00:00:06
hey weirdos I'm Elina I'm Ash and this is [Music] Morgan that's crazy I wanted to end that
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intro on a bang you did Bang Bang Pow crash boom I couldn't think of another thing
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that's I wish you guys had seen her face she literally went she like pursed her lips and like raised her eyebrows
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like I was like Bang Pow crash boom that's all that's all I got I'm still laughing at the the diet coke uh
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decoration on my side of the Shelf it's not fine I can I know for 100% certainty
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that I didn't put that there we like you know we we did a big clean sweep of the
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Pod lab and we just like wanted to clear out all the yuckiness and anything that
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needed to get we needed to get rid of we salted the rugs like we said we were going to we organized the bookshelves
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and somehow and I don't drink diet I know it's not you I'm sorry Mikey call out 2024 I'm old and I only drink so or
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water no you drink diet coke and apparently when you're finished with it you decorate my nice beautiful sound
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bath Candle sage poos Santo Shelf with another sacred thing yeah Diet Coke I I'm going to leave it there I love that
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is who I am that shelf that is who you are that is who I am candles Paulo Santo my passion the sound bowl a big whole
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thing of black obsidian more candles and an empty bottle of Diet Coke see Mikey was just trying to make it more you yeah
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that's all you you really you uh you jazzed up the Shelf succeeded I appreciate you I love it I'm looking
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like yesterday I was like oh I got to throw that out today I'm looking at it I'm like no I'm going to leave that
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there that's not trash maybe you should gild it what is how do you gild it in gold in Gold no no you know make a she's
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already she's good at school as Shea Shay would say she's already doesn't even have her cap wow some she'll
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evaporate into this air there you go or maybe not cuz she's probably just toxic probably aren't we
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all it's early it is me and Elena went to a bar class this morning together and it was [ __ ] crazy I have never felt
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so uh both Dead Alive and heaving in my life I'm not joking you I actually did think I was going to throw up on the way
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home a little bit wow I did not this was this is one I've been going to cuz I tried to get into my into my fitness
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routine recently so I've been going early and then Ash came for the first time today and it happened to be like a
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little more of an intense class it wasn't like crazy more intense but it was a little
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more crazy intense that [ __ ] rocked my world it was more than normal I will say
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that no it definitely was it was fun though yeah I would do it again I will you know working on your Fitness that's
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all you can do that's all you can do all you can do is decorate your shelf the way that you see fit and work on your
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Fitness exactly all right well and tell us a scary story and I can tell you yeah
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this is a scary St judging by the uh title of this one it's it's got some stuff yeah if somehow you are hearing
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and you didn't see the title this is uh the story of Winnie Ruth Jud the trunk murderous yeah that alone is really is
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really it it sucked me in yeah so Winnie Ruth Jud is in fact the trunk murderess
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uh but before that she was just win Winnie Ruth mckennell yeah mckennell she went by Ruth most of her life so instead
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of calling her Winnie we're going to be calling her Ruth throughout the story okay uh so she was born January 29th
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1905 in Oxford Indiana her early life was pretty difficult right from the start uh after she was born like not too
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long even after she was born she ended up getting pneumonia like as a newborn o and when she was four she contracted
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tuberculosis which obviously affected her throughout pretty much the rest of her life yeah you don't just shake that
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one off no she's a sickly child and then obviously kind of just traveled into adulthood like that there's really not a
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lot of documentation related to her life before she got arrested but she herself
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did claim that her early years were pretty happy ones like even though she was sick a lot she was still happy
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that's good in a letter written to her attorney in 1952 she said my brother was 19 months younger than me and we were
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very very affectionate toward each other my father was one of the most kind L and
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godly Souls wow he believed that everyone had some good in him he addressed everyone as my good man and my
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good woman the world would seem brighter just to talk to him that's really sweet
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I want someone to say that about me I will someday thanks the world seems brighter just to talk to her that's
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really nice it is I just also love how people spoke back then that's the thing like it's it's like Poetic it's so much
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it's like people just spoke on such a deeper level about the people that they loved like cuz at first I was like her
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and her brother were really affectionate toward each other like is that weird but
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it's like no they were just like affectionate like they just like loved each other yeah like that's the thing
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it's like we look at it from a lens of now where we're like what the [ __ ] does
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that mean we're jaded as it's like no they just talked they just talked different like they they um they explain
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different things in like more flowery pros and it's yes it's nice I like it to us it's a little jarring sometimes we're
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like what do you mean by that right but they really just mean like I love them I
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assume yeah that's what they mean find anything like I'm hoping I'm not I took my jaded cap off for a second I'm like
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should I put it back on wait a second do I need this wait a minute no I don't think you do for for this particular
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segment Ruth spoke similarly of her mother who she described as a kindly Christian woman a bit timid but a
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hardworking person always willing to make a sacrifice for her family and others who needed her services and
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sickness it seems like they're a pretty normal family it seems pretty lovely pretty loving you know um so yeah it
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seems like her home life was happy it was positive but other areas of her life were a bit less ordinary she said that
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when she started going to school she really realized pretty quickly that she didn't fit in with the other kids she
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was brought up in a really rigid religious household so she had never gone to Carnival she had never gone to
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like a baseball game a sports event couldn't go to movies oh jeez she really couldn't participate in any of the
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social activities that kids her age would have been engaging in at that point she wrote my mother did not think
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these things were wrong but our church did not approve of it so it wasn't so much like the parent like I think at
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home things were a little more loose happy and positive but the parents like lived by the church's teachings and said
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like well we won't go to movies and we won't enjoy those things but like it wasn't like sit down and read the Bible
