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00:01:32
Hello and welcome to Rewind with Karen and Georgia. Is that a lot of spice? Rewind.
00:01:47
Rewind. This is our Wednesday episode, our new Wednesday episode, where we recap our old shows with new commentary,
00:01:55
updates, and potentially retractions if necessary. I think this one is necessary.
00:02:01
Also, happy New Year's Day if you're listening on the day that this comes out. It's 2024.
00:02:06
It's 2024 now. Five. Five for you. Five. Okay. Yeah. I get time. This has been done in the past.
00:02:14
I can't believe it. Before you start your new year, which is going to be incredible, by the way.
00:02:20
What a year it's going to be for you. It's going to be. But before we go into the future, let's let us drag you into the past.
00:02:31
Oh, yes, that's right. Line. Because today we are recapping episode 26, Little Babies.
00:02:40
And we named it 2666 because, of course, we did. Punk rock. Yeah. and it came out originally on Thursday, July 21st, 2016.
00:02:51
I just want to say July 21st in mid to late July in Los Angeles is a pretty warm time.
00:02:57
Yeah. We were still in your apartment with no air conditioning. That's correct. I'm not saying that to you accusatorially.
00:03:03
No, I love it. It's my roots. I mean, but that's all I can think of when I think of like these,
00:03:08
when I look at these and I'm like, oh yeah, that's right. And then I'm like, I was having a great time and sweating my ass off.
00:03:14
We were sweating. I was wearing tiny clothes. We were, we talk about in the beginning of this,
00:03:18
like the worry that more fireworks are going to happen. Oh, yes. Because that's Los Angeles,
00:03:23
the first, like couple weeks before the 4th of July and a couple weeks after in Los Angeles.
00:03:28
It's just constant fireworks. Fireworks in the, a tinderbox of a city. That's just like
00:03:34
dry wood-based insanity. And we were so traumatized by the week before. That's right.
00:03:40
When we had those. Where someone said they almost got in a car accident because they
00:03:44
heard the fireworks from the week before and drove off the road. I thought it was happening
00:03:49
in there. I thought they were being shot at. We must be careful when we listen to podcasts
00:03:53
on the road. We have more power than we realize. And it feels great. Doesn't it though? Here in
00:03:59
2025. Okay. Are you ready? It's the Rewind episode. Now we all get to be day one listeners.
00:04:05
So let's listen to the intro of episode 26. let's start now let's start right now let's start right now fireworks baby you're a firework
00:04:20
whole building collapses someone's on some social media site said that they almost got in a car
00:04:27
accident when they heard the firework because they thought it was a gunshot oh no i know sorry
00:04:33
We were just as scared as you were. We were more scared because as loud as it was on the podcast, it was fucking 15 times
00:04:41
louder in real life. Yeah. You're fine. Sorry. It was very, very scary. Surprising.
00:04:50
And to me, funny. It's hilarious. It keeps happening, though. So it might happen again tonight.
00:04:56
And what is it? September? I mean, how much longer? I don't know. so prepare yourself and your dogs because i'm sure people some people has they're like thunder
00:05:07
jackets off but i tried to put a thunder shirt on george one time yeah and when i came home it was
00:05:14
eaten yes it was like ripped to shreds and parts were gone i know i know that well she's like no i
00:05:20
put a cat a collar on my cat once and came back and it was like here's what i think of it yeah
00:05:25
get fuck yourself get fuck i mean i wouldn't want a fucking collar i mean i guess i did when i was
00:05:29
14 and thought I was punk I work I mean that was the 90s right it was wasn't it there it was all
00:05:34
about cat collars and shit back then yeah punk fake punk rock totally I still have mine it still
00:05:41
smells like like um Victoria's Secret uh apple spray apple body spray no oh no you mean sorrow
00:05:50
yeah yep it still smells like ecstasy yeah uh hey how are you how was your week what going on Hi um I just been working Oh this is my favorite murder Oh guys listen
00:06:05
I mean, I figure if you press play on this, you probably know that. Uh, if you're one of those rando people that just goes through iTunes and picks different podcasts and hits play.
00:06:16
No one's ever done that, right? No, I seriously doubt it. But welcome if you're that one person and you're the lone wolf.
00:06:23
Hi. and if you're new to this I'm Georgia that's Karen I'm Karen this this is my voice Karen was
00:06:31
the one singing I do that because it's my passion it's her passion and she's good at it and I'm not
00:06:38
I disagree that I'm bad at that I'm bad you disagree that you're good at it I disagree that
00:06:45
you're bad at it thank you because I've heard you do it jokingly and it's not bad oh yeah it's not
00:06:51
I guess the secret is not to try or care or care. Yeah, that's true. Here's a good segue into
00:06:58
the presents we just got. I'm holding a cold beer to the stab wound that I gave myself.
