It’s been two years since “Accused” fans had new episodes to listen to, but the wait is over.
Season 4 of the hit true-crime podcast from the USA TODAY Network’s Cincinnati Enquirer releases with early, ad-free access for subscribers on Tuesday.Â
The new season follows the divisive case of Elwood Jones, who was convicted in the 1994 fatal beating of 67-year-old woman Rhoda Nathan and now awaits execution on Ohio’s death row.Â
Millions of listeners were captivated by the mysterious cases examined in the first three seasons, including a 23-year-old woman fatally stabbed in her college town, an overturned conviction in the death of a grandmother and the disappearance of a worker at a shady processing plant.
If you’re wondering what you might’ve missed in the first three seasons of “Accused,” or if you just need a refresher, here’s what each season investigated:
Spoilers have been omitted.
Season 1: A college town killing
Elizabeth Andes was found dead in her Oxford, Ohio, apartment in 1978. Police saw it as an open-and-shut case.Â
Bob Young emerged as a prime suspect. He was her boyfriend of three years and a fellow recent graduate of Miami University.Â
Within an hour of arriving to Andes’ apartment, he’d be questioned in his girlfriend’s murder. Within 15 hours, he’d confess to it. Within four years, he’d be exonerated twice.
But the span of nearly four decades changed little about the horror of what Bob saw and felt on the night of Dec. 28, 1978. It also changed little about law enforcement’s belief that he had taken Beth’s life.
They were so sure he had done it, they looked no further for her killer even after the evidence and two juries said he didn’t do it.
It wasn’t because no one else could have. It was because they were convinced they were right.
After 37 years, it was time to find out if they were.
You can listen to Season 1 of Accused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Wondery.
Experience in augmented reality: Step inside the crime scene at the heart of ‘Accused: The Impending Execution of Elwood Jones’
Season 2: DNA test frees a man, but doesn’t clear him
Retha Welch was a God-fearing mother of four children.
On April 13, 1987, Welch’s lifeless body was found in a pool of blood in her Newport, Kentucky, apartment bathtub. She had been beaten and stabbed. An autopsy suggested she’d been sexually assaulted as semen from three men was discovered at the crime scene. Police soon zeroed in on a convict she’d counseled, and within two weeks of Welch’s death, William “Ricky†Virgil was charged in her murder.
For police and prosecutors, the case was over. But not for Virgil. He proclaimed his innocence to anyone who would listen.Â
After 28 years in prison, Virgil was freed, his conviction reversed largely thanks to DNA testing. But police did not clear him of suspicion in Welch’s death.
Season 2 of “Accused” re-examines what happened in the original investigation. It begins with the premise that one of two scenarios must be true: Either William Virgil killed Welch and the state can no longer prove its case, or he was innocent all along, meaning that the system indicted and punished the wrong man – and someone else got away with murder.
You can listen to Season 2 of Accused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Wondery.
Season 3: A disappearance at a mysterious plant
On a muggy night in June 1984, a 39-year-old father of three went to work at a secretive plant in rural Ohio and disappeared.Â
At first, David Bocks’ family and coworkers thought maybe he’d fallen asleep somewhere private during his overnight shift. Then, the next day, bits of human bone were discovered floating in a vat of molten salt at the plant, and it became clear that Bocks had met a gruesome fate.Â
Bocks was declared legally dead two years after his disappearance at the Fernald Feed Materials Plant, a processing plant that many neighbors thought produced dog food. In reality, the plant was used to process uranium for nuclear weapons during The Cold War.Â
Detectives determined that Bocks had killed himself, but his family long doubted this explanation for his fate.
Season 3 of “Accused” used new interviews with dozens of witnesses and experts and investigated never-before-released documents to explore the case and the handful of conspiracy theories surrounding it  – some of which have proved true.
You can listen to Season 3 of Accused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Wondery.
Contributing: Amanda Rossmann and Amber Hunt, The Cincinnati Enquirer; Jay Cannon, USA TODAY
Join the conversation of the day: All USA TODAY Podcasts
Daily news updates, right in your inbox:Sign up for the Daily Briefing newsletter