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and play hours we have a loving home but it's it doesn't sound like it's a fun home yeah no I don't think there was a
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lot of room for fun and that limited so ization and lack of experience without with really anything outside of her
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religious world it would go on to play an important role in her adult life especially when it related to her
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romantic relationships because sometimes when it's like overly rigid your romantic relationships get a little
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weird other things get a little weird a little it's got to leak out somewhere you know so in 1924 when she was 19
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years old Ruth married William Jud a doctor and World War I veteran with uh he was more than 20 years her senior so
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a little bit old all right all right having grown up in a loving household Ruth had a lot of ideas about what
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marriage should be but she quickly learned uh life as Mrs William Jud was not going to be anything like her
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parents happy marriage author Jana I think it's bomersbach uh she wrote the trunk murderous said forget the image of
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a nice family doctor who settled in a community supplying his wife with a home and
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respectability unfortunately that's not what was going to happen at all Jud was addicted to
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Morphine uh which may have actually been the result of injuries that he sustained
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during the war but because his addiction was so strong he struggled to find and keep steady work after their wedding in
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1924 they packed up everything they owned and decided to move to Mexico where William started working for an
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American mining company which I think we talked about mining in one of my last episodes it was like a I mean he was a
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doctor like damn he and I think just because of his addiction he couldn't really swing it anymore like mining was
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like a last Stitch kind of seriously like it was the last job you were really going to go for but so at first the
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judge marriage was a happy one like in the beginning it was it seemed pretty all right and Ruth was writing letters
00:09:16
home telling her parents that she was enjoying Mexico the people were were so nice she was working on learning how to
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speak Spanish and that happiness seemed to last a few years and Ruth eventually became pregnant but unfortunately in 19
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27 her tuberculosis got worse and she had to be hospitalized for a short period and during that period she lost
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the baby oh that's sad and she and William decided that her health was probably too poor for her to Really Ever
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carry a child it just didn't seem like something that was going to be likely yeah so from there things really only
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got worse cuz that's like a big blow obviously if the if you think you want to have children and then one day you
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realize like it's probably not the best idea like I can't imagine how that would
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feel that's a tough yeah so Ruth returned to Mexico but the humid climate of the region seemed to make her TB
00:10:05
worse so she was never in good health while they were there and to make matters worse jud's addiction had
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finally caught up with him and he got fired from his mining job which caused even more stress and really further
00:10:17
strained their already fragile relationship Bo in letters home to her parents Ruth never mentioned jud's
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addiction problems never mentioned their marital troubles or really how unhappy she'd become instead her letters were
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quote always cheery always filled with the promise that the setbacks would be overcome very positive yeah she scking
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it out mhm and the lack of her sharing her frustrations was probably an attempt to keep her family from finding out that
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her husband was uh not really a a successful doctor and she was uh not really content with life but the truth
00:10:52
was Ruth and William hadn't been happy for quite some time by this point and Ruth had grown really tired of making
00:10:57
excuses and lying to her family yeah so in 1930 they decided toally separate with Ruth moving to Phoenix Arizona
00:11:05
where she hoped the dry climate would help and improve her TB at the time this was pretty risky it's 1930 she's a woman
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she has no income she really doesn't know anybody in the area and she didn't have a ton of skills that were going to
00:11:19
help her find a job but luckily she was able to find a job as a medical secretary at the gr I think it's gruno
00:11:26
Clinic um after she lied in her interview and assured her new employer that she had experience as a typist she
00:11:33
did not she did not but she was like I can do it yeah uh her lie became apparent rather quickly they were like I
00:11:40
don't think you know what you're doing but and she just like couldn't keep up with the pace or anything but her boss
00:11:46
liked her so much just thought like she was such a nice person that he was like I'm going to I'm going to bear with you
00:11:51
and you'll learn how to do this we're going to stick this up yeah so her position required her to work six days a
00:11:57
week and she was paid $75 a month which is not a lot no uh like I said the salary was small and after paying her
00:12:04
rent and her other expenses she sent what was whatever was left over to her husband at that point he had moved to
00:12:10
California looking for a new job so with little free time and essentially no money Ruth treasured the time that she
00:12:16
spent with her new best friends Agnes an Leroy who went by an and her roommate hedvig Samy samulon they were co uh
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Sammy was a cooworker from the clinic an and Sammy had been friends for a while while and then all three women bonded
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over having moved to Arizona around the same time and trying to make it on their
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own with no man to support them yeah so they were like we're girly pops we're out here we're new in town and we're
00:12:43
getting it done we're new in town yeah so not long after Ann and Sammy arrived in Phoenix uh William Jud joined his
00:12:52
wife in Arizona and for a time things were good again William got along with Ruth's new friends and the four of them
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hung out a lot of a group at one another's Apartments but unfortunately the good times didn't last really long
00:13:05
jud's addiction problems were just as bad as they had been if not worse and his inability to find Steady work meant
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that he was gone for a lot of the time as he was looking for work in other places yeah and at the same time things
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had actually started to take a downturn for Ruth's friends like Ruth Sammy had chosen Phoenix in the hope that the
00:13:25
climate would improve her tuberculosis but by late spring her her condition had gotten worse and she had
00:13:31
to make the decision to enter a sanitarium in Portland Oregon for treatment I said Oregon you heard it
00:13:37
Oregon Oregon I said it correctly not like not to be confused with the Oregon Trail cuz that's what it
00:13:45
is Oregon Oregon oron Oregon anyway Oregon don't worry just kidding unable to maintain her job and support Sammy and
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made the decision to leave her job and travel with her friend to Oregon so Sammy and Anne are now in Oregon for a
00:14:02
little bit in August of 1931 Sammy got discharged from that sanitarium and she and Anne moved back to Phoenix so they
00:14:09
were all reunited again so it like a little I think it was like about a year maybe like nine months to a year yeah uh
00:14:16
so now without jobs or income Ruth offered to move in with them and the three shared a small pretty cramped
00:14:22
apartment they had been the best of friends for months but there's a big difference between hanging out together
00:14:28
when you want to in having to be together all the [ __ ] time and sharing a living space and a
00:14:33
very small one at that abely that's a very different situation and also with stress of like having no money and a lot
00:14:39
of things going on in your personal life so before long they started having what
00:14:44
one friend described as quote unquote Petty arguments over everything cool yay fun also three girls doesn't usually
00:14:54
work out yeah in my experience three is not the best number for friendships yeah with girls specifically
00:15:02
yeah I was going to say that I can speak from that point of view too like it's never that's a tough one it can work
