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True crime with women at the center.
The Girlfriends follows women whose private alarm bells become collective evidence. Across fraud stories and Spotlight episodes, it treats testimony as the center of the case, moving from intimate memory to public accountability without sanding off grief, anger, or humor.
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The Girlfriends is a true-crime and testimony series about women who stop being isolated by the stories they were told. It begins in small moments. A date in Hawaii. A real estate website that looks impressive until the links do not work. An address that does not match the business it claims to house. From there, season five builds a story around Derek Alldred and the women who realize that their separate relationships may have been part of a much larger pattern. The show understands that suspicion often arrives quietly before it becomes proof. Wendy’s story gives the season its emotional doorway, while Lori’s search turns doubt into something practical, methodical, and hard to ignore. Pat, an old college friend turned private investigator, gives the investigation another push. The warning that comes back is blunt: run. That kind of moment could be played for shock, but The Girlfriends usually lets it land slowly. It is more interested in how women talk to one another afterward. It follows the phone calls, the comparisons, the anger, and the relief of discovering that the thing that felt like personal failure may have been engineered. The Spotlight episodes broaden the show’s purpose beyond one romance fraud case. Rosamund’s story follows a mother trying to understand what killed Ella, pressing past an inquest that cannot give her the answer she needs. Lejla’s episode begins with a devastating false story of birth and an identity crisis. Other Spotlight subjects named in the feed include Antonia, Tooba, Hélène, and Jacquie. The tone is warm, but never flimsy. It can sit beside grief, coercive control, deception, and institutional indifference without turning them into a lurid performance. The reporting leans on interviews, scene-setting, and the slow accumulation of detail. Its best quality is the way it treats women’s informal networks as serious intelligence. A friend’s bad feeling, a sister’s late-night search, and a group of warnings become forms of care. For listeners tired of true crime that flattens victims into plot points, The Girlfriends offers something more human: women naming what happened, finding one another, and pushing back.
Made for: For listeners who like intimate, interview-driven true crime where emotional memory and practical investigation carry equal weight. It especially suits anyone drawn to stories about fraud, coercive control, women’s solidarity, and accountability after official systems fail to act.
What sets it apart: The show’s strength is its refusal to treat gossip, gut instinct, or friendship as background noise. It turns those informal warning systems into the engine of the investigation, while keeping the women’s own words close to the surface.
When a group of women from all over the country realise they all dated the same prolific romance scammer they vow to bring him to justice. In this brand new season of global number 1 hit podcast, The Girlfriends, Anna Sinfield meets a group of funny, feisty, determined women who all had the misfortune of dating a mysterious man named Derek Alldred. Trust Me Babe is a story about the protective forces of gossip, gut instinct, and trusting your besties and the group of women who took matters into their own hands to take down a fraudster when no one else wo...
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
The Girlfriends traces how personal suspicion becomes shared investigation, practical action, and sustained demands for accountability.
The Girlfriends follows the work that begins when private alarm becomes collective action. In "Shark Bait," Wendy's new relationship prompts Lori to test the man's business claims, inspect an address online, and enlist a private investigator.
A dead-link company website becomes the moment your scam radar starts screaming.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A sunlit date turns into a slow, unnerving search for the truth.
Wendy's Hawaii date with Derek starts in a soft, flattering glow, then slowly exposes the first cracks in something bigger. The tension comes from that uneasy gap between being charmed and not quite trusting it, which gives the story a tight, intimate pull.
A mother's grief turns into a careful search for what was in the air around her daughter.
Rosamund's story follows a parent's search for what killed Ella, and the episode stays close to the slow, painful work of turning grief into evidence.
A 19-year-old's discovery that her birth story is false becomes a determined search for answers.
At the center is 19-year-old Leila, who learns that the story she has been told about her birth is false and is suddenly pulled into an identity crisis.
A sober look at what justice requires beyond the case itself.
The episode follows Lamar McIntyre's exoneration and Mark Dupree's view of what fairness should mean inside a justice system that has not always earned trust. Dupree comes across plainly and without theater, which helps the moral point land.
A steady, practical guide to documenting misconduct without pretending the process is easy.
The episode stays close to the hard part: what a person does after harm, when fear, shock, or plain exhaustion make action feel out of reach. It makes the case for writing things down, not as a grand gesture, but as a way to keep a record that may matter later.
A steady conversation about trauma, therapy access, and the community work that makes healing possible.
Myesha Hill comes through as an activist and author shaped by lived experience, with a background that also includes work as a former deacon and pastor.
ABC Audio's Theranos fraud series that also introduces its other true-crime podcasts.
Patrick Radden Keefe investigates whether the CIA secretly wrote a Scorpions hit.
Jake Halpern and the Snowball team track a con artist who defrauded a family.
A city-by-city true-crime documentary, from Detroit's Kwame Kilpatrick scandal to mob confessions.
A murder rumor in rural Alabama unravels into a clockmaker's suicide and estate feud.
Wendy meets Derek in Maui in 2013, and his story about seeing a whale shark on a scuba dive starts to wobble when he insists it involved Pacific Whale Foundation and a decompression chamber.
Season five of The Girlfriends tells the story of women who discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist and band together to take matters into their own hands.
A nine-year-old's lungs should not look like that.
Leila is nineteen, and shaken.
This transcript consists entirely of advertisements for various podcasts, including Two Percent, Thanks Dad, and Love Trapped, with no substantive content from the titled episode.
This episode of The Girlfriends features Tooba, who is challenging the Taliban's oppressive regime in Afghanistan.
This episode of The Girlfriends: Spotlight features Hélène's story of outwitting the Nazis during World War II, highlighting her courage and strategic resistance.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
This bonus episode from The Girlfriends podcast focuses on techniques to highlight and effectively share personal stories.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
"I got you, I got you, I got you." After the promos, the episode lands on Lamar McIntyre's 2017 exoneration and Mark Dupree's work in Wyandotte County.
No one should be forced.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
Myesha Hill joins the hosts.
This episode features advertisements for Point S tires, the Two Percent podcast on mental toughness, and the Thanks, Dad podcast with Will Ferrell, followed by a brief mention of a Bachelor star paternity hoax case.
This transcript features multiple podcast advertisements and promotions, including for Point S tires, the 2% podcast on mental toughness, and the Thanks Dad podcast with Will Ferrell, along with a brief mention of a Bachelor scandal.
This episode features promotional segments for multiple podcasts including Two Percent, Thanks Dad, and Love Trapped, focusing on themes of mental toughness, parental advice, and a true crime story about a pregnancy hoax.
This episode features multiple podcast advertisements and a brief mention of a Bachelor star paternity scandal.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
The host introduces a miniseries offering tips on solving crimes and keeping friends safe, based on their experience covering a romance scam case.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.
A group of women who all dated the same prolific romance scammer team up to bring him to justice.