How a Fake YouTube Live Stream Revealed Natalie McNally's Murderer

Script for Humble Mysteries, episode 11

May 18, 2024

I read somewhere a quote that went something like this: “Behind every strong person is a story that gave them no choice.” And truly, there are some people who manage to turn every single one of their struggles into something positive, who manage to stay truly happy even when things seem hopeless, and remain steadfast and loyal friends amidst their own life challenges.

And yet also in the same world, there are people whose one purpose seems to be to shatter everything someone has worked for, hoped for and lived for. To destroy years of work someone put into bettering themselves, their community and the world they live in. And more often than not, their reasons for taking away someone’s dreams are merely a reflection of their selfish, miserable and bitter lives.

Please join me as we explore the murders of Natalie McNally and her unborn son, Dean.

In Northern Ireland, about a 30 minute drive away from Belfast, the capital, in a smaller town named Lurgan, Natalie McNally spent her life. She was born to her parents Noel and Bernadette in 1990, and was raised with three brothers - Declan, Brendan and Niall. Because she was the only girl, she was treated as a princess with her brothers always feeling very protective of her.

Because she was never restrained in what she wanted to achieve in her life, Natalie was an accomplished young woman. After studying law, she ended up studying marketing and then in 2018 started a prolific career working for Translink, Northern Ireland’s train and bus services. She loved animals and lived with two cats and a big German Shepherd named River. She loved jigsaws, was an avid supporter of Everton FC and loved books. Those who knew her described her as a gorgeous, kind and generous young woman who always went the extra mile for her friends and family. And if anything, Natalie was a reflection of her upbringing and the family she came from. Her uncle said: “She has come from one of the kindest, most generous, most loving, most caring families that I have ever had the privilege to meet. She was petite, but fierce, independent and vocal about her values and beliefs.

When she was 3, Natalie was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, and lived her life dealing with the ups and downs of her diagnosis. She also quite often shared her everyday struggles with constant blood glucose fluctuations on her Twitter account. Natalie was advocating for a lot of social causes and had a rich social life. But even so, she was very close with her parents who lived in the same town, and visited them often. Her parents and her brothers loved their precious Nats, as they called her, and the 6 of them made a very tight knit family.

Natalie lived in Lurgan, a town of around 28,000 people. In 2022, Natalie met Stephen McCullagh, a 33 year old man who at the time worked in digital media and was a part time employee of the Belfast Telegraph. I wasn’t able to find how long their relationship was, how they met and all those things we love to know about couples. And then, fairly early into their relationship sometime in early fall, Natalie found herself pregnant. She shared the news with her family and they were over the moon. Her baby was going to be the first baby of the family, her parents’ first grandchild, her brothers’ first niece or nephew and the excitement was palpable. Her parents said they could not wait to meet the baby.

Now, Natalie and Stephen were not living together at the time. I am unsure of how serious their relationship was at that point, but it was clear that Natalie was excited about the baby and was in no way contemplating terminating her pregnancy. Whether or not that means that Stephen was on the same page, we just don’t know. It would appear that he was on board, because their relationship seemed to be going well - they were in regular contact, seeing each other, and being supportive of each other. But maybe they decided that just because Natalie was pregnant, it wasn’t yet time for them to move in, and they let the relationship develop naturally, regardless of the pregnancy. Which, as far as I’m concerned, is totally ok. At that time, Natalie had only just introduced Stephen to her parents and he met them on only two occasions. It was obvious that their relationship was still in its early stages.

Natalie obviously had a very good support system. You know how everyone says you need a village to raise a child? Well, Natalie had her village, we can be sure of that.

Stephen lived in the city of Lisburn, which is about a 20 minute car ride away from Lurgan with Lisburn being the bigger city of the two. There are bus lines going between the two places, so Natalie and Stephen were able to see each other regularly. As far as I can tell, Stephen lived alone, having lost his mother in 2013, and his father in 2015. When he met Natalie, he had a little dog whose name was Smokey, but he died sometime in September 2022.