00:15:09
like I'm not saying it never works but but it has the it has the more of a tendency to go AR ride because one
00:15:14
person ends up feeling left out a lot of times and like they say three is a crowd
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three is a crowd but fortunately in early October Ann managed to get her job back at the clinic and Ruth happily
00:15:25
moved out of the apartment and found her own place just a few blocks away in a letter to her fiance sent in late
00:15:31
September Anne wrote Ruth is leaving us in a few days it really hasn't worked out so well having the three of us we
00:15:37
are very fond of her and she's a sweet girl but three just seems to be a wrong number when one is used to living by
00:15:42
oneself and just one other very congenial one so when William was in town the four friends tended to
00:15:48
socialize as a group like I said they got along really well when he was away though the three friends all really
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young all very beautiful women were known to throw parties that were attended by by large numbers of
00:16:00
businessmen married and unmarried oh Scandal that is Scandal waiting to happen it sure is journalist Don dear uh
00:16:10
dearer I think it is said in this town at the time this is my favorite quote of this entire thing are you guys ready he
00:16:15
said I'm ready hanky was the name and Panky was the game shut the [ __ ] up I will never recover that's an amazing
00:16:23
quote it's my favorite quote I think in a case ever hanky was the name and Pinky was the game I feel like I see
00:16:32
some like old gum shoe like detective with a big old cigar hanging out of his mouth smoking standing on in like an
00:16:40
Alleyway with like a one beam of light coming down from a from a a street light yes and this fog rolling through he says
00:16:50
hanky was the gay what was it hanky was was the name and Pinky was the game wow it's my favorite thing ever love I love
00:16:58
that a lot I love it so much so among the more popular and uh more like regular of their party guests was uh
00:17:08
jack happy jack hollerin a they called him happy jack happy jack oh I saw a face there he might have been a douche I
00:17:15
don't really know oh no yeah he was a Phoenix area businessman he was in his 40s he lavished the three friends with
00:17:22
gifts he was just like you know Happy Jack just giving you gifts showing up at your party so he's like happy time Jack
00:17:30
yes kind more like that because in addition to being what one friend described as a quote about as prominent
00:17:36
of a man as you'd find in Phoenix in those days he was also married and a father of three children but that rarely
00:17:43
stopped him from spending his nights in the company of other women like aside from his wife yeah I
00:17:50
kind of got that idea yeah so unknown to an Sammy and William Ruth had actually met happy jack in early January and they
00:17:58
had had been carrying on a clandestine Affair since then wow yeah yeah things escalated quickly yeah apparently yeah
00:18:09
according to Jana bomersbach Ruth quote wanted to get pregnant by hollerin and he'd pledged to her that regardless of
00:18:15
his other flirtation she was the only one he wanted but despite what he told her Ruth
00:18:20
knew Jack had also been spending time with an and Sammy and he had been supplying their parties with alcohol so
00:18:26
she had reason to Dev to doubt his Devotion to her she also knew that he'd been giving uh an and Sammy some money
00:18:33
and she also was like seeing him flirt with them and other people at their party shamelessly yeah constantly and
00:18:41
while they may not have known the extent of Jack and Ruth's relationship Sammy and an definitely realized that she
00:18:46
captured a certain amount of his attention whenever they were together so basically everybody's just suspicious of
00:18:52
everybody at this point that makes sense yeah and when it came to Jack hin they all had reason to be jealous of each
00:18:58
other of course so it's a mess yeah that's I was going to say this is just a this is so messy and it escalates so
00:19:05
quickly like so quickly it usually does yeah on the night of October 16th 1931 Ann and Sammy called Ruth and they were
00:19:12
like hey um do you want to come over for dinner but since she had planned a date
00:19:17
with Jack she declined and said she just had lots of work to catch up on okay yeah then several hours passed and she
00:19:25
still hadn't heard from Jack who she was supposed to have a date with with so she
00:19:29
she's like pissed off she's annoyed she's irritated so rather than you know just stay at her apartment and wait for
00:19:35
him she was like no you know what I'm going to go take an and Sammy up on their invitation good for her yeah and
00:19:40
she figured that if Jack did end up showing up she would be sending the message that she wasn't the kind of girl
00:19:45
who was just going to sit around and wait for him no all the guys know it wouldn't be right to leave your best
00:19:50
girl home on a Saturday night what's that from The Beach Boys look listen to you listen to you so so she arrived at
00:19:59
Ann and Samy's apartment a little after 9:30 that night and she's like oh I finished all my work sooner than I
00:20:04
expected they're like okay and she's like yeah I just figured I would take you up on your invitation so they sat up
00:20:09
they had dinner together you know they're shooting the [ __ ] gossiping girls just being girls but since Ann and
00:20:16
Ruth had to work the next day they decided to call it a night a little before midnight they said by that time
00:20:21
the Charlie had stopped running though and Ruth would have had to walk home so they just like uh Sammy and an were like
00:20:28
no you shouldn't walk home in the middle of the night why don't you stay on the couch and she was like yeah that's
00:20:32
that's a good plan now what happened next has been a matter of debate for decades and even Ruth herself has given
00:20:40
various slightly different explanations like depending on when she tells the story so it's kind of unclear what what
00:20:46
exactly happened between the three of them okay in the statement that Ruth would give less than a week later she
00:20:51
claimed I had gone to their girls home to remonstrate with Miss Samuelson Sammy for some nasty things she said about
00:20:58
Miss Lee man miss Samuelson got a hold of a gun and shot me in the left hand I struggled
00:21:04
with her and the gun fell Miss Leroy grabbed an ironing board and started to strike me over the head with it in the
00:21:11
struggle I got hold of the gun and Sammy got shot Miss Leroy was still coming at
00:21:15
me with the ironing board and so I had to shoot her I told you it escalated quickly that
00:21:22
I feel like it just was like bam like just whoo yeah a gun is now involved in yeah in an ironing
00:21:29
Bo for some reason the notion of like bopping someone over the head with an ironing board sounds funny
00:21:38
in theory yes and then when you actually think about it you're like damn Hur like
00:21:43
that is gnarly so I'm like damn that would be scary cuz at first I was like that's a silly image of somebody like
00:21:49
bopping someone with an ironing board but then I'm like no that's a little scary actually cuz it's really just like
00:21:55
metal with like a it's not even like a cushion on top it's like a bored I think it's just like and it's like somebody's
00:22:01
like slamming you with an irony that's crazy yeah who knows if that really happened damn I know cuz there was
00:22:07
another version of the incident where Ruth said that she and Sammy got into a heated argument and Sammy had quote come
00:22:13
at her with a gun in the kitchen and then in order to defend herself Ruth said that she grabbed a bread knife off
00:22:19
the counter and stabbed Sammy holy [ __ ] and then she ended up shooting her while
00:22:23
they were both struggling on the floor for the gun and then she said and tried to break up the fight by hitting her
00:22:29
with the ironing board so that's why she shot her next well and here's the thing
00:22:33
the iron back to the ironing board you don't shoot someone that's coming at you with an ironing board you don't bring a
00:22:40
gun to an ironing board fight like you just don't welln that's wild Behavior like that's
00:22:47
reckless something in her I think just snapped it certainly seems that way and then cuz there's no justification here
00:22:56
that I'm seeing yeah and I don't mean like Snapped as like I don't know if she there ends up being like this whole
00:23:03
debate over whether she's insane like criminally or not yeah and I don't know that she is or isn't like when you find
00:23:11
could just be like Snapped as in like like the TV show Snapped yeah like she'd come to a point where she couldn't take
00:23:17
it anymore and she snapped not that she snapped from reality right exactly thank
00:23:21
you I don't know I'm interested to see what you think because things escalate even more from here to the point where
00:23:28
you're just like but it goes on for so long that you're like well it's not just a moment where where she snapped out of
00:23:36
reality for a second and like lost it right it feels like there's probably more that's going to happen here that
00:23:42
I'm going to be like um considering like a trunk is in the title yeah the trunk is coming up yeah yeah that's the thing
00:23:50
so so that she has her stories she has a couple different versions of them they're all pretty similar but there's
00:23:55
just like little aspects that change from time to time this State meanwhile would present a very different version
00:24:00
of events during trial in their version all three women were arguing over Jack hollerin and after Anne and Sammy had
00:24:07
gone to bed the prosecution claimed that Ruth snuck into their bedrooms and shot
00:24:11