00:07:05
Okay. Can I just explain this very quickly? So we had Georgia has a little pile of presents
00:07:10
waiting for me when I got home to her apartment from work. No, this isn't my home. And it was like,
00:07:15
I waited for you so we can open these up. We wanted to open them off air so it wouldn't take
00:07:19
forever. And one of them I opened to because Georgia was slightly afraid they could be a bomb
00:07:27
or something dangerous. Karen's face. So I'll go. I was like, I'll go ahead and take the hit.
00:07:32
I mean, you're off camera talent. I can have the eye patch. All you need are your is your brain.
00:07:39
And I would love for my teeth to be blown out so I can get some awesome veneers. Anyhow. Yeah.
00:07:44
So I did the first two and Georgia was like, I said, she picked up the third one and I said, do you want me to open that?
00:07:50
And she was like, I can do it. I'm not that insane or whatever it was you said. And then she went to open it and stabbed herself in the bare leg with a pair of scissors.
00:08:01
And it, I have to tell you, as painful as I'm sure it is, it's also hilarious. It's one of those things, and this happens to me a lot, where I'm glad it happened because it's worth it.
00:08:10
Like I run into stuff all the time and like do dumb shit. And I'm like, I'm so glad that that happened.
00:08:16
Yes. That's humor and life. Instead of just when you look down and have a rando.
00:08:22
That's the second time I said that word and I've never really said it before at all.
00:08:26
What's going on? What teen boy am I trying to impress? When you look down and there's just a huge bruise for no reason.
00:08:35
Where you're just like, does this mean I have blood cancer? Yeah. Why? The majority of my bruises I don't remember getting and it's not because I'm constantly drunk.
00:08:43
I'm not. You're not. And I and I mean, when I'm drunk, I'm smooth as shit, too. Like, I'm good.
00:08:48
I'm much better in person when I'm drunk. When you're drunk, what I notice is that you seem to just enjoy every single thing that goes on.
00:08:55
Yeah. You just have a big smile on your face and you think everything's kind of funny and like enjoyable.
00:09:00
It seems like. Yeah. I like, um, I think I like understand moments so much better and understand people and get,
00:09:08
get life better. Yeah. Which is like so unhealthy, but I think maybe I'm not anxious.
00:09:16
Maybe that's it. Maybe I'm amused and not anxious. Deep down under underneath when you use beer to uncover your true personality.
00:09:23
Well, we got some, Oh my God. Amazing. Yes. We just had it like a baby July Christmas.
00:09:30
What was that? Someone slamming the door, but it sounded like a gun. That sounded like a half firework to me.
00:09:37
Yeah, it did. All right. Let me start. We got a beautiful card that's the sparkliest thing.
00:09:43
It's gorgeous. With a really funny, cute joke on the front and really great printing inside.
00:09:50
Beautiful printing. The kind of printing I wish I could do, but I don't understand why that looks the way it does.
00:09:55
I might do this. I might trace over the handwriting later. It's so satisfying. Have you ever tried that?
00:10:01
I've never done it. It's from this card is from Emily and she just said a bunch of lovely things.
00:10:07
And it was it's basically a thank you card for our podcast, which is the cutest thing of all time.
00:10:11
She was raised well. Girl. And she likes a card. We'd like to thank her parents for this card.
00:10:18
Mr. and Mrs. Emily's parents. Right. Move on to the next one. Then we got from Candace.
00:10:25
She sent us this really fucking rad. She's going to start doing murder zines. And the first one is the murder scene is called the Matilda effect.
00:10:35
And the first one is about Francis Glessner Lee. There's there are women in science scenes.
00:10:41
Oh, I thought they were murder. No, they're women in science. Women in science scenes.
00:10:44
Sorry. But the first one is about a woman who did she want to be a cop? Did that card say she wanted to be a scientist?
00:10:55
She wanted to be. She's basically, if you guys have seen the documentary, The Nutshell Studies, where this woman way back when really wanted to be a doctor or a nurse.
00:11:05
And she wasn't allowed to because of her family. I think she was a rich, I think she was from a wealthy family.
00:11:09
So instead she started to make detailed miniature models of composite crime scenes.
00:11:14
So she just made miniature crime scenes so that cops could study them without screwing up the crime scene.
00:11:18
And she's just had this huge effect on crime scene procedure. and she's incredible.
00:11:26
I love Candice. You can get these at SmutPunks. It's S-M-U-T-P-U-N-X.com and she's going to make,
00:11:35
she makes other buttons and stuff and she just makes shit. And I haven't seen a fucking zine
00:11:39
in real life in so long. I know. Did you ever make a zine? No, I never did. I made a zine for,
00:11:43
it's like a tribute to Ray Bradbury and D-Light. Combined? Yeah. Wow. Because those are the two things you liked.
00:11:50
That's what I liked when I was 16. So seeing a zine is like exciting. It very cool And I think you should I think we should all support zines You know what I did was I just assumed that Candace made a zine for all the things I like instead of what she interested in women in science
00:12:06
This was, yeah, it was, it was specifically for me. Well, it is a true crime subject.