Natalie and Stephen spent the night of December 17th together, I believe they spent it at his apartment. The next day, December 18th 2022, it was a Sunday, and they each had their own plans for the day. Natalie was going to watch the FIFA World Cup final at her parents’ house, and Stephen was going to go live on his YouTube channel. He planned for his stream to last 6 hours, from 6pm to midnight, and he named it “The Violent Night Christmas Live Gaming Stream”.

At the time, his YouTube channel had about 35,000 subscribers and the description on his channel said: “Welcome along to a channel run by a massive man child and his special friends who should really know better by now, but don't. In reality we celebrate toys, collectibles, memorabilia, sarcasm, and all things nerd.”

As far as I can tell, he was a fan of Doctor Who, Star Wars and similar franchises, and he often bought memorabilia and toys connected to those franchises and made videos about them.

He also used to do live streams, but in December 2022 it had been over a year since his last live stream.

That afternoon he and Natalie exchanged a few messages, he announced his live stream on his facebook and twitter, and Natalie liked those posts. She also texted him that she might take a peek at his live later that evening. I was able to find information that Stephen promised Natalie that he would quit drinking, or at least drink significantly less, once they found out they had a baby on the way. On Stephen’s facebook page there is a post from April 2022 in which he announced his first day at the rehab clinic. He never specified what kind of rehab he was in for so that’s the only information I was able to find in regards to his potential problem with alcohol, but it’s definitely something to keep in mind.

Natalie joined her parents around 3pm and together they watched the World Cup final match between Argentina and France. When the match was done, Natalie and her dog River walked back to her car, and Natalie’s mom remembers giving her some wrapping paper and some other trinkets. It was a week until Christmas, Natalie’s favorite time of the year. As Natalie got into her car, hands full of wrapping papers, she told her mom they will see each other on Tuesday. Her mother watched her drive away, not knowing she just saw her daughter for the last time.

The next morning, on Monday, December 19th, Stephen was trying to reach his pregnant girlfriend, Natalie, but she was not responding to his texts and calls. He got worried and went over to her place. Once there, he found Natalie dead and called the police.

The police secured the crime scene and, obviously, focused their attention on the person who not only found Natalie, but was also in a romantic relationship with her. I will keep repeating that partners need to be looked into whenever something like this happens, and the police know this very well. Stephen, for some reason, refused to be cooperative with the police and refused to answer their questions, specifically questions about what the crime scene looked like when he arrived and before the medical staff attended. However, he did have an answer when the police asked him where he was and what he was doing the night of Natalie’s murder. Stephen said he was live streaming to his YouTube audience for 6 hours. Nonetheless, Stephen was arrested for his lack of cooperation with the authorities.

I’m assuming that the medical examiner gave an approximate time of death based on the state of her body, and the police most likely concluded that Natalie did, in fact, die during that 6 hour window when Stephen was live on YouTube, so his status was changed from suspect to witness, and he was released from jail.

Of course, the people in the area, especially women, became immediately concerned for their safety. The attack happened in the night, and the victim was a woman who lived alone. Definitely a scenario that would have any woman quite fearful about her own safety.

The police, however, made every effort to assure the public that there is no immediate threat. They said that Natalie most likely knew her killer, as there were no signs of forced entry. This made the police believe that whoever killed her, either had the key to her apartment, or they were let in by her. The police characterized the attack as targeted, and once again assured the public that there is nothing to suggest that there is a threat to other women. In Natalie’s home, the police also recovered the murder weapon - a kitchen knife from Natalie’s own kitchen.

In the same town, Natalie’s parents spent Monday not knowing anything was off. In their home filled with photos of their three sons and their precious daughter, they finished the day and went to bed hoping to see Natalie the next day, after her scheduled OBGYN appointment. But instead, they were woken up by a doorbell at 4,30am on Tuesday morning. The police officers informed them of what had happened to Natalie. Her dad said that the young female officer who was there breaking the news to them that morning, cried.

Soon, her father and her brother Declan went to identify her body. When they were shown her body, her injuries made her face almost unrecognizable. The bones in her face and neck were broken, and she had been stabbed multiple times. Although the official autopsy report was never released to the public, it was reported that her injuries were due to blunt force trauma, but the attack was described as frenzied. It definitely didn’t look as if someone had punched her and she fell and hit her head, or pushed her down the stairs or fatally stabbed her once. It was obvious from her injuries that the attacker’s intention was not only to kill her, but to also hurt her, and Natalie’s dad said that she was given a horrible death, and that his only hope is that she died instantly and didn’t suffer for long.

