The Twisting Case of April Kauffman

[Music] hey you and welcome my name is mike and in this whole video we're going to take you know that trip that trip you've all been waiting for when i say you all i mean probably just one guy we're going to jersey jersey shore baby i mean i think that's something we all collectively wished we could uh erase this is a very weird and twisting story and it's about a local radio host named april kaufman april was married to dr james kaufman a prominent new jersey endocrinologist they had a great marriage were well paired but it turned out dr james was kind of a dr jekyll this would be news to april let's give it a go you and i come on april was born and raised in the state of new jersey a lifelong shore resident she had a strong love of motorcycles corvettes and for her an even bigger passion was advocating for us veterans she would be involved in countless programs helping former soldiers april herself was a bit of an owl entrepreneur you know she had various ventures she owned a salon she owned a catering business but she would go on to eventually become host a talk show radio host for wibg fn weekdays between two and four don't miss it pretty good thought there now you know yourself she had a strong gregarious personality was well liked by her audience where april would talk about anything and everything if you don't vote i will find out i'm going to your house i'm dragging you outside i love being here to bring you the truth as unfurnished as i'm pretty unbuttered on the biscuit it is homelessness is a big a big issue in our country right now foreign because i really want to tell you people when i did this initiative and king and king arthur and i started to tackle this uh situation with the lack of veterans health care i'm really going to tell you who helped me who gave me lip service the people that really told me it would never be done told me it would never be done april lived in linwood new jersey with her husband since 2003 dr james kaufman a fairly prominent guy in his own right she had a daughter kim from a previous marriage and two grandsons [Music] now dr james fusa he's a real tough guy a former green beret medals galore purple heart sharp shooting medals a viet [ __ ] nam vet he had been ambushed by the vietnamese stabbed his whole unit wiped out but he managed to crawl his way back to safety you know platoon we've seen it he lived it two tours so watch yourself as you can imagine this was a good fit for april who was out there demanding quality health care for those who served this was such a big issue that affected our veterans and our state our country so i will thank my husband for a lot of the things that i've learned over the years so you know april and james they were two two large figures in the local community you know and they were happy out it seemed every morning he'd be at the door to his medical practice before april herself would be followed soon after thursday 10th of may 2012 was no different until it was [Music] at 8 30 a.m dr james called his wife from his practice in egg harbor township as he usually did in the mornings this time he got no answer and after trying you know her for a few times he eventually called the handyman to go uh just have a goo and the handyman found what you found [Music] where's your emergency yes i have my bosses down her you gotta cut on her arm forty-seven-year-old april was found dead on the floor of her bedroom face down having been shot multiple times the medical examiner would speculate she had been shot in bed and struggled out before collapsing on the floor this would soon become a media frenzy a very popular local radio host gunned down in her own bed i'm very upset she said you're a friend of mine i can't believe that i can't believe it we just we just talk less the investigation began the funeral would be held killer south jersey radio personality april kaufman will be laid to rest the 47 year old was found shot to death thursday morning inside her linwood new jersey home our katie zachary is live in margate at bethel synagogue where the funeral service has just begun good morning katie good morning lori that's right a private funeral service for april kaufman is getting underway as we speak inside the synagogue behind me outside you see several veterans they have been lining the entrance to the synagogue for the last hour holding flags and also there are two dozen motorcycles lined up in front of the synagogues after the funeral which we're told will be about an hour veterans will get on their motorcycle and lead a procession once this service ends sources tell nbc 10 that investigators do not believe her murder is random [Music] and so you know whispering began as it would about who would have done this you know uh rumored rumor mill straight up cranked into action she was liked by everybody so what you got you know an affair seems like there may have been indiscretions on both sides of james and april's marriage that would be quite a common thing to happen as we've seen many times you know love that's a [ __ ] love triangles that we talk about usually end in a shitstorm but it didn't seem like this was one of those but was april afraid that something like this was going to happen to her her last radio appearance seemed to suggest it at a certain point my legacy of leaving um you know really beautiful daughter and two grandchildren on this planet i really hope to god that people you know hey i could get a flyover at my funeral now but could really say that here was an american citizen who really stood up and dug her heels in and and you know yelled fire and i expected it to be put out well the rumor mill was you know uh going 90. april's daughter kim pak you know her daughter from a previous marriage pretty much from jump street she was you know had her eye on the ball and her finger pointed she was pointing it right at her stepfather dr james kaufman no they never really got along i mean here's kim's wedding day that relationship was dripping with as much love as this sentence is sarcasm it seemed that this big shot doctor he was very controlling of his wife april who was a strong person in her own right yet he had her to a t two months before her untimely death april confided in her daughter kim pak that hey stick of working up this marriage it's a few days after the