietnam has no extradition treaty with the United States. Bodycam footage captured Donna telling officers she didn't know there was a warrant. She was 73 years old.Prosecutors called her the engine behind the Adelson family's conspiracy — the woman who pushed hardest for the custody relocation, who signed 44 paychecks to the go-between, who allegedly scheduled her daughter's alibi for the morning of the murder, and who call...

Some defenses fall apart in the courtroom. This one basically fell apart the second the prosecutor opened her mouth. "Do extortionists send a girlfriend of the victim to get the money?" That's the question Georgia Cappleman asked a jury after Charlie Adelson took the stand and swore, under oath, that he'd been shaken down by hitmen — and had simply been making the payments ever since.

The payment plan itself deserves its own hall of fame. Three thousand dollars a month, funneled through the family dental office, in checks his mother signed, funded by cash she allegedly laundered be...

Dan Markel won a custody ruling that kept his two sons in Tallahassee. His ex-wife Wendi couldn't move them south. Her mother Donna allegedly offered Markel a million dollars to change his mind — and when he refused, prosecutors say the Adelson family ordered a contract killing. Two hitmen drove from Miami, followed Dan from his gym, and shot him in his own garage on July 18, 2014. He was 41 years old.This is the first installment of a four-part series covering the entire Adelson murder-for-hire conspiracy. What investigators found was a payment trail running through the family's dental practice near Fort La...

Five people are in prison. Prosecutors have named two more in open court. Dan Markel was gunned down in his own garage in 2014 — a Florida State law professor and father in the middle of a custody fight with his ex-wife Wendi Adelson. Her brother Charlie is serving life. Her mother Donna is serving life. The hitmen are locked up. The go-between is locked up. And Wendi and her father Harvey are still free.

Prosecutors have labeled both of them unindicted co-conspirators — not behind closed doors, but in front of judges, across multiple trials. After Donna was conv...

If you've followed the Adelson family saga from the beginning, you already know the names that still aren't in a cell: Wendi and Harvey. And you're probably asking the same thing the rest of us are — are they actually going to get away with it?

Dan Markel was a father of two, shot dead in his own garage in 2014. A decade later, his ex-wife's brother and mother are both serving life. The hitmen and the go-between are locked up too. But Wendi — Dan's ex-wife — and Harvey — the family patriarch caught at the airport with one-way tickets out of the c...

The oral arguments in Charlie Adelson's appeal took place today before Florida's First District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee. For 40 minutes, three judges — Lori S. Rowe, Thomas D. Winokur, and M. Kemmerly Thomas — heard competing arguments about whether Adelson's 2023 murder conviction should stand. Defense attorney Michael Ufferman argued that pretrial publicity made a fair trial in Leon County impossible. He pointed to devastating jury selection numbers: 130 prospective jurors were questioned, 54 had formed opinions, and 53 believed Adelson was guilty before opening statements. Jurors were overheard discussing the case after being told not to. Ufferman called it the clearest case for a ch...

Everything we covered this week on the Adelson case — Charlie's appeal heading to oral arguments, Donna's transfer to South Florida, and the question that won't go away.

On February 3rd, 2026, Florida's First District Court of Appeal will hear oral arguments in Charlie Adelson's bid to overturn his life sentence. His 91-page brief makes four main arguments, but the numbers tell the story: of 130 potential jurors interviewed, 96 had heard of the case. Of the 54 who formed an opinion, 53 believed Charlie was guilty before the trial started. His attorneys argue pretrial publicity made a fair trial impossible. They also cl...

Charlie Adelson will be back in a Florida courtroom on February 3rd, 2026 — but this time, it's not a trial. It's an appeal. His attorneys have filed a 91-page brief with Florida's First District Court of Appeal arguing that his conviction for the murder of Dan Markel should be reversed. The core claims: Leon County was so saturated with pretrial publicity that an impartial jury was impossible; potential jurors were caught discussing the case after being instructed not to; text messages that could have supported his defense were improperly excluded; and his attorney Dan Rashbaum operated under a conflict of interest th...

In this 2025 Year-in-Review Hidden Killers special, we bring together the two most explosive pillars of the case against Donna Adelson: the alleged long-term orchestration of a murder-for-hire plot — and the undercover “bump” that may have exposed her entire operation in a single moment.