The police then began the painstaking process of gathering evidence and moving forward with this investigation. One of the first things they did, was obviously talking to the neighbors. None of the neighbors were alerted by Natalie’s dog barking, and you would think that a protective breed like a German Shepherd would be barking if there was an intruder. It all pointed to the fact that whoever came into Natalie’s home that night, wasn’t a stranger to Natalie or her dog River.

One of the neighbors said she heard a woman scream around 9pm on the evening of December 18th.

Over 4,000 hours worth of CCTV footage was recovered, and by combing through it, the police were able to find footage of a man carrying a rucksack, or a backpack, or some kind of sack, arriving on foot at Silverwood Green, Natalie’s neighborhood. The man can be seen arriving on December 18th at 8,52pm. The same camera then captured him leaving the neighborhood, again on foot, at 9,30pm.

He can be seen wearing a tracksuit, top and bottom of the same color and white trainers. The color of his clothing seems different when he’s leaving the neighborhood, which led some people to think he changed his clothes. But to me it seems like he is wearing the same thing, he was just captured in two different spots on the same street, once in the light, once out of the light. I could be totally wrong, and maybe he did change, and that was what he was carrying in the bag.

Another piece of CCTV evidence came from one of the city buses from Dunmurry to Lurgan. The footage shows the same man, wearing a tracksuit and taking careful steps to conceal his face using a hood and a scarf. The man was wearing black gloves, but when he bought the ticket from the driver and received change, he wasn’t able to pick up the change with his gloved fingers, so he took off the black glove he was wearing and revealed a yellow latex cleaning glove.

This glove that the man in the footage was wearing was consistent with traces of a yellow Marigold glove found at the crime scene in Natalie’s blood. Marigold is a british brand and they make cleaning gloves.

Now, the suspect took the bus to Lurgan, but when he was done he probably just wanted to go back home so he found a taxi and asked the driver for a ride. This wasn’t an old school taxi, it was a service that worked through an app, but the driver agreed to drive this man to his destination even without the app. Once the police found the taxi driver, the man he described matched the man who was seen in the CCTV footage. He showed the police where he dropped off the man, and the location matched the route captured by the taxi driver’s app. It was the home of Stephen McCullagh.

Natalie’s family spent their Christmas gathered around her coffin in their sitting room. They mourned two deaths - Natalie’s and the death of her unborn son who they named Dean.

During those days, Natalie’s family opened their home to many people - the police, members of the media, friends and family, and Stephen. During Christmas Day, when Natalie’s coffin was in her parents’ home, Stephen was there as well, receiving condolences alongside her family. At one point he even requested to be left alone with her coffin, and the family granted him 30 minutes.

Imagine having to spend Christmas, which is many people’s favorite holiday, with your loved one’s coffin in your house. Natalie’s mom remembers how festive and decorated their house was when they got the news of her passing. She said their friends and family took down the decorations for them. Natalie’s family all agree that their Christmases will forever be just that one memory - of Natalie’s coffin in their sitting room.

And this really, really hit me hard. I have an incredibly big soft spot in my heart for pregnant women, and I was actually also around 14-15 weeks along just around Christmas too when I was pregnant with my son. We actually announced my pregnancy on Christmas Eve, and it was such a special feeling to know that our next Christmas will be spent as a family of 3, with our baby.

I can’t even imagine what Natalie’s family was going through and the amount of grief this entire situation brought to them.

Natalie was buried the next day, on December 26th 2022.

During the month of January, the detectives moved forward with their investigative work. I am assuming it was around this time that Stephen’s computer and his devices were taken in for forensic examination.

Stephen had a good alibi, there was no disputing that. But when the police dug deeper into his devices, they found a video file that was deleted only 5 minutes after Stephen’s live stream on YouTube ended. That video file was the live stream that Stephen streamed that night. And it turned out, it was recorded on December 14th.