each one of them in the head shooting Anne first That's cold blooded and then they said when Sammy heard the gunshot
00:24:18
she woke up and threw her hand out in a defensive gesture and that's why she had
00:24:22
a bullet hole in her hand that makes sense and they said that was quickly followed by the Fatal gunshot to her
00:24:28
head which would make sense cuz you get shot through the hand and then you're like reeling from getting shot in the
00:24:34
hand it leaves you vulnerable to exactly a shot in the head and you're sleeping in bed like You' just W already
00:24:39
vulnerable you know according to Ruth's biographer uh Jenna bomb bomersbach the most likely account of the murders is
00:24:46
kind of like an amalgamation of Ruth's version of events but with the inclusion of a few key details that she would
00:24:52
later describe in a letter she was going to send to her husband William because remember she's still married to William
00:24:57
I forgot about that yeah in the letter Ruth claimed that she did stay the night at an and Samy's apartment and then the
00:25:03
next day they were sitting in the living room and an argument broke out days before that Ruth had set jack up on a
00:25:10
date with a woman that she knew through the clinic but she knew that this woman had
00:25:15
syphilis so she was telling them that and whether the comment was made jokingly or out of jealousy Samy
00:25:22
threatened to tell Jack that Ruth had knowingly set him up with a woman who had syphilis and allegedly she told when
00:25:28
I tell them you associate with and introduce them to girls who have syphilis he won't have anything to do
00:25:33
with you damn so [ __ ] got like this got so that's all the only way you can describe it is just like [ __ ] messy
00:25:43
yeah like I'm looking at this and I'm like I would want to be a 100 miles away from this situation and if that's the
00:25:49
truth how [ __ ] up like you can't be doing that syphilis is a serious [ __ ] disease absolutely it is come on damn
00:25:57
and the thing is if Jack hollerin had found out about Ruth wanting to set him up with somebody that had syphilis out
00:26:03
of in like a vengeful Spirit you know well and not like not telling him not going to be a consensual yeah that would
00:26:10
be non-consensual if he didn't know and she was like and definit like she wasn't
00:26:16
going to tell him because this whole thing was like he had [ __ ] her over yeah so she was like haha so she was
00:26:21
like I'll you damn that is feels not proportionate agreed but yeah so if he had found out he would uh obviously
00:26:28
think pretty poorly of Ruth and their relationship and end things yeah which would jeopardize everything that she had
00:26:34
hoped for with her future with Jack so in a moment of anger Ruth said Sammy I'll shoot you if you tell that and in
00:26:40
response Sammy went into the other room returned with the gun and pointed it in a threatening gesture and reacting
00:26:46
without thinking Ruth grabbed the barrel of the gun and it went off bullet grazed
00:26:50
Ruth's hand and then the pain from the bullet wound and the shock from The Sound Of The Gunshot that sent Ruth out
00:26:57
of her chair she knocked Sammy to the ground grabbed that bread knife and stabbed her in the process and then she
00:27:04
managed to get the gun away from Sammy and quickly killed her two closest friends holy [ __ ] so this is like
00:27:09
another version of the events that may or may not be true there's like 16 up until this point there's I think there
00:27:15
might even be more damn bombers boach believes Ruth had planned to send because that all of what I just said was
00:27:22
those were details laid out in the letter that Ruth was planning to send to William and bomersbach believes that
00:27:27
Ruth planned to send this letter to her husband in order to explain what had happened and then she was possibly going
00:27:33
to take her own life but the letter never made it to William and would eventually be used against her in court
00:27:40
EK yeah bombers box said she would eventually tell this story many times all of them after she'd been convicted
00:27:46
of murder but she would always tell this same story so she told like all these different versions but then when she was
00:27:53
convicted that last one is the story that she stuck with and it's the one that she ped to her husband like right
00:27:59
after everything happened so I tend to believe this one out of all of them I could yeah that does make sense I I I
00:28:07
believe it to a degree yeah you know after shooting both women Ru and this is where it gets really dark just so
00:28:13
everybody knows uh Ruth moved each back into their beds cleaned up the best she could and then went to work for the day
00:28:20
oh just went to work yep and later that afternoon after she was finished with her shift she went back to the apartment
00:28:26
and in Samy's apartment and loaded both bodies into an's steamer trunk and had it moved from their apartment to her own
00:28:34
where she dismembered Samy's body placing her head torso and lower legs into the smaller shipping trunk and her
00:28:42
remaining body body parts went into a smaller suitcase and a hat box damn worried that she would be caught
00:28:49
and wanting to distance herself from the crime scene on the morning of October 18th she booked a ticket to California
00:28:55
on the Golden State limited which was a railroad that went from Phoenix to LA and she checked the trunks with the
00:29:02
baggage handlers at the station holy [ __ ] so she has two bodies dismembered in multiple Trunks and checks her
00:29:12
luggage which contains two dismembered bodies she is Wy Wy that is Wy that's a bold move the boldest one might say so
00:29:23
the next day the Golden State limited pulled into the station in La where the baggage handler HJ Maps noticed a strong
00:29:30
odor and saw quote what he believed to be blood leaking from one of these trunks so he goes and gets his
00:29:36
supervisor Arthur Anderson and he's like hey I think that this is just wild what he thought
00:29:43
was in there bleeding he said I think this trunk might have some Contraband meat in it I mean okay I don't know a
00:29:53
lot about like what people were smuggling throughout the country in the 19 1930s but I will tell you I didn't
00:30:00
know that there was Contraband meat I just love that that is the that's the first thought yeah I also
00:30:08
feel like that'd be a really good band name Contraband me we are Contraband me yeah that is a good band name when you
00:30:14
yell it you are right so Anderson set the luggage aside and was like oh you know what when like the owner gets off
00:30:19
the train we'll ask what the [ __ ] is going on here but when they found Ruth she just told them she didn't have the
00:30:25
keys but that she would quote phone her husband and have him bring them to the baggage station oh okay and they're like
00:30:31
yeah totally so you're just traveling with luggage that you don't have the keys to like that's interesting that
00:30:35
makes sense okay so they waited and she used the phone at the baggage counter to
00:30:40
make that call but she claimed she got no response and she said she'd have to drive downtown to locate her husband but
00:30:46
after slipping away into a crowd she jumped into a waiting car of her brother The Waiting car of her brother Burton
00:30:53
mckinnel and they just sped off leaving the bags there [ __ ] so she called her brother and was like you need to pick me
00:31:00
up in LA and he was sitting there waiting for her and she was able to get away holy [ __ ] and and left the bags
00:31:06
there and left the bag so concerned about the contents of these Trunks and their suspicious as [ __ ] owner Anderson
00:31:13
notified the LAPD and they forced the locks open on the trunks obviously of course revealing the horrific contents
00:31:21
inside in addition to the bodies contained within the trunks detectives also found the women's purses which
00:31:28
allowed them to identify both bodies as Sammy and Annie and an excuse me she just put their ident like just just put
00:31:35
an IDs with them just put their purses in there in case you need with their identification I was like why didn't you
00:31:41
just like I'm glad that you didn't but you why didn't you just leave their purses at home damn you really just gave
00:31:46
it to them cuz also that would have made it look like they had like disappeared exactly but I'm I'm glad you didn't I'm
00:31:51
glad she was so thoroughly thinking that yikes wow they also she put everything in these suitcases they also found the
00:31:58
spent shell casings from the 25 caliber pistol that was used to kill both women in their
00:32:05
purses like here's their IDs in the murder weapon essentially oh yeah the murder weapon as well oh the actual
00:32:12
murder weapon or like not the murder weapon but something that was used in the murder the green handled bread knife
00:32:17
that Ruth had stabbed Sammy with was also in the trunks wow the evidence inside was uh also covered in bloody
00:32:24
fingerprints which investigators assumed would probably be a match for the trunks
00:32:28
owner once she was located they were like you know what I'm going to go out on a limb and say yeah yeah going to say
00:32:34
as soon as we get her I feel like these fingerprints match most importantly though somebody had managed to write
00:32:40
down the license plate number of the car that Ruth had escaped in and a day later
00:32:44
her brother Burton was found and arrested but still no Ruthie damn in an interview with police Burton insisted he
00:32:52
didn't know where the hell his sister was and he didn't know anything about the bodies in the trunks he's like she
00:32:56
called me man I just just came I just came to pick her up he's like I'm just that [ __ ] sucker who has to pick
00:33:02
somebody up from the train station I'm that guy in the town who says whose C we take it I don't know anything about it
00:33:09
just I'll pick you up he said I don't know why she did it if she did it she must have been insane according to him