Tony Brueski sits down with defense attorney and former prosecutor Eric Faddis, along with retired FBI Behavioral Analysis Program Chief Robin Dreeke, to deliver the most complete psychological and legal breakdown of Donna Adelson we’ve produced yet.

We start with the big question hanging over the entire trial:
Was Donna Adelson the mast...

In today’s explosive Hidden Killers breakdown, we examine the testimony that has completely reshaped the Donna Adelson trial — testimony not from police, not from experts, but from Donna’s own children, whose words now carry some of the greatest weight in the courtroom.

First, we turn to Wendi Adelson, whose strategy has the courtroom buzzing. While her brother Robert delivered blunt, precise answers, Wendi leaned heavily on one phrase:
“I don’t remember.”
 Again. And again. And again.

But is this selective memory a trauma response from years of family pressure, manipulation, and emotional con...

The façade of the “sweet grandmother in a cardigan” shattered today. In this hard-hitting Hidden Killers breakdown, we walk through nine of the most devastating revelations from Sergeant Christopher Corbett’s testimony — evidence so precise, so digital, and so tightly woven that it left the courtroom stunned.

These weren’t theories. These weren’t assumptions. These were time-stamped movements, call patterns, incriminating texts, and Donna Adelson’s own words, laid out with forensic clarity.

Among the biggest blows:

• The “Outside your house” text. A message sent at the exact moment prosecutors say Donna was tracking Dan Mark...

In this 2025 Year-in-Review Hidden Killers special, we break down one of the most significant moments to emerge from the Donna Adelson trial: the testimony of Jeffrey LaCasse, Wendi Adelson’s former boyfriend, whose words added a new layer of depth — and danger — to the State’s narrative.

LaCasse took the stand with a calm, steady presence, recounting conversations he had with Wendi in the months leading up to Dan Markel’s murder. His testimony struck the courtroom when he recalled Wendi telling him that Charlie Adelson had “looked into all options” to fix the family’s custody frustrations. In 2014, it soun...

In this 2025 Year-in-Review Hidden Killers special, we break down two of the most devastating developments in the Donna Adelson trial — the explosive emails prosecutors say reveal her true motives, and the jaw-dropping testimony from her own children and Wendi’s ex-boyfriend that shattered the family narrative she’s tried to control for more than a decade.

First, we examine the emails Donna sent to Wendi during the custody battle, messages prosecutors use to peel back the “sweet grandmother” facade. These emails — strategic, emotional, manipulative — show Donna instructing Wendi how to behave in court, urging her to use psychological tactics, float...

The Trial of Donna Adelson took an even more complex turn today as Robert “Rob” Adelson, Donna’s eldest son, stepped into the witness box. Unlike the investigators and outside witnesses, Rob brought jurors a deeply personal perspective, one that intersects family loyalty with the gravity of a murder trial.

Rob’s testimony centered on family communications and interactions around the time of Dan Markel’s murder. He fielded questions about his mother’s involvement, the family’s frustrations over Wendi’s custody battle, and whether Donna ever spoke openly about solutions to “fix” the problem. While carefully measured in his answ...

In one of the most emotionally charged moments of the Donna Adelson trial, Wendi Adelson took the stand — and the courtroom shifted. This wasn’t just another witness testifying about timelines and documents. This was the daughter of the accused, the ex-wife of the victim, and the woman whose family turmoil prosecutors say fueled a murder-for-hire plot that stunned the nation.

Wendi walked jurors through her bitter divorce from FSU law professor Dan Markel, the custody battles that stretched on for years, and the deep frustration her parents felt about her being “stuck” in Tallahassee instead of living near the...

In this powerful Hidden Killers special, we bring together two of the most revealing conversations ever recorded about the Adelson family — the psychological roots of the crime and the stunning courtroom collapse that followed. This is the full story behind the guilty verdict, built from expert behavioral insight and razor-sharp legal analysis.

Retired FBI Special Agent Robin Dreeke returns to break down what he calls one of the most disturbing dynamics he’s ever studied: the enmeshed, codependent, emotionally fused relationship between Donna Adelson and her son, Charlie. This wasn’t maternal affection — it was psychological domination. Dreeke explores...

In this 2025 Year-in-Review Hidden Killers special, we examine one of the most explosive family implosions in any modern true-crime case: the unraveling alliance between Donna Adelson and her daughter Wendi, and why that break may define the future of the Dan Markel murder trial.