murder james hired a big shot defense attorney you know he wasn't named a suspect so doing that was suspect now though at the time of april's death he did have a great alibi he was caught on footage by a little old snack at the time his wife was shot in wawa kim was on the case as the months went by trying to get something you know out of this investigation that seemed to be going nowhere james had stopped talking long ago it seemed like he was moving on and the uh you know the county prosecutor was basically of of the line that it's a continuing investigation it's open [Music] what more do you want from me for such a high profile case it seemed the investigators were dragging their feet while the public were more keen on getting answers than the people who were well supposed to you know it's never really been explained why such a major case was kind of kicked to the curb it was one year ago today when linwood new jersey was shocked to hear that april kaufmann had been murdered well tonight the crime remains unsolved while there was a candlelit vigil on the one year anniversary of april kaufman's death james was off auctioning all her stuff a few months later he remarried this time to his high school sweetheart now what really lit the powder keg in you know what happened to april was when james went after her life insurance policy classic see he had tried to get it three months after her death and the insurance crowd were kind of so in june 2013 he basically filed suit demanding her death money so with james still not a suspect and with kim believing him to be that guy she filed a wrongful death suit against james this morning through my attorneys i have filed paperwork in federal court to stop dr kaufman from obtaining the money this would prevent him from getting the 600 000 life insurance policy see there is the old slayer statute no money until the insurance company could be assured that james wasn't a killer james kaufman would give a deposition on the wrongful death suit categorically of course denying of course that he'd any part in his beloved wife april's death and she had a power which i've known after 30 years as obviously someone has passed away and i ran downstairs and went out on the lawn and was hysterical and started vomiting okay do you have tissues by the way i go do you need to wait what's it with me don't know what you're on about now during that four error deposition something came out have you ever served in any branch of the military no did you ever tell kim pak you were in the military yes okay did you ever did she ever do a project for college and um part of the project was you being in the military and what you went through yeah and that you carried bodies yes um and and the torture that you had gone through did you ever tell anyone that you were a green beret yeah who'd you tell i don't recall how many people he never never served in yellow military he was uh full of full of [ __ ] uh stolen valor i believe it's called a big no-no and he gave some theories on what he believed really happened to april and who was responsible what do you think i thought it could be someone who was one of the veterans the last choice was that it was someone in a uh motorcycle game what brought a second kingdom the pagans pagans you say the pagans motorcycle club was founded in 1959 and are an outlaw motorcycle gang seems like their arrival to hell's angels and involved in various criminal enterprises on the east coast pretty hardcore one percenters but that as they say was that at that time no decision would be made on the you know the civil suit none would be made for another good few years and the board rock remained [Music] in 2017 a new county prosecutor damon tyner would take office he asked his staff to compile a list of of unsolved homicide cases going back 40 years in atlantic county he wanted the ones that were solvable april kaufman was pretty high upon the list they would re-examine the case of what happened to this beloved local radio host certain breaks had been made james's deposition included and possibly a renewed investigation could get to the bottom of what happened james kaufman was worth another look and when a tip right a tippity tip came in from the fbi about james but relating to a completely different matter he was looking more and more suspicious see investigators got a tip that maybe just maybe he was involved in some kind of scheme running out of his running out of his medical office narcotics scheme and so the police hopped by they were gonna go through his papers and yeah sniff around snoop well when the police showed up this happened here he comes he just went the other way just went down the side hallway i might have been on the phone i think yeah he went hold on he's coming out he's coming out five district five we got one at gunpoint we have one at gunpoint dr james coffman i have one at gunpoint dr james kaufman he has a weapon we have a search warrant intrusive as possible all right you have any questions for me no i just didn't appreciate being handcuffed i told them you don't want to get handcuffed you have shoulder issues right you have no weapons on you where's the weapon in the residence like poland's yeah i already told the swag and is there anyone else in there no definitely look at this everyone come back only one weapon in there yeah this is a legal weapon i don't worry about that just wanted to make sure that it ends peacefully today but thank you for answering my calls and thank you sources and bodies that we can bring down to help go through stuff okay well i just want something about the lab part of what we're looking at is uh allegations of medical fraud okay so that's fine but but here's the i just had one or two questions because you want to go through here and keep things orderly he was arrested on weapons charges and this gave prosecutors time to get into what really happened to april [Music] and a cooperating witness um informed the police that james had been asking around but what's the best way to make someone go away the permanent way the witness being a former pagan biker guy it seems that dr james led a double life when by night he would write fraudulent opioid prescriptions for the pagan biker gang he was part of a drug ring they'd pop into his office pick up the prescriptions and sell them on the street so this