Obviously, that meant that Stephen’s rock solid alibi has now been seriously undermined. The detectives found that the footage that was streamed on the evening of December 18th was pre recorded. Stephen then shared the screen with his audience and made it appear like he was live, streaming his gameplay and a video of himself commenting.

The game he played was GTA (Grand Theft Auto) and at the very beginning of the video, Stephen told the viewers that he wouldn’t be able to interact with the chat due to technical issues. That’s highly suspicious because that's the whole point of YouTube lives. I have never done a live stream, but I have seen many of them done by other YouTubers and they always have the ability to see the chat.

Following this discovery, Stephen McCullagh was rearrested on January 31st 2023.

Once in custody, Stephen admitted that the footage he streamed on the night of December 18th was indeed recorded a few days in advance. However, he denied any involvement in Natalie’s death and instead claimed that he spent the evening at home, drinking until he passed out. When asked to explain the taxi driver’s claim that he gave him a ride to his home that night, Stephen actually said that a man unknown to him did show up at his house at that time, but he was never able to describe him or explain what happened to that imaginary man.

Stephen’s stream and his entire channel are actually still up at the time of me recording this episode.

The police, obviously, also watched the recording of his live stream and found that he left brazen and taunting hidden messages about Natalie’s death in the stream.

Let’s start with the title of the stream. Again, Stephen titled it “Violent Night Christmas Live Gaming Stream. Also, now that the detectives knew that Stephen was in Natalie’s home from around 8,52pm until 9,31pm, when they found that timeframe in the video that was streamed, they saw Stephen saying “I need to kill this bitch, I need to take her down” during a mission that involves killing a woman. He then failed that mission the first time, and then decided to try again saying: “Fuck it, I will try that mission again because I almost had the fucker.”

Now, remember that Stephen promised Natalie that he would not drink during her pregnancy, yet at the very start of his fake stream he said he was going to have a drink because it would be more fun to get shitfaced.

During his fake live stream Stephen would take regular breaks about once every hour. During those breaks, the screen would show a message saying that the stream will be back soon.

About 3 hours into the stream, when Stephen was on a break and the break screen was being live streamed, an image appeared on the screen for a few seconds. It was the movie poster for the James Bond movie titled “No Time to Die”. The image then disappeared and Stephen came back and started explaining that his controller somehow fell onto his keyboard which opened the image that was just shown. And not only that. Before he took this break he said: “Pay attention, 007.” It's quite honestly incredible to me that he put so much detail into these sick and perverted Easter Eggs, but it's too much for it to be just a coincidence. And just keep in mind that all of this was pre recorded, so the “No Time to Die” image was edited into the recording; it couldn’t have just happened on its own.

In a different part of the fake live stream, he was commenting on the physics of the game he was playing on his Xbox, and he sarcastically said: “That’s physics, that would happen in the real world.” After a short pause he said: “Absofucking-not-ly”, but then immediately corrected himself and said: “Abso-fucking-Natalie”. All the while he is smirking into the camera.

Some other evidence that came from Stephen’s and Natalie’s devices also included the fact that Stephen’s phone had not been used the evening of Natalie’s murder from roughly 6pm until 11,16pm which was about 3 minutes after the taxi driver’s app showed them reaching the drop off address. Stephen claimed that Natalie’s attacker did come to his home, but he had no explanation on why, how he knew that was Natalie’s attacker, why he didn’t call the authorities and who even that man was or what he looked like.

Natalie’s phone revealed that Natalie had exchanged 33 messages with her former partner only a few days before she was murdered.

It was also revealed that during Natalie’s and Stephen’s sleepover on December 17th, her phone was unlocked 9 times in the wee hours of the night.

The detectives believed that it was Stephen who unlocked his girlfriend’s phone and accessed the chat that contained Natalie's conversation with her former partner. The nature of Natalie’s conversation with her former partner was never revealed, was it something explicit, was it something as simple as “I miss you”, was it just a platonic conversation, we really don’t know. 33 messages doesn’t seem like a lot to me, but the prosecution thought that those messages were the catalyst for Natalie’s murder.