00:12:12
Yes. So. And so fascinating. If you get, it's called the nutshell, what's the documentary called?
00:12:18
The Nutshell Studies. You got to watch it. Yeah. She's, it's great. Candace. Fascinating.
00:12:23
Thank you. Thank you so much. Please keep remaining to be a badass. Then we got this amazing puzzle from Holly.
00:12:33
She said, Karen and Georgia, thanks so much for sharing your favorite murders. I made a puzzle about mine.
00:12:39
Thought you might like it. Like it? Yeah. We fucking lost our minds. I'm so excited.
00:12:44
I kind of begged Karen for it. It's a 3D puzzle of H.H. Holmes murder castle in Chicago, which is the best thing of all time.
00:12:55
So I think everybody probably knows, but if you're, if you just started liking true crime,
00:13:01
HH Holmes, I think they're going to make the Devil in the White City movie with Leo DiCaprio.
00:13:06
And you can get this at, where can you get her? The puzzle? Yeah, wait, wait, wait.
00:13:12
Okay. You can get hollycarden.com. So it's H-O-L-L-Y-C-A-R-D-E-N. And I think she's going to start just making true crime puzzles.
00:13:23
That's amazing. I cannot wait to make this. I'll take photos. It's very cool. So anyway, she started off with H.H. Holmes Murder Castle, which you can watch the movie.
00:13:33
It's the best story ever. If you get creeped out by premeditated planned psycho murder, this is the story for you.
00:13:41
And I would do it, but they did it on last podcast on the left. I know. I am not.
00:13:46
It's been done a lot. It's been done a lot. And it's very well known. And a movie is going to come out.
00:13:50
Yeah. So we let we let we it got taken care of. Yeah. In our minds. And finally.
00:13:57
Oh, my God. And then finally, Bethany, who may Bethany Jones. I'm assuming these people are OK with their names being said.
00:14:07
Yeah, I think they want to shout out, which they absolutely. So Bethany Jones is from the base element makeup bath and body.
00:14:14
I would call it company. and um she sent us uh her card says i hope you like your namesake lipsticks i loved creating
00:14:25
them while listening to your podcasts all of your podcasts one after the other i twitch
00:14:30
and fittingly when i was done my kitchen looked like a murder scene and i was smeared red to the
00:14:35
elbows um i've got a bit rock and roll and made the skull bath bombs in your honor to
00:14:41
see what an inspiration you are stay sexy don't get murdered it's so awesome This box smelled, we could smell the bath bombs from outside.
00:14:50
That's why it wasn't a bomb because I feel like they wouldn't go to the trouble of making it pleasant.
00:14:54
A soapy bomb. Well, it was a bomb. Oh, my God. I didn't think about that. Yeah, that's right.
00:14:58
You were right. See, you were right all along. I'm psychic. But bombs can be good.
00:15:02
Bombs can be good. So we just got a shit ton of lip gloss and lip balm and lip scrub and eyeshadow.
00:15:12
A lot of them are named, like have quotes from the podcast. there's a fucking lip balm called Elvis want a cookie.
00:15:18
And once we, we got excited and exclaimed that when we saw it, Elvis lost his fucking mind.
00:15:22
Cause he thought he was getting one. So I had to give him one. Yeah. We kept saying Elvis.
00:15:26
We, I won't say it again. No, no. But yeah, there's, I mean, our names are on, he on lip balms.
00:15:31
This is, this is right up my alley. She's going to make them. She just wanted us to get the first ones,
00:15:36
which is so fucking cool. Yeah. Um, so you can go to the, the base element at Etsy.
00:15:44
Yeah. and buy murderino and non murderino you guys we can have our own makeup line fucking love this
00:15:50
podcast from bethany it's so cool it's very cool thank you for our gifts totally worth it to open
00:15:56
up to open you up to danger i know and get that pot that po box hey look that's plenty of presents
00:16:01
that's plenty i'm okay with the p i i talked to my therapist about it i really fucking lost my shit this last week i talked to her about it i got some pepper spray
00:16:13
The reality is it's not going to fucking I mean, what are the chances that's going to happen?
00:16:17
It's not. Then I get scared when you say that. Sorry. All right. If you really, really want to find it.
00:16:23
And if you actually have something that you're making that's like legit, you can have the P.O. box.
00:16:27
Also, there's 80 million ways to contact us so that you could probably say, hey, here's what I'm going to send you.
00:16:32
Totally. And here's a copy of my driver's license so that if I do harm you in any way.
00:16:36
Right. And now we have evidence. Evidence. It's all on the Internet. So that was present.
00:16:42
Present. That was present corner. What we call present corner. Okay, we're in. This is fun.
00:16:53
So we start opening like gifts from listeners, which I know scared the shit out of me in the very beginning.