little drug ring not that little was one maybe april learned of maybe she also learned that james was never no green beret and she wanted a divorce and she threatened to expose what he really was and what he was doing which well that was a year before she was killed in 2011. over the next 12 months a hitman would be sought and eventually found lucy investigators broke this case wide open today in what sounded like a made-for-tv movie involving drugs greed the pagans motorcycle gang and a murder for hire plot by a doctor who was afraid of losing everything in a divorce no that wasn't the only fraud dr james was involved in you know when he told the uh hippocratic oath to go [ __ ] itself in return for some sweet kabasha after all 70 000 people die every year in the u.s alone of drug overdoses two thirds of them being from opioids so he was a drug dealer with a degree he had been linked to an insurance fraud scheme one involving unnecessary blood tests where he would get a kickback from the blood test lab another involving compound cream prescriptions for pain management god love when you're highly advised to take a very addictive substance for pain do you have it though james kaufman paid a biker 10 grand to do the job and on the 10th of may 2012 as he was leaving the house that morning he well as he was out the door he left the doors unlocked shortly after he left the convenience store he apparently handed the hitman a gun and pointed him in the direction of his home funnily enough right the the killer the hitman you know james didn't pull the trigger but he was responsible for a death see the hitman a francis mulholland died a year and a half after april's death he died of a drug overdose surprisingly enough one prescribed by dr james coffin it seems that francis mulholland he never got over uh doing doing what he did and so for five years after april's death the drug ring continued now that a loose end had been taken out of the picture today james kaufman age 69 and ferdinand agello age 62 were charged with murder in connection with the death of april kaufman in addition to racketeering related to the illegal distribution of narcotics through kaufman's former medical practice additionally argello is charged with conspiracy to commit the murder of james m kaufman upon information and belief known to my office an individual named francis frank mulholland was paid a sum of money to kill april coffman in january 2018 james kaufman was charged with well putting a hit on his wife and racketeering working with the pagan motorcycle gang to set up an illegal drug distribution network for oxycontin he was accused of working with the apparent leader of the pagans a fella named ferdinand or jello to do ah well what happened he too would be arrested and a number of other indicted in this drug ring now of course james would deny that he had ordered and he kind of you know solicited any kind of murder which then ferdinand aguelo organized and francis mulholland carried out he would deny anything to do that he would say that he was strong-armed into this drug destruct ring and that april was killed when james said he wanted out which explains his behavior following her death that to the majority unsurprisingly seemed unbelievable though he did have his supporters as his links with the pagan motorcycle gang were being exposed prosecutors began to worry that he could be assaulted or worse while being held threats were made we learned dr james kaufman has been moved to a prison in hudson county new jersey due to an alleged plot by a co-defendant to have him killed and so they moved him to another facility for his protection [Music] tonight an investigation is underway into the death of dr james kaufman the man charged with arranging his wife's murder took his own life in his jail cell and he left a suicide note before he could go on trial in january 2018 68 year old james kaufman was found dead he had used a bed sheet beside him was a six page note in it he denied doing anything to his wife he said it was april herself who introduced him to the pagan motorcycle gang remember she loved bikes and all that stuff and she was the one responsible for setting up the narcotics ring with the pagans but honestly this isn't widely believed to be true from james kaufman's final note quote as god as my witness and will be i cannot live like this i no matter what anybody says i did not do anything to my wife and i am not was not in the rackets morituri tay salutamus i'm sure i butchered that but it's you know it's latin for we who are about to die salute you said you know by um well people criminals and captives and the during the mock naval battle they're probably not going to make it out alive so they said that to the emperor and they also said it in gladiator so maybe he was a russell crow fan salute [Applause] sometime in 2011 april came to me and said would i like to go to a motorcycle rally at smithville to meet some of her friends when we got there they were sitting on an outside patio next to the bar i was slightly shocked to say the least that they had the colors of pagans i was very nervous one of the leaders said for me to see his motorcycle when we got there he said april said i would help them out and after that he explains more or less how he was forced into being the well top of this drug ring i want to apologize to any person i've hurt insulted or was rude to in my 68 plus years i made peace with god and said the shema i'm ready to go goodbye p.s sorry about my handwriting and thanks to my friends who stood by me they knew i didn't kill april [Music] his co-conspirator ferdinand augello was ultimately convicted in the murder of april kaufman but denies he had anything to do with it in 2018 he was sentenced to life in prison and so ends this old one you know one will probably never never really get to the to the bottom off but what was what was really going on there but it's really a story about greed how we can have it all still not enough which you know in turn when you get into what we got into will invariably lead to tragedy all around all a ring like a drugs ring narcotics ring bringing it back thank you come on so much for watching i really appreciate it and i appreciate you i will see you as always real soon in the next video tuesdays and fridays take care of yourselves [Music] you