I have to disagree with that, because if Stephen recorded his fake live stream on the 13th or the 14th of December, that was a whole few days before he found those messages. And I fully believe that the reason he pre recorded it was to use it as alibi for what he planned to do to Natalie, and in that case, his decision was already made before he read those messages.

Stephen’s attorney tried to argue that a live stream was a good way for Stephen to promote his channel and get the views and the subscribers. But, why record a fake live in that case? Why didn’t he just do the actual live. He spent 6 hours playing a game, whichever way you turn it, so what difference would it make for him to actually do it live on the night of December 18th?

But Stephen's descent into “piece of human garbage” territory did not stop there.

Even though he was treated as a witness in the investigation, he actually never helped the investigation, never asked about the investigation or offered any kind of insight to the detectives.

He was, however, in consistent contact with Natalie’s family. He regularly visited them, spent time with them in their home and used them to find out how the investigation was going and what evidence the police had.

I believe that during those visits, something must have felt off to Stephen because only a few days before he was arrested he left his phone in Natalie’s parents’ home. He later came to pick it up saying that he forgot the phone by accident. But when the detectives finally had him in custody, they realized that when he left his phone in Natalie’s family’s home, he recorded 40 minutes of audio, presumably their conversations.

He was hoping to uncover whether or not the family was suspecting him, and he pretended he accidentally left his phone there, for the sole purpose of recording the family’s private conversations.

And that alone is what cemented to me that Stephen McCullagh is a bottom of the barrel, trash human. I mean, not only did he kill their daughter, and their sister. He also took the life of her unborn child who the family was so excited to meet.

And then he went on to regularly visit her family in their home, not because he felt remorseful or because he wanted to aid the investigation. No, he went there to find out how much the police knew about the case and to find out whether the family were suspecting him. And if you remember, when Natalie’s coffin was in her family’s home on Christmas Day, Stephen requested to be left alone with it, and the family allowed this. He spent about half an hour with her coffin doing who knows what. And, guys, let’s not forget that before Natalie’s death, Stephen only met her family on two occasions. Only two! They were not friendly or close before Natalie’s death, so the fact that they even allowed him into their inner circle really shows what kind and accepting people they are.

When Stephen had a hearing in court later on and a question of bail came up, the public prosecutor pleaded with the judge to deny bail for Stephen because he could potentially be dangerous. She said: ”He will be desperate at this point. Over the last six weeks he has behaved in such a way that he displayed a confidence that he had got away with this. He was liaising with the family. He was at their home. He will be absolutely desperate now. He has shown he is capable of deception beyond imagination. There are absolutely no bail conditions that could alleviate the risks posed here. Had there been any suspicion voiced by the family and any expression of an intention to talk to police, we just don’t know what would have happened. He’s a dangerous person, and I would ask you to refuse bail.”

And those were my exact thoughts when I first read about Stephen recording the family’s conversations. What would have happened if they did actually talk about him and expressed their suspicions? What if they decided to call the police on him, and he heard it? Was the plan to simply be ok with that? Knowing what he did, we can conclude with certainty that he probably would have found a way to deal with Natalie’s family as well, simply for suspecting him. It’s an incredibly chilling thought.

Another slimy Stephen thing I want to bring up is the post on his facebook he made on January 15th 2023. In the post, Stephen was remembering his mother’s death, he posted an older photo of himself and his mom, and wrote this: “Nine years gone today, missed now more than ever. Cherish the women in your lives, their absence makes you realise just how much you learned from them and how strong they were for you. Mothers matter, make sure they know that before it's too late. Rest in peace.”

Imagine how incredibly vile you have to be to preach about cherishing the women in your lives to other people, to say that mothers matter, only weeks after brutally murdering a woman, and a mother to be.

That’s why I’m so sick of people who preach about kindness, but have no problem being the absolute worst people to others. We all know a few of those, I’m sure. I know I have a good example of that in my life.

During the hearings following his arrest, Stephen’s lawyer tried to argue that the prosecution’s case is based only on the fact that Stephen wasn’t streaming when he said he would stream. Stephen pleaded “not guilty”, and it was decided that the trial will be held in Belfast, due to the amount of digital evidence in this case, such as the CCTV footage, data from Stephen’s and Natalie’s devices and so on. Belfast is considered better equipped to deal with the IT requirements needed to present this case in its full extent to the jury.