00:16:58
Yeah, clearly. I mean, you're taking true precautions and then hurting yourself in the process.
00:17:05
That sounds like me. That sounds like me through and through. Taking precautions, hurting yourself on accident.
00:17:10
Yeah. I mean, I can relate. I think that's very relatable. Also, I think we were doing a lot of those kinds of,
00:17:17
okay, strangers are sending us big boxes. We just got to go with God on this one and like play along.
00:17:22
And I have to say this, we've been doing this for almost nine years. We've been given a lot of amazing gifts,
00:17:30
a lot of hilarious gifts, a lot of downright weird gifts. And I maybe shouldn't be saying this,
00:17:36
but we've never gotten a scary gift. No, I've never felt threatened by a gift, except that doll that had the happy face and the sad face.
00:17:44
But the person who gave it to us... It was hilarious. It was hilarious. And God, I wish I could remember her name,
00:17:50
but also knew that that's what they were doing. We needed it. Yeah. It was great.
00:17:53
And do you remember we sent it to a listener Yes Someone won it Who has that If you won the scary two doll please send us an email of how your life has been going since it entered your home
00:18:05
We must know. And actually, so what's really cool about these gifts that we just opened is that at
00:18:11
Holly's store, who gave us the H.H. Holmes murder castle puzzle, is still active at hollycardon.com.
00:18:19
Yeah, she has a whole empire over there. Amazing. Check that out. Yeah. And also, we talked about The Devil in the White City, and we got so excited because the movie was supposed to come out.
00:18:29
Did it ever come out? Nine years ago. It's never come out, but all the same people are still attached.
00:18:34
And it is essentially, it's Leonardo DiCaprio, and I think it's supposed to maybe be Scorsese.
00:18:38
I can't remember. But it's a famously cursed project now. Shut up. Yeah. Because I want to watch it now, though.
00:18:45
But I want it. But I want it. It's like that idea. I just saw TikTok on it. And there's a shot.
00:18:52
The opening TikTok, the opening picture of the TikTok was this, the scene from the statue's
00:18:59
shoulder overlooking that big pond or lake or whatever they built in. In the state fair or the, what's it called?
00:19:06
Fairgrounds? World's Fair. Yes. Yes, exactly. For the World's Fair. But they built it like it was all white.
00:19:12
It's an incredible looking thing that like I got to actually see this one picture that I was like, oh, my God.
00:19:18
And then, of course, the Ferris wheel. You know, it's so crazy is that when this came out, this episode, TikTok didn't exist.
00:19:25
Is that true? I'm making that up. I think it's true. I think it's true. I bet you it was.
00:19:31
I wonder if Vine had even been shut down yet. Shit. Like Vine walked so that TikTok could run.
00:19:37
Remember when we were Vine stars? Were we? No, I don't know. We could make that up.
00:19:42
Pat Walsh was a Vine star. Was he? Yeah, he was. Oh, that's so cute. He would get on there and sing little songs like,
00:19:48
all the girls are going to a pizza party. Yeah, Vine. Okay. Legendary. So let's now, as we always do on this podcast,
00:19:57
take a left turn because this episode is horrible. It's horrifying. It's child murder abuse.
00:20:05
This is basically a listener warning, but it's not just about child murder. it involves brutal child abuse.
00:20:14
It's funny how our stories start to sync up at this point, where it's like we both had
00:20:18
the same mindset. Yeah. And so this episode is especially horrible because of that.
00:20:23
But I also find it really interesting as I was reading through, it's clear that you and
00:20:28
I are understanding how to talk about true crime in a way that we hadn't been taught.
00:20:35
May I correct? Just starting to understand? Okay. Starting to understand. Yes. In a way that we weren't taught and that we were figuring out from listeners' notes and from the way it made us feel.
00:20:50
Yes. And so there's a lot of comments here that it's almost like you can hear us feeling out our own empathy.
00:20:58
Right. And what it means and what it doesn't excuse, but how to think about the stories.
00:21:06
Yeah. And so it is a different time completely. And I think you and I are clearly, you know, feeling our way through that.
00:21:13
I mean, I think about it all the time where, and we've talked about it a lot, but it's like
00:21:19
growing up on quote unquote true crime and the way the media used to treat it was normal to us.
00:21:26
That's just how it was. Salacious. You're trying to, you know, sell these stories.
00:21:30
Killer centric. Yeah. Just kind of pop culture-y. And so us coming in from that stance in 2016, looking back now and looking back basically the whole time, it's just kind of like, why are we this disconnected? Why aren't we? And I mean, disconnected maybe isn't the right word, but it is like, yeah, you can hear us slowly starting to realize nothing is black and white, nothing is straightforward.