This combined episode covers two of the biggest developments of the year. First: the seismic moment when Wendi Adelson refused to testify for her mother. Donna’s defense team attempted a high-risk maneuver by subpoenaing her to the stand — but Wendi fought back, and the judge quashed it. Her refusal is more than a lega...

The verdict dropped — and the courtroom snapped to attention. In this full, uncut Hidden Killers upload, you’ll see the exact moment Donna Adelson reacted to being found guilty, followed immediately by the judge warning her she would be removed from the courtroom if the behavior continued. No edits, no cuts, no commentary layered over the moment itself — just the raw courtroom footage exactly as it unfolded.

After the clip, Tony Brueski breaks down the legal mechanics behind what you just witnessed:
 • Why judges issue removal threats
 • What qualifies as disruptive courtroom conduct
 • How jurors interpret emoti...

In this 2025 Year-in-Review Hidden Killers special, Tony Brueski breaks down one of the most talked-about courtroom moments of the year: the opening statements in the high-stakes murder-for-hire trial of Donna Adelson. From the prosecution’s meticulously crafted narrative to the defense’s chaotic stumble out of the gate, this episode captures the full shockwave of a trial Florida—and the nation—can’t stop watching.

Prosecutors came out swinging, painting Donna not as a grieving grandmother swept into family conflict, but as the driving force behind the plot to kill Florida State law professor Dan Markel. They laid out motive...

Assistant State Attorney Georgia Cappleman took center stage in the Donna Adelson trial and delivered one of the most consequential closing arguments of the entire case — a summation built on motive, timing, and a digital trail prosecutors say Donna cannot outrun.

Cappleman told jurors the path to the truth was simple: “Follow the evidence and find her guilty.” And with that, she walked them step by step through the 2014 murder-for-hire plot that left FSU law professor Dan Markel dead in his driveway.

Her message was direct. For Donna Adelson, relocation wasn’t a hope — it was a mission...

In this full-length Hidden Killers special, Tony Brueski brings together the complete story of Donna Adelson, the woman prosecutors say sat at the center of one of Florida’s most cold-blooded murder-for-hire conspiracies. With three co-conspirators already convicted—including her son Charlie—Donna is now the final alleged architect heading toward trial, and this episode lays out the entire case: the family pressure, the money trail, the coded prison calls, and the psychology of a matriarch accused of pulling the strings.

We begin with the internal dynamics of the Adelson family, where prosecutors argue Donna exercised powerful influence over m...

Donna Adelson is officially back in South Florida — just not the way she planned. According to Florida Department of Corrections records, the convicted mastermind behind the Dan Markel murder-for-hire has been transferred from the Ocala reception center to Homestead Correctional Institution in Miami-Dade County. It's the exact placement her defense team requested at sentencing, when Judge Stephen Everett recommended she be housed close to her husband Harvey. The woman who allegedly funded a contract killing because she couldn't accept her grandchildren living in Tallahassee is now thirty miles from her former life, behind razor wire, serving life without parole. Her so...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we revisit the shocking moment that shattered the illusion of Adelson family unity — Wendi Adelson’s refusal to testify for her mother, Donna, in one of Florida’s most explosive murder-for-hire trials.

In a stunning pretrial twist, Donna’s defense team tried to subpoena her daughter, Wendi, hoping her testimony might humanize Donna or counterbalance the prosecution’s narrative. But Wendi’s lawyers fought back, arguing that testifying could incriminate her — and the judge agreed. The subpoena was tossed, meaning Wendi will not be forced to take the stand.

...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, this full-length special brings together all four parts of our deep investigation into the case of Donna Adelson — the grandmother, mother, and alleged mastermind at the center of one of Florida’s most shocking murder-for-hire conspiracies.

This is the complete, unbroken story — from the private family dynamics that prosecutors say sparked a deadly plot, to the public trial that could end with Donna spending the rest of her life behind bars.

We begin inside the Adelson family, where Donna’s influence allegedly shaped everything — including her children’s...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we’re breaking down the most calculated—and sometimes downright desperate—moves by Donna Adelson, the matriarch at the center of Florida’s most infamous murder-for-hire case.