00:33:15
Ruth had met him on the college campus shortly after she arrived in California and asked him for a ride he said she
00:33:21
said she wanted me to pick up her trunks which she had brought from Phoenix Arizona and throw them in the ocean I
00:33:27
asked her why she wanted me to do such a strange thing but she got angry and said
00:33:31
the less I knew the better off I'd be baby um that's when you should I mean that is a police Moment Like that's when
00:33:39
you're when you somebody tells you please pick up those trunks and throw ran away from and throw them in the
00:33:46
ocean and when you say like why would why would I throw your trunks in the ocean and they say like it's probably
00:33:51
best that you not know a lot about it don't touch those trunks dude don't touch those trunks you got to you got
00:33:57
got to call someone you just wipe your hands in that situation you walk the other way you call someone and you say
00:34:03
they said it's the best the less I know the better yeah so I'm going to stay with that but I'm going to pass this on
00:34:07
to you exactly exactly but this poor guy he's like this is my sister I don't know
00:34:12
what the [ __ ] is going that's really hard like that's a [ __ ] position in I keep forgetting it's her actual brother
00:34:17
yeah exactly but still I mean I would do a lot of [ __ ] for you I'm not throwing
00:34:22
[ __ ] in the ocean for you I'm not throwing bodies in the ocean yeah and I'm I'm way too conspicuous yeah so true
00:34:27
after the bag of Chandlers at the station started questioning them about the contents of the trunks Burton said
00:34:33
he also became suspicious and insisted that they leave the station he said outside in the car I opened her valise
00:34:39
which I think is a is the trunk okay he said what I saw nearly made me faint nearly drove me nearly drove me insane
00:34:47
and he was referring to the portion of Samy's body that Ruth had put in the suitcase when it didn't fit in the trunk
00:34:53
oh my God so there was the trunks at the station and she has her suit but she has
00:34:58
her suitcase which has part of Sam's body part of Samy's body in the suitcase yes my jeez yeah he said I knew then
00:35:07
what was wrong why she acted so strange he claimed he drove her downtown and gave her $5 and then dropped her off in
00:35:14
the middle of like a very busy La Street and that was the last time he had seen her but he said I hope she gets away she
00:35:21
was forced to do it I know the poor kid damn that's some brother [ __ ] yeah like
00:35:27
wow so while the police combed the city looking for Ruth the Press had managed to gather a ton of information on the
00:35:33
victims the suspected killer and a number of friends and family members all in like a pretty short amount of time
00:35:39
like a surprisingly short amount of time well she wasn't really uh super careful
00:35:44
no she definitely wasn't but still I was like wow you guys got a lot but the most
00:35:48
significant finding was the letter that Ruth had supposedly written William after the murders where she disclosed
00:35:54
pretty much all the details of the crime as well as letters written by back and forth between Ruth and William based on
00:36:00
what little they had learned from investigators most press figured out that there was not only marital trouble
00:36:06
between Ruth and her husband but also they were like yeah we're pretty sure she was seeing another guy the Tucson
00:36:12
citizen among others reported that the County Attorney from Phoenix Lloyd Andrews speculated that quote a woman of
00:36:19
Mrs jud's stature could not have committed the slangs and packed the bodies into the trunk alone and
00:36:24
therefore she must have had an accomplice so now people are starting to think somebody did this with her he'd be
00:36:30
surprised he continued on it would be foolish considering all we have learned to go on the theory Mrs Jed alone was
00:36:36
responsible for these slayings she's a woman of slight build and it would have been impossible for her alone to have
00:36:42
handled these bodies there's little doubt a man was involved in the packing of the
00:36:47
trunks I mean you'd be surprised what you do in a desperate situation regardless of how big or small you are
00:36:56
right agreed so so in an attempt to distance his own self from this crime and from the innuendos and rumors
00:37:02
appearing in the press that she had some help William Jud reached out to her husband reached out to a reporter from
00:37:08
the LA Times to comment he said I wish the police would exceed to my wishes and permit me and her brother to start in
00:37:14
the hunt I believe that my wife would find me in some way and then we could start to unravel this appalling mystery
00:37:19
honestly good for William he's just like [ __ ] that he's like I have nothing to do
00:37:24
with this and actually I'd like to help you find her so we could figure find what the [ __ ] happened also be that way
00:37:31
he also refuted reports in the press that his marriage was in trouble or that he and Ruth had been experiencing any
00:37:36
Discord in the relationship he said my wife is the quiet refined type there's nothing vicious or criminal in her
00:37:42
makeup and we never quarreled except the usual spats between husband and wife I'm
00:37:47
like that's not necessarily true she moved all the way to Phoenix because things were so bad yeah and I forgot how
00:37:52
bad it was yeah yeah yeah I he didn't know about Jack it doesn't sound until yeah until he did know he did know but
00:38:00
but they did have issues yeah but when it came to whether Ruth had murdered Sammy and an he rejected the theory
00:38:06
entirely he said I know she's mixed up in it in in some way but she's too frail too small and too weak to have committed
00:38:12
these Deeds uned H she did commit spoiler alert she did she never named another accomplice don't discount just
00:38:22
based on how somebody's stature yeah they never found anything any evidence to that it was anybody else other than
00:38:30
her mhm so while the Press quickly built a strong case against Ruth and her unnamed accomplice hundreds of LAPD
00:38:36
officers were Fanning out across the city and what the LA Times were calling quote the greatest police hunt in the
00:38:42
history of the West damn which I love that was really intense yeah according to the times police searched a small
00:38:48
cabin owned by Burton mckinnel where they found quote two pieces of cream pie and four sandwiches had been brought
00:38:54
there two days earlier they said leading them to believe that the location was being used as some kind of Hideout I was
00:39:00
like or the guy just really likes pie and sandwiches I mean I'd be in trouble if that's what they're looking for I was
00:39:06
literally just going to say I'd be screwed I'm like you looking for snacks because uhoh because I got a lot of
00:39:12
those I'm in trouble but the cabin it went under heavy surveillance and Ruth never returned so he might have just
00:39:18
been a hungry guy he just like creep eyes or she might have been there at one point and he was like have a pie but
00:39:23
between the time the bodies were discovered at the train station and the day Ruth was arrested residents of Los
00:39:28
Angeles and readers around the country probably were terrified of some maniacal butcher running around on the loose and
00:39:35
possibly hunting for more victims yeah cuz you don't know what the what happened here no exactly and it's
00:39:41
remember this is in the 1930s so it's really hard for people to think that a woman could do this fathom this yeah
00:39:48
yeah even in 1960 what we when we talked about the barle case and Ruth was involved a different Ruth people were
00:39:55
like no way she's too pretty and she's a woman yeah exactly so people just couldn't believe it too pretty too
00:40:00
pretty and actually this Ruth was also pretty and it played into the case mhm so after Burton dropped Ruth off
00:40:08
downtown on the evening of the 19th she made her way to the Lavina sanitarium which she was previous she was familiar
00:40:15
with from a previous day to her surprise nobody stopped or questioned her when she walked in so she found an unoccupied
00:40:23
room and laid down on the bed later she said I went to bed there and I remember nothing else for 4
00:40:30
days I love that she was just able to Walt in there and just lay in a bed she just walked into a hospital and laid in
00:40:36
a bed for 4 days yeah like like okay hello we were doing okay I guess yeah I guess so on the morning of October 23rd
00:40:44
she left the sanitarium and placed a call to a doctor that she knew at another area sanitarium asking if he
00:40:51
would be able to mail the letter that she had written to William but the doctor was like no Ruth and I know that
00:40:57
they're looking for you you need to turn yourself in like I I'm not playing any part in this good for that doctor so
00:41:03
instead she walked around the city for a while until she overheard a woman reading an article from the paper and
00:41:08
she heard the woman say her husband wants her to call this number like they were talking about her wow this woman
00:41:14
yeah so she found a copy of the newspaper that the woman was reading and she called the number that William had
00:41:20
given to the reporters she said immediately I called that number and my husband answered in Spanish and told me
00:41:25
to me him meet him at the builtmore theater when they arrived she found her husband in the company of another man
00:41:31
and she found out that he was the attorney that William had hired to represent her damn so they both
00:41:36
convinced her to turn herself into the police and together they made arrangements for her to surrender at a
00:41:41
nearby funeral parlor interesting I'm not sure what the point of that was to make it really intense and Theatrical I
00:41:48
guess so and it was on the condition that she immediately be submitted for psychiatric evaluation smart yeah so a
00:41:55