00:21:57
and at the same time, like, oh, you know, the woman from your story later went on and got to
00:22:03
tell her story. And it was a complete, like flipped that kind of very singular media narrative that we
00:22:10
learned and kind of went with when it happened. Right. Like the story can be nuanced without
00:22:14
taking away the perpetrator's culpability. And you can understand a story and people's motivations
00:22:21
in ways without saying that they didn't deserve the punishment or that justice exists and so does
00:22:28
empathy. But, you know, how do we look at that? And I think we had to do that in a different way
00:22:34
for this podcast. Right. And in a way that it's embarrassing to go, oh, I never, I didn't really
00:22:39
think of the victim's family, but no one really did in a forthright way that we could have copied.
00:22:45
Yeah. Like everyone now gets to copy everybody else that caught up and is doing better and doing
00:22:51
better. Right. Because of course, all of our anonymous internet friends have logged on to
00:22:57
say do better. Yeah. Many, many times. Okay. Okay. Okay. You're right. You're right. We'll do our best.
00:23:02
All right. So let's get into Karen's story. A classic story. One that I can't think about
00:23:08
without thinking about you as a child because she truly does look exactly like you. Yeah.
00:23:14
This is the story of Mary Bell. hero.co 34 to 48% fewer calories than regular products.
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For full offer details, visit BoostMobile.com. Hey, do you want to talk about our favorite murders?
00:24:55
We might as well. Skippers! Come back to us. It's time. I think you're first. Is it me?
00:25:02
I think so. The murder that I chose this week. Yes, Karen. And my favorite murder is one that's always it's been one that like the first time I read it, I couldn't I would have to turn my eyes away from the page because it is horrible and horrifying.
00:25:22
but also like there's an underpinning of salaciousness to it that I thoroughly enjoy.
00:25:28
It's about Mary Bell, the child, child killer. Fuck. Yeah. The childhood child killer.
00:25:36
Yes. Now what I realized in looking through, uh, my researchers, my research searches today,
00:25:42
um, I mean from weeks ago. Right. For when all that research you've been. Oh, just piles and piles.
00:25:49
Every night I go to the city library Like Morgan Freeman And I let the guy play It's the same one from
00:25:55
First Ghostbusters movie The big huge cavernous ghosty I go down in the basement
00:26:01
Where the very old dead ghost librarian is Microfiche is involved You scroll microfiche
00:26:08
For hours So In the pictures of Mary Bell Which we should put up on the Instagram page
00:26:15
That's what I look like when I was little exactly. So I've always had a bit of a connection to Mary Bell, uh, in, in certain ways, but I also
00:26:28
know, and we got called out. Um, I think it was on, I can't remember the woman, the girl's name,
00:26:33
but the girl that shot up the, the school. Oh my God. Mary. Anyway, it's gone. Sorry. It, um,
00:26:42
Lisa that that girl we kind of got there's um a couple people are like we were being too sympathetic
00:26:48
to her or being like too nice when normally we're mean if it's like a man and it's older we're mean
00:26:54
and like hang him high I don't disagree with that I know I mean everyone has a lot to say about every
00:27:00
but I can see that point I'm not gonna argue I agree well I brought it up because I was thinking
00:27:06
is that how I'm gonna be about Mary Bell but the truth is I honestly believe that Mary Bell
00:27:11
is a psychopath. I think she, anytime she seems sympathetic, it's because she's trying to seem
00:27:19
sympathetic. I think she is like, I think she's nightmare. Like we need to talk about Kevin,
00:27:25
the bad seed. She's the reality of all of that fiction, evil child. Right. Like nothing can be
00:27:31
done. Now I think there's a reason she's that way. I don't, she may have been born that way
00:27:36
because they do talk about how she from an early age, like didn't bond, but she had this fucking
00:27:41
crazy mother. Either way, to me, I'm, I'm just want to say it at the start. I'm not defending
00:27:49
her. I'm not defending Mary Bell. Okay. But I also want to say another thing about it. Whenever
00:27:52
there's like a child molester or a murderer or someone, we talk about their past and we're like,
00:27:56
yeah, that sucks. What are we supposed, I don't, I don't think we were softer on her.
00:28:01
I don't either. I think we're always like investigating the past of the person who's
00:28:06
killing people that doesn't exonerate them from. But I think sometimes, you know, when it's
00:28:10
personal opinion, which is all, all of this podcast is sometimes more empathy will come out.
00:28:17
Even if you have it, you won't express it. Like I don't have a ton of empathy for Richard Ramirez,
00:28:23
even though he did get hit in the swing and he had the worst uncle in the world, whatever.
00:28:28
We're just saying it's understandable that this person didn't become a normal member of society.