In one of the year’s most revealing episodes, Tony Brueski exposes how Donna’s defense team has spent months trying to slow, stall, and spin the inevitable. From filing motions to disqualify the judge, to claiming Tallahassee’s residents are too “emotionally informed” to serve on a jury, to arguing that routine evidence is somehow “prejudicial,” this has become a masterclass in delay t...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we’re revisiting the case that dominated headlines, divided families, and exposed the darkest corners of privilege and power — the unraveling of Donna Adelson.

Just weeks before jury selection was set to begin, Donna’s long-awaited murder trial imploded into chaos. Prosecutors dropped a stunning bombshell: a massive cache of new evidence — more than 80,000 emails, months of wiretap recordings, and what insiders say could include jailhouse informant testimony. Suddenly, Judge Stephen Everett had no choice but to halt the trial, citing an avalanche of discovery that left even seasoned...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we revisit one of the most surreal twists in the Donna Adelson murder trial — the moment when a novel became potential evidence in a real-life homicide case.

In this special episode, Tony Brueski breaks down the unprecedented legal and psychological debate surrounding This Is Our Story, a book written by Donna’s daughter, Wendi Adelson, years before the murder of her ex-husband, Dan Markel. What began as fiction has now been pulled into a courtroom as a possible roadmap to motive.

Prosecutors argue that the story — about...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we’re revisiting two defining moments in the unraveling of the Adelson family empire — moments that exposed not only the legal chaos behind the Dan Markel murder case, but the chilling psychology that fueled it.

In this special combined episode, Tony Brueski dissects Donna Adelson’s courtroom performance of a lifetime — a bond hearing turned one-woman show where the alleged murder-for-hire mastermind painted herself as the real victim. Frail, misunderstood, and oh-so-tragically sleepless behind bars, Donna leaned hard into self-pity, deflection, and emotional theater. But beneath the trembling voice an...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we revisit one of the most chilling and dysfunctional family dramas ever to play out in a courtroom — the Adelson saga, where murder, money, and manipulation collided in one of Florida’s most unforgettable true crime stories.

In this combined special, Tony Brueski sits down with Defense Attorney Bob Motta (Defense Diaries) to dissect the bizarre downfall of Donna Adelson and the lingering shadow of her daughter Wendi.

First: Donna’s bond hearing — a spectacle of self-pity and denial. The 75-year-old matriarch tried to paint herself as a fra...

As part of our Hidden Killers 2025 Year in Review series, we’re revisiting one of the most jaw-dropping courtroom sagas of the year — the unraveling of Donna Adelson, the 75-year-old grandmother accused of orchestrating the murder-for-hire plot that took the life of Florida State law professor Dan Markel.

In two of the year’s most explosive episodes, Tony Brueski sat down with both Defense Attorney Bob Motta (Defense Diaries) and retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer to break down how a once-untouchable matriarch’s arrogance and denial helped destroy her family’s last shred of credibility.

Donna’s co...

This Thanksgiving, three of the most talked-about defendants in America are experiencing the holiday in a way most people never imagine: behind the walls of three very different prison systems. Bryan Kohberger. Sean “Diddy” Combs. Donna Adelson. Three names dominating headlines — now sharing the same institutional reality when the rest of the world gathers around family tables.

In this episode, we take you inside what Thanksgiving actually looks like in prison. Not the fantasy version, not the movie version — the real, stripped-down version served on plastic trays under fluorescent lights. Idaho, federal, and Florida prisons all have their own rhyt...

How does a grandmother, a former schoolteacher, a woman who spent decades projecting the image of a devoted matriarch, end up at the center of one of the most disturbing family-driven crimes in recent memory? Tonight, we go deep into the psychology behind the Donna Adelson case — not to excuse her actions, but to finally understand the mental scaffolding that allowed her to justify something most people couldn’t even imagine doing.

In this episode of Hidden Killers, we break down the narcissistic mindset that shaped Donna’s worldview for decades. We explore the internal story she built, one wh...

How does a grandmother, a former schoolteacher, a woman who spent decades projecting the image of a devoted matriarch, end up at the center of one of the most disturbing family-driven crimes in recent memory? Tonight, we go deep into the psychology behind the Donna Adelson case — not to excuse her actions, but to finally understand the mental scaffolding that allowed her to justify something most people couldn’t even imagine doing.

In this episode of Hidden Killers, we break down the narcissistic mindset that shaped Donna’s worldview for decades. We explore the internal story she built, one wh...