The judge said that this was one of the most complex cases she had come across, and set the trial date for Monday, September 9th 2024.

This, of course, means that Stephen McCullagh has not yet been found guilty of murder or anything really, so consider the information I just presented alleged.

I’d like to talk a bit about what Stephen’s motive for this might have been. I know we mentioned those messages Natalie exchanged with her ex partner, and how Stephen must have read them the night before Natalie was murdered. And I will reiterate what I said before - I don’t think that was his motive.

His fake live stream had already been recorded at the time when he read those messages, and all the references to Natalie’s death were already included in it.

I think we have to look for the reason in the fact that Natalie was pregnant, and that Stephen is a self described man child.

What I have seen of his personality, watching some of his videos and scrolling through his social media accounts, he doesn’t seem like someone who was particularly interested in getting serious about life. It seemed to me that Natalie and Stephen were on totally different paths in life, and even if that wasn’t a problem in their relationship at the time, it was going to come to some kind of breaking point sooner or later.

This is just my opinion, but I really think that Stephen was not ready to become a father. I don’t think he was even ready to commit to Natalie or make any kind of big plans for the future.

Natalie, on the other hand, seemed like someone who set herself on a great career path, and was now ready to discover other parts of adulthood, such as parenting. The fact that she was happy about her pregnancy, even despite her very new relationship with Stephen, makes me believe that she probably was ready to become a mom because she has worked hard to make her circumstances such that a baby would be welcome, and wouldn’t feel like a disruption of her career, life goals or anything else.

Stephen, on the other hand, never even acknowledged their relationship on social media, at least not from what I could find, and seemed more preoccupied with other things.

I wonder if the two of them ever had a conversation about what to do about the pregnancy, and I wonder if Stephen ever suggested that she should terminate it.

Obviously, no one can make Natalie do that, so if she wanted to keep the baby, Stephen didn’t have a say in it, but it does make me wonder if the reality of Natalie entering the second trimester started to freak him out.

He decided that Natalie and the baby have to go, he planned out an elaborate alibi, and quite honestly, it was a good plan. Having thousands of people watch you innocently play a game while your girlfriend is being murdered is a really solid way of proving that you were not at the crime scene. Except, he forgot to take into account the amount of CCTV cameras we have in public places today, and the fact that the police will probably still look into him and his devices despite his alibi, simply because he was one of the last people to see Natalie alive, and because they were romantically involved.

In his attempt to create an alibi for himself, Stephen inadvertently documented the level of premeditation he had when carrying out his disgusting plans.

After Natalie’s death, her parents and her brothers stepped up to advocate for other women who were victims of their romantic partners. They wanted to get Natalie’s story to as many people as they could, and they achieved that, and a lot more. They united people around a cause, and gave Natalie’s legacy the best possible platform. Her dad said: “Our Natalie's death was just horrific. If some good can come from it, it gives us a bit of hope, a bit of comfort.”

This case has really touched me. Like I said, Natalie’s pregnancy around Christmas time reminded me of my own, and her close relationship with her family reminded me of my own family. I can’t imagine Christmas without one of my family members forever. I truly, truly sympathize with Natalie’s parents and her brothers, and I hope it gets easier for them with time. I also hope they get some closure after Stephen’s trial. Natalie and her family deserve justice.

Natalie’s death was a terrible tragedy that defined this town forever, and changed one family forever. The most wonderful time of the year, that Natalie loved so much, is for her family now just the painful reminder of the one person they will never see again and the one person they will never get to meet.

The house that was always glistening with Christmas decor, welcomed last Christmas with a tiny rainbow Christmas tree. Her mom said that was Natalie’s tree, and they put it up just for her. They couldn’t bring themselves to decorate the rest of the house. Grief in the McNally family is still fresh, the wound is still raw, and the chapter is not yet finished. The gravity of this loss is perhaps best captured in the statement Natalie’s dad gave on the anniversary of her death: “When I think of Christmas now, I think of Natalie’s coffin in the wee room on Christmas Day. That’s my Christmas now, and always will be.”