00:28:33
Yes. And for me, that's, what's interesting to me when you can, when it's not just, Oh,
00:28:38
you were born with this defect where you do not have mirror neurons and you do not empathize with
00:28:43
other human beings. That's one thing. But like, if there's like a little path, you could have been
00:28:49
normal. If you didn't experience this parent or this aunt or whatever is some awful pit that you
00:28:56
fell in in your childhood. That to me, that's like, that's really what's fascinating. That's
00:29:01
the study. That's the study. Yeah. The, the, um, the effect that they killed someone and murdered
00:29:08
them and raped and all these horrible things. That's the effect. You know, there's a cause and
00:29:12
effect, et cetera. Yeah. And the cause is fascinating. Right. And if I had a, an education,
00:29:19
B didn't have ADD, I would probably read up on it a ton and become some type of a,
00:29:25
of a learned expert about it. Me too. And instead, instead I have, I work in TV,
00:29:32
so I am rewarded for not paying attention to anything. But we do have a, we do have a
00:29:37
true crime podcast so I think we're good I think we're basically doing that uh yeah yeah we're
00:29:44
doing our best anyhow sorry go on uh no um so I've I've always found Mary Bell fucking
00:29:54
fascinating so this happened in 1968 oh actually I thought it happened a lot longer ago That cool 68 Yeah And it happened in the inner city suburb of Newcastle in England
00:30:07
That's Stephen King's town, right? No, no, no. In England. Never mind. Newcastle.
00:30:14
No, Newcastle. Castle Rock. It's Castle Rock. Oh, yeah. Castle Rock's the... Yeah.
00:30:17
He's all about Maine. Can we just strike all of that from the record? Yes, absolutely.
00:30:21
We're going to go in and edit this down so good. No, we're not. No, we're not at all. And we never do. Okay. So she was born to a
00:30:33
unwed, unstable, 17 year old sex worker named Betty McCricket. And Betty used to leave her daughter with relatives and acquaintances,
00:30:47
just dumped her off anytime she could because she had to go. I guess she would go into Glasgow a lot and work as a sex worker.
00:31:03
Even as a non-17-year-old sex worker that I was, the thought of having a child at 17.
00:31:10
Nightmare. Nightmare. It's just, what a great opportunity for a ton of bad decisions.
00:31:15
Totally. Like this one where she once gave Mary to a woman she met on the street outside an abortion clinic.
00:31:23
Shut up. Yeah. Betty was doing it. So her apparently their household was filthy and sparsely furnished.
00:31:33
And the Betty's family members said that Betty tried to kill Mary more than once in her first few years of life and tried to make it look accidental.
00:31:43
so they all became very suspicious when mary quote-unquote fell out a window head drama uh
00:31:49
possibly and also when she accidentally consumed sleeping pills what the fuck um so they think she
00:31:56
could have definitely gotten brain damage because she had sleeping pills iron pills and apparently
00:32:02
mary um sorry betty would feed the pills to mary and tell them they were candy oh for fuck's sake
00:32:09
Um, there are some people who now say that they think Betty probably had Munchausen's
00:32:15
by proxy, which is the, the fascinating disease where a parent gets, um, addicted to the attention
00:32:25
and, um, sympathy that they get from a sick child. And so they make the child sick on purpose.
00:32:31
It's basically what happened in the movie seven when he, when the barfing girl finally
00:32:36
brings him back to her house. That's a great scene. um no not seven fucking we both you're like the other number movie the sixth sense our brains are
00:32:47
sinking up because that was just oh you know what's so hilarious yeah we're we're it's like
00:32:53
our mistake brains are like uh i did the same thing where when i was talking about the poly
00:32:59
class murder i called it i called it cloverfield which is a movie and the city name where her body
00:33:07
was found as Cloverdale and Adrian, my friend, whole time you called it that. Yeah. I think,
00:33:13
but I think I only said it once. Adrian texted me and she's like, dude, it's Cloverdale. You,
00:33:18
you went there for softball games. What are you doing? And I was just like, she's like,
00:33:21
I'm the only one that noticed, but seriously, it's Cloverdale. Yeah. Grow up. Maybe you were
00:33:27
just trying to protect the town. So people like, so look, you lose wouldn't show up there. That's
00:33:30
right. That's what you were doing. Just stay away from Cloverfield. Um, so bad news, obviously,
00:33:38
and in her upbringing. Um, and so of course at school, Mary was known as a chronic liar,
00:33:44
disruptive people. Um, she on occasion would voice her desire to hurt people. Um, she did a
00:33:52
lot of kicking and punching and, um, lying. And so all the kids, they would make fun of her a lot
00:33:59
because she was just basically a monster and a mess. And later on, sorry, I was just trying to figure out when a good,
00:34:12
but basically later on it came to be discovered that Mary's mother would use her
00:34:18
and sell her in prostitution as well from the age of four. Holy shit. So she, I guess this is another thing that does fascinate me.
00:34:28
This is another thing that like that kind of trauma can affect you and does affect your personality.
00:34:35
So she was subjected to really awful things at such a young age that they think that that that probably plays into the psychopathy and the behavior.
00:34:47
Yeah. You're like, this isn't a safe world. Nothing is safe. I need to fucking defend myself.
00:34:54
And I want to start hurting others the way I'm being hurt. And it's a way that it's normal.