little past 6 p.m. la P officers arrested Ruth at the Alvarez and Moore Funeral Home just a few blocks from the
00:42:01
Hall of Justice whatever condition she had put on her surrender were not honored and instead of being taken to a
00:42:08
local psychiatric hospital she was taken immediately to an interrogation room which makes sense where they were like
00:42:13
what the [ __ ] yeah they might not have thought she was insane at the time but most people were surprised by her
00:42:19
appearance when she was taken into custody they like I said like they're picturing like this maniacal butcher
00:42:25
like dangerous psychopath yeah but what they found was a very small frail woman who looked disheveled confused and in
00:42:33
real bad need of a shower and clean clothes I love that they're like and she stunk they were like she was smelly and
00:42:39
she looked like [ __ ] her hair looked a mess which also it didn't there's pictures of her surrendering she looks
00:42:46
[ __ ] great I was like well [ __ ] what what would anyone think of me on any given day I'm not even surrendering ever
00:42:53
capture me going to the local coffee shop and I'll look like I need to been on I've been on the lamb for it's
00:43:01
the yam it's the yam excuse I've been on the sweet potato for a few days exactly
00:43:06
but in her confession Ruth told the version of the story where she went to Sam Sammy and an's home to confront
00:43:12
Sammy about quote unquote some nasty things she had said about an and then a conflict escalated and she ended up
00:43:19
shooting both of them and with her face buried in her hand she just kept repeating I had to shoot her I had to
00:43:24
shoot her like she just kept saying it when the bodies were discovered at the train station though detectives and
00:43:31
District Attorneys the uh the District Attorney's Office had assumed that they had a pretty easy case before them as
00:43:37
long as they could capture the killer if even half of what the Press was reporting turned out to be true this
00:43:42
murder was motivated by jealousy and there was a grim evidence found in possession of the killer yeah but the
00:43:50
confession threw a wrench into their plans for like this open shut case because Ruth didn't deny killing Sammy
00:43:56
and Anne but she claimed that she had done it in self-defense yeah that's going to be a
00:44:01
problem for them yeah completely different from first-degree murder and in addition to that there was scratches
00:44:06
on her arms and face and the remember she had been shot in the hand as well so the Bullet had that it had literally
00:44:13
lodged in her hand and it had become uh gangrenous o so that suggested that oh [ __ ] may have been some truth
00:44:23
to would make me second guess if there's like ual wounds on her and she's claiming self-defense how do you get
00:44:32
away from that and especially back then too they you know I mean that's a pretty
00:44:35
good defense pretty good case so later that evening detectives got a hold of the letter that Ruth had planned to send
00:44:41
to William before tearing it up and leaving it behind in an empty store on the night that she arrived in California
00:44:47
I don't know how they were able to find us oh Jesus but the letter which Ruth denied she ever wrote contained a
00:44:53
description of the incident where they fought over Jack who claimed who Ruth claimed knew all about the murders oh no
00:45:00
which fueled the accomplice Theory yep the letter said it was horrible packing those things as I did it I kept saying
00:45:07
I've got to got to or I'll be hung I've got to go I've got to O in her statement
00:45:13
to the Press after her arrest she exclaimed I am not a fugitive from Justice and I am not a criminal I did
00:45:18
the only thing any decent woman would do um I fought for my life and I'm fighting
00:45:23
for it now because I am very ill ah I like to consider myself a decent woman and I don't think i' do any of that [ __ ]
00:45:33
this has got me second guessing cuz I'm like I don't know I I don't think I'd do
00:45:37
that maybe I don't want to call myself a decent woman decent I don't know I'm like you are in fact a criminal what a
00:45:43
thing to say yep I did what any decent woman would do we all say huh what no no not me I don't she doesn't speak for us
00:45:52
I think you could have done a lot better things I I just met with the Coalition of decent women and they they agree she
00:45:57
does not speak for us they said no they said no said she's always trying to get herself in this club no no no we keep
00:46:04
saying no thanks now despite her efforts to fight extradition she was returned to
00:46:09
Phoenix on October 30th where nearly 3,000 people were waiting to catch a glimpse of what the Press had named the
00:46:16
trunk murderous damn later that day County attorney Andrews announced to the press that he intended to bring the case
00:46:22
to trial quickly and he had every intention of pursuing the death penalty he told the reporters he was willing to
00:46:28
try Ruth separately for each murder and he continued by saying thus if she has acquitted on a charge of murdering one
00:46:34
of the women she will then be tried on the other charge who so he meant business he was like you're not getting
00:46:40
out of this yeah no and it turned out that he was true to his word not long after she got back to Phoenix Ruth was
00:46:45
indicted for the murders and a trial date was set for January in the meantime the press and the Phoenix police
00:46:51
continued digging into Ruth's story looking into her personal life they were just determined to figure out
00:46:57
which version of the murder was the accurate one Ruth took some advice from her lawyer though and uh decided to stop
00:47:05
speaking to the press and the police since she was arrested and instead she insisted that she acted alone in the
00:47:11
murders and the dismemberment of Sammy and an now some of the comments that she made previously though only strengthened
00:47:19
speculation that she had an accomplice in either one or both of these acts in late November she finally sat down with
00:47:26
a psychiatrist Dr Joseph Katon and for the first time she spoke on record about happy jack there according to K quote
00:47:34
she showed scorn for Jack hollerin stating that he was acting as do the rest of men he had forsaken her he would
00:47:40
not raise a finger to help her even though she may be hanged damn so she was making it sound like he had helped her
00:47:48
in some way but he was going to let her take the wrap for he was going to let her hang for it yeah wow years later it
00:47:54
would become clear that since her arrest she had been covering up for two men but
00:47:59
not for the reasons that most people expected knowing that she'd be arrested she concocted the first story about
00:48:05
confronting Sammy over the nasty things that she said about an this was intended
00:48:10
to cover up her affair with Jack hollerin which she figured would destroy his reputation and devastate her own
00:48:16
husband yeah I wondered if that was the reason for that one yeah that's why she had lied in her interviews with Dr Kat
00:48:23
and Ruth explained that there never would have been a case against her if it hadn't been for hollerin though she felt
00:48:28
that if she hadn't engaged in this affair with howerin that there would never have been an argument with her
00:48:33
friends and nobody would have ever ended up dead wow that's so [ __ ] up so that
00:48:37
was the role he played he didn't help her it was just that because of the affair yes they got in this fight and if
00:48:44
it was never happened in the first place they wouldn't be fighting over this thing and it never would have escalated
00:48:49
exactly it all came down to jealousy and like really cattiness so it's like he didn't do anything except for have an
00:48:55
affair with this yeah he was just like a shitty dude yeah you know uh this Revelation didn't change the outcome for
00:49:01
Sammy and Anne though but it did offer some explanations as to why her story had changed several times depending on
00:49:06
who she was talking to if Ruth believed that Jack had abandoned her in November though she had completely changed her
00:49:12
opinion by mid January just before her trial was about to begin she told Dr katton Jack hollerin still loves me and
00:49:19
always has oh no she was completely certain that he was going to come through with her in his defense no or in
00:49:25
her defense excuse excuse me when Katon asked why she had such a big change of heart she said he has sent word to me in
00:49:32
jail here that he still loves me and that makes things different he would come up to see me if he could but you
00:49:38
know as well as I do he can't do that because there's a warrant out for his arrest
00:49:43
wow it was clear to Dr katton that Ruth had fallen for whatever Jack hollerin had told her y uh there was no warrant
00:49:51
out for his arrest I didn't think so and whatever he told her was probably just an excuse to keep distance between
00:49:57
himself and her oh man yeah but on the verge of trial she remained committed to the idea that should things not go in
00:50:04
her favor Jack would come to her rescue he would offer some kind of testimony that would explain everything and she
00:50:10
would be acquitted which is really sad yeah that's that's some serious dulu that's the thing like I don't think
00:50:19
she's criminally insane but I definitely think she's a very mentally ill woman there's something off here that kind of
00:50:26
delusion is you can understand it to a point but then it comes to like there's more here
00:50:32
yeah I don't know what it is but there's more here it feels like that's the thing
00:50:36
exactly so the trial began on January 21st 1932 in Phoenix Arizona in his opening statement Lloyd Andrews laid out
00:50:44
the state's case for the jury according to him Ruth's jealousy and fears over losing her lover Jack and her husband
00:50:50
