When Angela Russo agreed to meet an online match, the 24-year-old hoped she might have found love. Instead, she disappeared. Weeks later, her body was discovered in a shallow grave in the Arizona desert.
“Angela was going to meet up with who she thought was this perfect man,” Maricopa County Prosecutor Joseph Hinrichsen said during the Nov. 8 episode of Catfish Murders. “But what she was walking into was a trap.”
Angela’s mother, Diana Schalow, last heard from her on April 18, 2016. Angela had texted that she planned to go bowling with coworkers before spending the night at a friend’s house. After that, she stopped responding to Diana’s messages and calls.
“That was so unlike her,” Diana recalled. “Angela always responded to text messages.”
Diana became even more alarmed after learning that Angela had not shown up for work on April 19. Her coworkers also said she had never gone bowling with them.
Angela’s family reported her missing, but police noted that, as an adult, she could have left voluntarily. Diana remained unconvinced. She supplied photographs and pointed investigators toward several identifying tattoos: a songbird on Angela’s foot, a ladybug behind her ear, and designs featuring Tigger and Eeyore.
Who Was Angela Russo?
“Angela was a fun-loving little whippersnapper,” Diana told Catfish Murders. “She wanted to make everybody happy.”
Angela was training to become a medical assistant and hoped eventually to work as a pediatric nurse. But as investigators examined her disappearance, her search for a romantic partner became central to the case.
“She was looking for Prince Charming,” Angela’s brother Ryan Schalow said. “That person that was great with family, was great with kids, believed in God…everything you could look for in a guy.”
After police eliminated Angela’s former boyfriends as suspects, the investigation appeared to lose momentum. Then phone records produced two important leads: Angela had recently been in a rough Phoenix neighborhood and had exchanged messages with a 520 area code connected to a prepaid phone.
“For police, that complicates things,” Jeff Roseberry, deputy county attorney at the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office, said. “This number may have been utilized for different people.”
Investigators also examined Angela’s old phone, which remained in her bedroom, and discovered that she had been using the dating app Plenty of Fish.
Angela had been messaging a man who went by Jodeci. His texts came from the same 520 area code. Photos showing him in a military uniform, along with references to his faith, suggested he possessed many of the qualities Angela wanted in a partner.
The two had arranged to meet on April 19, and Angela’s Google Maps history showed searches for an address in Phoenix.
When police went to the apartment, they learned it was registered to Claudia Martinez. Her boyfriend, investigators discovered, had an unexplained connection to Angela.
LaShawn Johnson Investigated in Angela Russo’s Disappearance
Claudia offered investigators little information. She said she did not know Angela or anyone named Jodeci and claimed she had been at work on April 19.
Her boyfriend, LaShawn Johnson, quickly drew the attention of detectives. The 25-year-old had a felony record and was already jailed on an unrelated charge.
Police obtained records for the prepaid phone and found that it was linked to LaShawn. He had also used the online name Jodeci. Investigators then carried out a search of the apartment.
“They realized that he was catfishing Angela,” Hinrichsen said. “Basically, pretending to be somebody in order to lure them in, make them feel comfortable to get what they want.”
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LaShawn admitted that he had matched with Angela online but denied meeting her or speaking with her by phone. Detectives questioned that account, particularly after learning that he had changed his phone number with his service provider the day after Angela disappeared.
“Why would someone want to do that?” Hinrichsen said. “It’s the desperation to change the phone number that becomes very apparent and indicative of foul play.”
Investigators later monitored two jailhouse calls between Claudia and LaShawn. During one conversation, Claudia said police had searched the apartment and taken some of LaShawn’s belongings. In the other, LaShawn told her to remove additional items from a safe.
Claudia then provided investigators with more details.
She said she had picked LaShawn up on April 20 from a landscaping job in Tonopah, a remote area where that type of work was unusual. Claudia also recalled hiking with him on May 12, when he found a burned car and seemed eager to show it to her.
When Claudia guided police to the vehicle, investigators noticed the unmistakable odor of decomposition. Nearby, a cluster of rocks appeared to have been arranged in the shape of a body.
As officers moved the rocks, strands of red hair—matching Angela’s hair color—were visible in the ground. Beneath them was a body bearing the distinctive Eeyore and Tigger tattoo.
“I broke down crying,” her brother recalled after learning the news. “The worst day of my life.”
What Happened to Angela Russo?
Angela’s disappearance had become a homicide investigation. A second search of the apartment uncovered blood evidence, and DNA testing later linked it to Angela.
When police questioned LaShawn again, he changed his story. He said Angela had come to the apartment with one of his friends, though authorities were unable to verify the friend’s identity.
Detectives then asked LaShawn whether he wanted to write a letter to Angela’s family.
“He writes an apology to them and basically says, ‘I’m sorry for what I’ve done, and I hope you can forgive me,’” Hinrichsen said. “He then crumples it up and then tries to hide it in his sock.”
In July 2018, more than two years after Angela disappeared, LaShawn stood trial for her murder.
Prosecutors believe Angela went to the apartment expecting to meet LaShawn for what she thought was a first date.
“It seems most likely that Angela would have been murdered in the apartment,” Roseberry said. “But her body was likely removed in those early morning hours…and placed into the trunk, where LaShawn could then drive her out to the Tonopah area and then bury her in that shallow grave, setting the vehicle on fire.”
LaShawn took the stand in his own defense and accused Claudia of killing Angela.
“He did witness the murder, but the murder happened when Claudia got home that morning,” Hinrichsen recounted. “She saw them together, threw herself into a rage, went and got a knife from the kitchen and then chased Angela around the dining room and then stabbed Angela multiple times with a knife.”
Claudia, who was never charged, denied the accusation. In October 2018, LaShawn was convicted of first-degree premeditated murder and sentenced to natural life in prison.