00:34:58
It's the way children, yeah, it's the way children communicate that they're being hurt when they know they're not allowed to talk about it.
00:35:04
Right. Fascinating. Totally. Okay, so on May 25th, 1968, two boys playing in an abandoned house found the corpse of four-year-old Martin Brown lying in an upstairs room.
00:35:17
Mary Bell and her friend Norma Bell, who was not related to her, they just had the same last name, followed the boys inside the house.
00:35:24
And when the police arrived, the two girls had to be ordered out. So they really liked looking at this dead body.
00:35:31
How old were they? Mary was just about to turn 11. Okay. And Norma Bell was 13, but Mary was the dominant of the two.
00:35:41
Sure. Like a little more mature and smart. There was no obvious cause of death. So it was assumed that Martin Brown had swallowed pills from a discarded bottle, which was found nearby.
00:35:52
So the next day Norma Bell father caught Mary choking Norma and he slapped her face and sent her home He choking She was choking her so bad
00:36:05
Holy shit. The day after this little boy died. So four days later, Mary Bell appeared at the Brown residence asking to see Martin.
00:36:16
And when she was reminded that Martin was dead. Wait, she showed up. She showed up at the dead boy's house asking to see him.
00:36:26
And when the adult that answered the door reminded her that Martin was dead, it was the mother that answered the door.
00:36:32
And when the mother said, he's dead, Mary said, oh, I know he's dead. I want to see him in his coffin.
00:36:38
Oh, my God. Can you. What would you do? I'd scream. I'd run screaming. I mean, a little girl, too.
00:36:46
Yeah. Who's. Yeah. Okay. So two months later, three-year-old Brian Howe goes missing and immediate searches mounted.
00:36:57
And Mary Bell tells Brian's sister that he might be playing on a heap of concrete blocks that had been dumped out in a nearby vacant lot.
00:37:06
And which is where he was discovered dead from manual strangulation, legs and stomach and penis mutilated with a razor and a pair of scissors.
00:37:16
the police discover at the scene the letters M and N were scratched into his stomach.
00:37:21
Oh, fuck. So as the investigation narrows, Mary, so somebody that had been walking by said they saw kids
00:37:32
around that pile of stones that day. And then when they took the three-year-old's body into the corner, he said, it looks like
00:37:44
he's strangled but it's such light force that i think we're looking at a child murderer
00:37:51
so then the cops went around and started interviewing all the kids in the neighborhood
00:37:56
and mary and norma were both dinged right away because their stories kept changing
00:38:03
mary acted super weird they got freaked out by how creepy and weird she was and norma couldn't
00:38:09
stop giggling. Holy shit. Um, so Mary, when her, when the investigation got narrowed onto Mary
00:38:18
Bell, she suddenly remembered seeing an eight year old boy with Brian on the day he died.
00:38:24
And she said that the boy hit Brian for no reason. And that she said that same boy had
00:38:29
been playing with broken scissors. Um, uh, the, but the boy, she was naming a specific boy. She
00:38:36
was basically trying to pin it on him but he had been at the airport that afternoon oh fuck and so
00:38:41
the thing that mary didn't know is that the scissors were confidential evidence no one knew
00:38:47
about the scissors oh mary that wasn't public when you're a fucking 10 year old murderer
00:38:51
is that you didn't you don't understand you can't keep your shit in line dude yeah so baffling she essentially implicates herself uh with the scissor comment and
00:39:06
she had described them exactly so she's trying to pin it on the other boy yeah and in doing so
00:39:11
she's like they were silver colored and some there was something wrong with them like one
00:39:16
leg was either broken or bent so she basically describes the exact scissors to a tee i mean smart
00:39:21
smart uh smart investigating by the cops that they like figured this shit out pretty quickly
00:39:27
and can you imagine sitting in an in a room across from an 11 year old girl when you see this picture
00:39:33
big blue eyes little button nose kind of vacant just think baby karen but just think baby karen
00:39:42
i was a precious lamb but she's lying to you so you're buying her at first and then she gives she
00:39:50
does the old inglorious bastards holding up a three and you don't even want it to be true like
00:39:56
you're not even like we're gonna get this guy no it's like wait a second you just said this wrong
00:40:00
thing creepy enough that the coroner says you're probably going to want to look for a kid because
00:40:05
a kid strangled a three-year-old so you probably don't want it to be true you probably have children
00:40:09
of your own and this little girl is like yeah the scissors i mean the chill that would go down your
00:40:16
back so so uh okay i did the slidey thing again which i always do so um brian howe was
00:40:30
buried on August 7th. And the investigative detective was named Detective Dobson. And he
00:40:37
was there. And he says, Mary Bell was standing in front of the house house when the coffin was
00:40:42
brought out. I, of course, was watching her. And it was when I saw her there that I knew
00:40:49
I did not dare risk another day. She stood there laughing, laughing and rubbing her hands.