had motivated her to murder the only two people who knew the truth about her relationship with Jack Hollin or at the
00:50:57
very least suspected it on the night of the murder she got to her friend's home around 10:30 after the two had gone to
00:51:03
sleep she snuck into the room and after quickly entering the bedroom she pressed
00:51:07
the revolver to an's head and pulled the trigger killing her immediately the sound of The Gunshot they said woke Samy
00:51:13
who threw up a hand either in protest or protection which explained how she got that gunshot wound through her hand and
00:51:19
then after shooting her in the hand she Ruth pointed the gun at her head and killed her instantly yeah or uh Andrews
00:51:27
argued that this was supported by the statements taken from the girls neighbors who recalled hearing gunshots
00:51:33
right around 10:30 p.m. but when they looked out the window Sammy and Ann's home seemed like it was dark and quiet
00:51:39
so they didn't really think anything yeah and it was also supported by the so-called drain letter where Ruth
00:51:45
confessed the murder to her husband with just slightly different details while the accuracy of the details were in
00:51:52
question a handwriting analysis did confirm that the handwriting matched ru and that she had written the letter now
00:52:00
among the first Witnesses called by the prosecution was Dr Katon who was there to testify on Ruth's sanity or lack
00:52:07
thereof however before he even reached the witness stand Ruth started shouting at him and demanding that he leave the
00:52:14
room oh she screamed get out of here I won't have you near me seemingly angry that Dr katton had made statements about
00:52:21
her to the prosecutor and the Press she jumped out of her chair and continued on
00:52:26
saying you talked about me I won't have it you stay away from me what in the middle of her trial the middle of her
00:52:32
trial which again I feel like there's something there cuz it didn't seem like she was
00:52:37
acting like like this is over-the-top behavior but it didn't seem like it was like a farce you know like it was
00:52:43
actually like genuinely happening yeah so and that's the thing because Dr Katen was like startled by her Outburst so he
00:52:50
left the room to collect himself and he came back a short time later uh through a different entrance this time smart
00:52:56
eventually he did provide testimony on behalf of the prosecution and he told the court that in his opinion she was
00:53:03
sane damn which is wild her emotional Outburst was exactly the type of courtroom Antics that so many spectat
00:53:11
Spectators had hoped to see and expect everyone showed up for exactly but more than that everyone was very very eager
00:53:19
to hear from Jack halin oh I would be he had been subpoena so and people knew that they were ready they wanted to hear
00:53:25
what this man had to say yeah so he was waiting in the anti chamber waiting to be called and he and
00:53:31
likely everyone else was surprised his name was never called in court that day or any other what when asked why he
00:53:39
never called howerin to testify Andrew said I guess I must have overlooked him he's my witness I'll admit that I'm what
00:53:48
he just never called him he's like a star witness and he's like oh [ __ ] he's a star witness and I love that he's like
00:53:54
I will admit he is my my witness like thank you for admitting that like I don't know if you should admit that
00:54:01
yikes what I must have overlooked him yeah he overlooked him the truth was though that Jack really didn't have
00:54:10
anything to offer the prosecution and his presence in the courtroom really would have only added to the chaos and
00:54:16
that is very true and I was thinking that like I'm I'm shocked that like he's using the I must have overlooked him and
00:54:22
not just said like he would have caused a a scene a scene and we just didn't need any more scenes in that courtroom I
00:54:29
think that's way more the answer and I think he just maybe didn't want to I honestly now that I'm thinking about it
00:54:36
I feel like the prosecutor didn't want to say that because if he says he's trying to avoid a scene it makes it seem
00:54:42
like he is doubtful that she's has something to say that could blow him up you know exactly and I almost wonder
00:54:50
like cuz we don't have like actual You Know audio of him doing it I wonder now that I'm looking at it if he was just
00:54:57
like yeah crazy must have overlooked him just like shrugging his shoulders like he's my witness I'll admit to that like
00:55:05
just kind of like that like wink wink nudge nudge like tongue and cheek kind of thing I bet that's what it was more
00:55:10
than anything I think so that makes more sense yeah that's the thing they like there was really no point in calling him
00:55:16
because really the states case against Ruth Jud wasn't just backed up by the evidence they collected it was also
00:55:22
supported by her multiple multiple multiple confessions regardless how one varied from the other she always killed
00:55:28
the women yeah and that fact was not lost on Ruth Jud who saw how things were going and was definitely starting to
00:55:35
worry that she was going to be found guilty and sentenced to hang on January 26th just a few days into the trial
00:55:42
during a recess she broke away from the jail matron guard and fled into the Hall
00:55:47
trying to make an escape and she called out to her brother as she was running by
00:55:52
get my lawyer Sheriff MC mcfaden is telling the witnesses what to say just like running by she's just like hey uh
00:55:59
get my dry cleaning and call my lawyers like she's just like throwing out to do list to be she's like the sheriff is
00:56:05
trying to [ __ ] me over I got to get out of here Fu this it doesn't sound real no
00:56:10
uh she was quickly captured because they're literally in a [ __ ] Courthouse yeah and she was returned to
00:56:16
the courtroom where trial resumed after a very short break wow and this was just
00:56:20
a small disruption in the grand scheme of things which is wild that like the person on trial trying to escape with a
00:56:26
small small little bump they're like oop sorry about that there also weren't really any immediate consequences like
00:56:33
yeah they were just like sit down pretty much yeah but it was part of an emerging
00:56:37
pattern of very highly emotional and very disruptive behavior from Ruth that would continue well beyond the trial to
00:56:44
that point Ruth's mother testified that her daughter was quote a woman under mental strain who struck when be when
00:56:49
best friends turned on her okay so she's like I mean that happens sometimes we've
00:56:56
all had that happen right and like that's not an it's not a proportionate response yeah I lost a whole friend
00:57:02
group I never I never lost it like cucko nuts oh yeah you know I had a best friend turn on me in like Middle School
00:57:09
yeah exactly you know Junior High you don't you don't do this about it you don't do this about it yeah yeah I mean
00:57:15
nice that her mom came to her defense but I mean yeah it's your mom I think I would have kept quiet on that one I'm
00:57:19
not a mom though so I don't know yeah when it came time for the defense her attorney Paul shank invoked the
00:57:25
irresistible impulse Doctrine what a Doctrine he argued that while she may have confessed to the crime Ruth was not
00:57:31
sane at the time and thus unaware of the consequences of her actions an irresistible impulse Doctrine
00:57:40
sounds spicy it does you know yeah another good band name irresistible impulse yes yeah and even add Doctrine
00:57:48
onto it it would be a really cool like emo band I like that like pop punk emo band if you're talented do that do it I
00:57:56
like that uh but unfortunately the testimony from Dr katton and another state psychiatrist Dr Paul Bowers
00:58:03
refuted shank's claim yeah according to Bowers quote regardless of testified delusions and hallucinations and a
00:58:09
strain uh and a strain of insanity in her ancestry it was his opinion that Ruth was in fact quite sane he said I
00:58:17
think she was trying to fool me she did not display any demented actions and he went on to explain that rather than show
00:58:23
no awareness of the consequences Ruth had actually gone out of her way not only to conceal her crimes but to
00:58:29
conceal her Affair from her husband that's the part that really that's why she me with the sanity thing is she had
00:58:36
so much like a a forethought here like she had so much like she wanted to cover up several things yeah exactly she part
00:58:46
of this was the affair in covering it up like that shows that she's thinking of the future and rationally mhm exactly
00:58:54
when shank asked whether the dismember of another human being was not a sign of psychosis Bowers replied quote that was
00:59:00
exactly the best thing for her to do if she wanted to get away with it that's the thing I feel like we're we're very
00:59:06
like conditioned to immediately assume like well if you dismember someone you have to be psychotic which is a normal
00:59:11
reaction very normal reaction cuz you're like that's psychotic I can't put my brain there like who would do that but a
00:59:18
sane person who is choosing to get rid of a problem M will do Unthinkable things anything just to get away from
00:59:27
things and it's not psychotic it's just Unthinkable that's the thing it's like that's where you have to put your it's
00:59:34
just Unthinkable exactly it's good you can't put your brain there that's the best way to psychotic that's the best
00:59:39
way to to say it on February 7th both sides rested and they gave their closing arguments with Andrews reminding the
00:59:46
jury of the complete wealth of evidence they had against Ruth and making yet another push for the death penalty Paul
00:59:53
shank on the other hand spent his sick 6 hour closing I don't understand those statements because you talk at me for 6
01:00:03
hours and I'm going to say you lose just based on principle how do you don't talk
