Murder of Dee Dee Blanchard
Before dawn on June 10, 2015, Clauddine "Dee Dee" Blanchard, a 48-year-old woman, was murdered in her home in Springfield, Missouri. Her daughter, Gypsy Rose Blanchard, and Gypsy's then-boyfriend, Nicholas Godejohn, carried out the killing. The pair had met online in October 2012 and began planning the homicide about a year before the crime. After Gypsy posted a series of explicit messages about the killing on a public Facebook account she shared with her mother, neighbors contacted police, leading to the discovery of Dee Dee's body. The case soon drew national media attention. Early reporting framed the homicide as part of a long‑running fraud scheme, with local outlets noting that Gypsy appeared healthy and could walk despite years of public claims that she was severely ill.
In 2016, Gypsy accepted a plea agreement and was sentenced to ten years in prison for second‑degree murder. In 2018, Godejohn was convicted of first‑degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. Gypsy was released on parole in December 2023. The case has since been the subject of numerous documentaries, dramatizations, and media analyses.
Background
Dee Dee Blanchard
Clauddine Pitre was born on May 3, 1967, in Chackbay, Louisiana, to Claude and Emma Pitre. She was of primarily French Canadian descent. Known by the nickname "Dee Dee", she grew up with her family in nearby Golden Meadow. Her mother died in 1997.Early in adulthood, Dee Dee worked as a nurse's aide alongside Kristy Blanchard and Laura Pitre. When she was 23, she met 17-year-old Rod Blanchard in a bowling alley bar. The two married on December 27, 1990.
Shortly before the birth of their daughter, Gypsy‑Rose, in July 1991, the couple separated. Rod later said he realized he "got married for the wrong reasons". They chose the name Gypsy‑Rose because Dee Dee liked the name Gypsy, and Rod was a fan of Guns N' Roses. After Rod declined to return to the relationship, Dee Dee took her newborn daughter and moved back in with her family.
Gypsy-Rose Blanchard
According to Rod Blanchard, when Gypsy was three months old, Dee Dee became convinced that the infant had sleep apnea and began taking her to the hospital. Repeated overnight stays with a sleep monitor and other tests found no evidence of the condition. Over time, Dee Dee asserted that Gypsy had a wide range of medical issues, which she attributed to an unspecified chromosomal disorder. She later claimed that Gypsy had muscular dystrophy and encouraged her to use a walker.In her book, Gypsy alleged that when she was five years old, her maternal grandfather made her and Dee Dee bathe with him. She also wrote that when she was seven or eight, she was riding on her grandfather's motorcycle when they were involved in a minor accident in which she suffered an abrasion on her knee.
Gypsy frequently attended Special Olympics events with her parents. She was named the honorary queen of the Krewe of Mid-City, a child-focused Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans. At the event, she described herself as an animal lover with four cats and said her grandfather was her "best friend".
Dee Dee sustained a leg injury that Gypsy later recalled resulted from a car accident, requiring a two‑month hospital stay. During this period, Dee Dee and Gypsy lived with Gypsy's maternal grandfather, Claude, for about ten months. In her 2024 book, Gypsy accused Claude of abusing both her and her mother during this time.
Around this period, Dee Dee began taking Gypsy to science fiction and fantasy conventions. They sometimes attended in costume, which allowed Gypsy to blend in.
Gypsy appears to have stopped attending school after second grade, possibly even earlier. Dee Dee homeschooled her thereafter, citing Gypsy's alleged illnesses. Gypsy has said she learned to read independently by reading the Harry Potter books.
After Claude remarried, Dee Dee and Gypsy moved in with him and his new wife, Laura. Family members later alleged that Dee Dee poisoned Laura's food with Roundup weed killer, contributing to Laura's chronic illness during this period.
During this time, Dee Dee was arrested for several minor offenses, including writing bad checks. According to relatives, when they confronted her about her treatment of Gypsy and raised concerns about Laura's health, Dee Dee left the household with Gypsy. The family said that Laura's condition improved afterward.
Move to New Orleans
Dee Dee and Gypsy settled in the New Orleans suburb of Slidell, where they lived in public housing. Dee Dee supported herself through child‑support payments from her ex‑husband, Rod, and through public assistance tied to Gypsy's purported medical conditions. She continued taking Gypsy to numerous specialists, primarily at Tulane Medical Center and the Children's Hospital of New Orleans. Some physicians provided treatment based on the conditions Dee Dee reported. After she told doctors that Gypsy experienced seizures every few months, they prescribed anti-seizure medication. During this period, Gypsy underwent surgery, and Dee Dee frequently took her to the emergency room for minor ailments.According to the Springfield News‑Leader, Dee Dee regularly consulted with Dr. Robert Beckerman, who was said to have treated Gypsy for ten years.