Channel: That Chapter

Views: 1,849,826

Keywords: that chapter, april kauffman, james kauffman, April kauffman linwood nj, James kauffman pagans

Id: lkNJRlEuAfE

Length: 24min 53sec (1493 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 29 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/TaylorAle]

Surprise! It's the husband!

[u/dawnat3d]

I noticed how many subs That Chapter has shot up to (over 700K today) so I took a look on https://socialblade.com/youtube/channel/UCL44k-cLrlsdr7PYuMU4yIw. I wonder at what point he can quit his day job, assuming he has one and wants to. Does he do the entire show himself?

I know many podcasters hire people to write their stuff and they just read it off. I assumed Mike did the research and video editting but maybe it’s gotten to be too much.

[u/Ermcphillynj16]

Unfortunately there is an innocent man sitting in prison for a murder he didn't commit. So many facets of this case are left out. I have plenty of paperwork if anyone would like to see how Ferdinand Augello is innocent.

[u/bettingonabudget1]

I live about 30 seconds away from where all of this took place. This is an incredible synopsis, however, the only thing not covered, is the depth of the drug ring. He may have been the head, but the arrests are still ongoing to THIS day for those involved, it has included School teachers, Firemen, Cops, ect. I believe all of this is still being controlled by the mob, which although, we don't hear much about anymore, controlled Atlantic City, NJ not too many years ago, only about 20 minutes from where I live, and where all of this took place. Incredibly interesting.