01:00:08
at me for 6 hours how does one do that no you don't to lecture for 6 hours is impressive but no also that's not cruel
01:00:19
and unusual yeah exactly for the people who have to sit there and listen yeah but he spent his 6-hour closing
01:00:24
sarcastically attempting to undermine the critical testimony of the psychiatrist and he heavily implied that
01:00:29
even if she was lying to either of the state psychiatrists that was a symptom of mental illness in and of itself which
01:00:36
ultimately supported their case of insanity no it didn't if she was lying to the psychiatrist that shows that she
01:00:42
even more so is trying to get out of everything and would show more for her sanity exactly like I'm sorry did you
01:00:49
run this by anyone first me thinks no one near you be like that's actually not at all what that means he like you're
01:00:57
going to sound dumb when I was reading this I said to myself Paul shank doesn't have a Raymond no like Rusty had a
01:01:03
Raymond in you need a Raymond Presumed Innocent it's a great show you guys got to watch it yeah but in closing he quote
01:01:10
begged that she be not sent to the Gallows or to a felon cell but treated as a sick woman and committed to an
01:01:16
asylum before retiring for deliberation judge Howard Speakman instructed the jury of their opinion to or sorry their
01:01:24
option to return one of six verdicts they could do Dam guilty of first it's a lot I know guilty of first deegree
01:01:31
murder with death penalty guilty of first-degree murder with life imprisonment guilty of second degree
01:01:37
murder manslaughter not guilty or Not Guilty by reason of insanity okay so the jury deliberated for nearly two days
01:01:45
before finally finding Ruth Jud guilty of first deegree murder I didn't do it which so I'm not sure I understand that
01:01:53
correctly because first-degree murder aren't you supposed to like she snapped in the moment so that's not premeditated
01:02:00
and don't you have to have premeditation for first-degree murder that is interesting cuz I would more think of
01:02:05
this as second deegree murder me too because it it seems like it was in the I I would 100% convict of second degree
01:02:12
murder me too I would have I think I would have trouble with first degree because I don't think this was planned
01:02:17
she didn't go there with a gun the gun was there yeah she didn't go there with the trunks she went to work and had to
01:02:23
get the trunks you know what I mean yeah I wonder if it has to do and I'm not sure if that's what it is if it has to
01:02:30
do with all the steps after like the cover up and everything all the coverups and all like and going to work while
01:02:36
they're just like laying in their beds yeah that is I feel like that maybe all that played into it a little bit but I
01:02:42
agree that I would more likely thought I was going to see a second degree murder
01:02:46
that's what I thought too I'm glad you felt the same cuz I was like am I just not understanding this right somebody
01:02:51
who understands it better let us know yeah uh but when the verdict was read Ruth showed no emotion she gave no
01:02:56
response she simply bandaged and unbandaged her left hand obsessively while she listened to the jury Foreman
01:03:03
speak yeah so on February 24th she was back in court for her formal sentencing her lawyer motions for a new trial had
01:03:10
all been denied and when she asked well when she was asked whether she had anything to say for herself she
01:03:16
attempted to tell a quote rambling story and to charge an insufficiency in the states proof but she was ultimately
01:03:23
overruled by judge Speakman and in response she shouted those women were not murdered and then stood defiantly
01:03:29
behind the the defense table as the judge read her death sentence out loud for the court setting an execution date
01:03:35
for May 11th 1932 those women were not murdered I'm like yes they were like come on yes they
01:03:42
were also there might be some states where that was not required PR premeditation for degree murder and I
01:03:51
was just looking at it up the fact that it was uh what 19 yeah 31 32 yeah yeah that makes sense so I think things have
01:04:01
since changed oh okay thank you for looking that up no problem but Ruth ex uh execution date was put on hold
01:04:08
petting an appeal to the Supreme Court of Arizona but after hearing her case they upheld the lower Court's ruling
01:04:14
they said the evidence particularly the letter she had written to William quote conclusively refutes any argument of
01:04:20
insanity yeah despite their decision she was deemed mentally ill just 72 2 hours
01:04:26
before her execution date and was moved from the prison uh from the prison that she was staying in to the Arizona State
01:04:33
Hospital for the insane where she remained quote under sentenced to be hanged if she ever recovered her
01:04:38
sanity in the 12 years that followed she was there 12 years she escaped a total of six times holy [ __ ] in one attempt it
01:04:48
is believ that she had outside help but every time she managed to escape she was
01:04:52
recaptured and returned to the hospital six times single time holy [ __ ] after 20
01:04:57
years in the state hospital she petitioned the State Board of Pardons and paroles to have her senten uh
01:05:03
commuted to life in prison and on May 5th 1952 her commutation was approved with the provision that if she was ever
01:05:10
deemed sane she'd be moved to the state prison in Florence oh okay in 1962 she made her seventh holy [ __ ] and arguably
01:05:19
most successful escape from the hospital this time she traveled to California where she found work as a domestic
01:05:25
worker what and stayed out for 7 years stop before being recaptured in 1969 she just went out there and found a
01:05:35
job she in California wow like hello what wow so nearly so they found her they put her back in jail in prison and
01:05:44
then nearly 20 years after her commutation she was granted Parole in late 1969 assuring the state uh State
01:05:51
parole board that she would quote live as quietly as I can upon her release she returned to the home of Dr John blemer
01:05:58
and his wife who she had been living with after like during that last Escape jeez Dr blumber died in 1982 and she
01:06:05
sued his wife for $48 million claiming that she'd never been paid any wages for her work while she
01:06:13
was there and had essentially been kept as an indentured servant for 11 years the court agreed with her and she was
01:06:21
awarded a $225,500 cash settlement from the doctor's estate I am speechless Yep this woman she is
01:06:34
something wow after that lawsuit which uh was in 1982 if I didn't say she faded Into Obscurity lived out the rest of her
01:06:43
life in Phoenix Arizona and October 23rd 1998 Winnie Ruth Jud died from natural causes at the age of 93 years old 1998
01:06:56
1998 and while she spent most of her life associated with one of the most notorious cases completely shrouded in
01:07:04
mystery and controversy many people still believe the jury and American people were biased by all the Sens
01:07:10
Sensational coverage of the story huh according to attorney Larry uh debus who represented Ruth in the 1960s he said if
01:07:18
the body hadn't been cut up this would have been just another homicide and nobody ever would have heard of Winnie
01:07:23
Ruth Jud which I agree with but but all but also the bodies were cut up yep um so so like that's a nice thought but
01:07:33
were that if they weren't but like but they were she did dismember a body yeah so and even still that's fun to talk
01:07:42
about that like if she didn't but she did if she shot two of her friends and then went to trial I feel like it still
01:07:48
would I don't think it would have as Sensational no because the it is the it's the trunk of it all I mean that
01:07:56
that what a weird thing to posture like it's just like if she didn't dismember this person nobody would know about her
01:08:04
and it's like correct yep what else do you have very cast and obvious yeah like it's like what
01:08:12
yeah yeah Larry debus there I don't know that's like if somebody gets in a car accident you're like if this car did not
01:08:20
exist you wouldn't have you wouldn't have been in this accident it's like yep thank you but it does and I did so like
01:08:27
I don't understand how that helps anybody it was a weird statement to make that's saying anything it yeah it's not
01:08:33
if Jeffrey dmer did not kill people you would not know who he was yep correct true true so much for pointing that out
01:08:42
cuz he did so that's why what that's just so weird it's a hot take what a hot take trly a hot the hottest take but
01:08:50
absolutely wild that she W escaped seven times and one time seven times was out for 7 years and then when she did get
01:08:58
out she just went and worked for this family who wasn't paying her I guess yeah cuz like there was proof that they
01:09:05
weren and then she got the money and the fact that she lived until 1998 like I was alive when she died she
01:09:12
was old yeah she 93 yeah she lived to be old which is not really I know fair I'm
01:09:20
Dam there's some people who die much younger and it's like and they I mean didn't dismember their friends and them
01:09:26
into a trunk like the people that you killed didn't really get to live that long true cuz you killed them holy [ __ ]
01:09:31
Winnie Ruth J kind of saying like what that guy said they didn't get to live that long yeah and it's like cuz you
01:09:36
killed them correct oh so yeah what a case damn the trunk murderous the trunk murderous what
01:09:44
a case we hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird but not so weird
01:09:50
that you have an affair on your husband with a guy named Happy Jack and Hanky is
01:09:53
the name and py is the game and kill your friends and dismember them I don't ever think you should keep it that
01:09:58
weird thanks thank you pinky pinky was the name and pink it was the game [Music]
01:10:25
[Music]