After Hurricane Katrina devastated the region in August 2005, Dee Dee and Gypsy left their damaged apartment and relocated to a special‑needs shelter in Covington, where they stayed for three months. Dee Dee told officials that Gypsy's medical records and birth certificate had been lost in the flood. A doctor at the shelter, who was originally from the Ozarks, suggested that they relocate to Missouri. The following month, they were airlifted there as part of the resettlement program for people displaced by the hurricane.
Move to Missouri (2005)
Dee Dee and Gypsy initially lived in a rented home in Aurora, in southwestern Missouri. During this period, Gypsy was honored by the Oley Foundation, an organization that advocates for the rights of feeding‑tube recipients, as its 2007 Child of the Year.Move to Springfield
In 2008, Dee Dee and Gypsy moved east to Springfield. Habitat for Humanity built a small house for them on the city's north side, equipped with a wheelchair ramp and hot tub as part of a larger development project. The story of a single mother caring for a severely disabled daughter who had fled Hurricane Katrina drew considerable local media attention. The community frequently offered assistance to the family, and Dee Dee—now identifying as Clauddinnea Blanchard—continued to go by her longtime nickname. She also set up an outdoor movie screen at their home and charged neighbors $1 or $5 to watch films.In the summer of 2009, Children's Mercy Hospitals and Clinics published a story highlighting a reunion between Dee Dee, Gypsy, and Dr. Robert Beckerman following an appointment at the Comprehensive Sleep Disorders Center.
The outpouring of support in Missouri included numerous charitable contributions. While living in Louisiana, the pair had primarily relied on occasional stays at Ronald McDonald Houses during medical appointments; in Missouri, they received free flights to Children's Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, trips to Walt Disney World, and backstage passes to Miranda Lambert concerts through the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Rod Blanchard continued to make monthly child‑support payments of $1,200, sent gifts to Gypsy, and occasionally spoke with her by phone. He later recalled that during one call on Gypsy's eighteenth birthday, Dee Dee told him not to mention her daughter's real age because "she thinks she’s 14".
Rod and his second wife hoped to visit Springfield, but Dee Dee repeatedly changed plans. She allegedly told neighbors that Gypsy's father was an abusive drug addict and alcoholic who had never accepted his daughter's health issues and had never provided financial support.
Many people who met Gypsy-Rose were charmed by her. Her height, nearly toothless mouth, large glasses, and high, childlike voice reinforced the perception that she had the medical problems her mother described. Dee Dee regularly shaved Gypsy's head to mimic the appearance of a chemotherapy patient, allegedly telling her that medication would eventually cause her hair to fall out and that shaving it in advance was easier. Gypsy often wore wigs or hats to cover her baldness. When they left the house, Dee Dee frequently brought an oxygen tank and feeding tube, and Gypsy was fed the children's liquid nutrition supplement PediaSure well into her twenties.
Medical interventions continued. Dee Dee had some of Gypsy's saliva glands treated with Botox and later removed entirely to address her purported drooling. Gypsy later claimed that Dee Dee induced drooling by applying a topical anesthetic to numb her gums before doctor visits. Tubes were implanted in Gypsy's ears to treat her many purported ear infections.
In her memoir, The Prison Confessions of Gypsy‑Rose, Gypsy wrote that she developed an addiction to pain medication beginning at age sixteen.
Suspicions of deceptive behavior
In September 2007, Bernardo Flasterstein, a pediatric neurologist who examined Gypsy in Springfield, became suspicious of her reported muscular dystrophy diagnosis. He ordered MRIs and blood tests, which showed no abnormalities. "I don't see any reason why she doesn't walk," he told Dee Dee on a follow-up visit after observing Gypsy stand and support her own weight. Flasterstein noted that Dee Dee was not a reliable historian. After contacting Gypsy's physicians in New Orleans, he learned that her original muscle biopsy had been negative, contradicting Dee Dee's claims of muscular dystrophy and her assertion that all medical records had been destroyed in flooding. He suspected the possibility of factitious disorder imposed on another. Dee Dee later obtained access to Flasterstein's notes and stopped taking Gypsy to see him.Flasterstein did not report Dee Dee to social services. He later said that other physicians advised him to treat the pair with "golden gloves" and that he doubted authorities would believe him. In late October 2009, an anonymous caller informed police that Dee Dee used multiple names and birthdates for herself and Gypsy, and suggested that Gypsy was healthier than claimed. Officers conducted a wellness check but accepted Dee Dee's explanation that she used false information to avoid an abusive ex‑husband. Without contacting Rod, they concluded that Gypsy appeared genuinely mentally disabled, and the file was closed.