00:40:56
I thought my god I've got to bring her in or she'll do another one holy shit so they bring in Mary Bell
00:41:07
why are you laughing psychopath because it's me she's also rubbing her hands together right now
00:41:12
because I'm picturing it and it's like how why don't they make this movie it's the creepiest thing of all time
00:41:19
seriously this is like the ring except for the girl has her hair back out of her face and she's like she thinks she's getting away
00:41:30
with it she wanted to kill that little kid she killed him and then she wanted to see his dead
00:41:35
body it carried out of the house it's just what's so crazy is the like you know when you when adults
00:41:41
kill they like try really hard to hide it and try to outsmart people that's like what you do but
00:41:46
this little person who I guess you can argue didn't understand that either death was permanent
00:41:52
or what it meant Maybe maybe maybe or she enjoyed the feeling so much that she had done it She you know cause there was some killer that we talked about where they said I want people to
00:42:07
feel on the outside the way I feel on the inside. Was that the, one of those Cheshire murders? Yeah.
00:42:12
Or was it the person you talked about last week? No. Either way. This is a factual,
00:42:20
sexual corner. It's fact based. It's that thing of like when you finally feel right in the world is
00:42:26
when like that's how she felt right. She killed that. She had the power to take his
00:42:32
life away and put him in that box. She finally had power. But she also had to be a little bit
00:42:36
like arrested in her in Yes. She couldn't be smart enough. She couldn't have been smarter
00:42:46
than a 10 year old. She was just didn't understand right from wrong. You don't think so?
00:42:51
Go on. Because this is where it gets crazy. Oh, my God. This is where? This is where.
00:42:58
Well, this is where it shows that she was raised by two criminals because her mother ended up marrying.
00:43:06
I think his name was Billy Bell, and he was like a career criminal. And so they clearly talked about being arrested, going in and out of jail and all this stuff, because when she's arrested, first of all, when they say you're going to be charged with murder, she said, that's all right.
00:43:20
by me. Wow. And she she sorry when she was in jail there was a stray cat in jail. Oh fuck.
00:43:40
Elvis cover your ears. Yeah Elvis you're not gonna like this. She grabbed the cat
00:43:45
tightly by the neck and the guard told her not to hurt the cat and And Mary allegedly replied, oh, she doesn't feel that in any way.
00:43:54
I like hurting little things that can't fight back. In another incident, a policewoman said that Mary said she'd like to be a nurse, quote, because then I can stick needles into people.
00:44:07
I like hurting people. Oh, my God. So there was kind of a naive quality about it.
00:44:15
Then also the jailers, once she was in there, she calmed down a little bit after a while.
00:44:20
And a lot of the jailers liked her. The guards, you know, because they said she was very smart.
00:44:26
She was very sharp. But she was a chronic bedwetter. Oh. Yeah. And she's got one of the pieces, probably two if we count those, being overdosed on drugs by your mother.
00:44:39
And dropped out of a window. And dropped out of a window. Sure. Probably got two.
00:44:43
At least. What's the other one? Fires? Fire, yeah. Okay. No report of fire on her.
00:44:49
But she was terrified of going to sleep because she was afraid she was going to wet the bed.
00:44:57
And she said to one of the guards, I usually do. And at home, her mother would humiliate her anytime she wet the bed.
00:45:07
So she would rub her daughter's face in the pee when she found it. And she would hang the mattress outside so the neighborhood would see it.
00:45:18
So when they went to trial, Norma was acquitted of all charges and Mary was convicted of two counts of manslaughter.
00:45:25
So I think it they say that Norma was there. Norma had like eight brothers and sisters or some huge family and their whole family was there supporting her.
00:45:37
And she did a lot of crying on the stand and saying Mary did it. Mary did it. And Mary did the same thing or saying Norman did it. But all she had was her lunatic
00:45:46
mother who was wearing a blonde wig and would freak out so much and cry and do all these
00:45:52
things that her wig would fall off. And then she would get up and run out of the courtroom and then
00:45:57
come back. And so because of that Munchausen's by proxy, like this was her drama. She was basically,
00:46:04
you know, say in the very slight chance that Mary wasn't guilty, she was condemning her
00:46:10
anyway because no one had sympathy for that family whereas everyone was like oh this little
00:46:17
girl's just been set up by mary bell yeah and then in the tabloids mary bell just became the just the
00:46:23
face of evil for years and years yeah um they didn't have anywhere to put her because they
00:46:30
didn't have they they had never had to deal with sending an 11 year old girl to jail so there was
00:46:35
like lots of places for juvie for little boys, but none for little girls. So they had to keep her,
00:46:41
they kept her in like a separate quarters in a, in a boy's detention center for a long time until
00:46:48
she was in her teens. When she was in her teens, she escaped jail for a little while with two
00:46:52
other boys, but then they, then they were only gone for two weeks and then they went back.
00:46:57
she spent um uh up until her like i can't i don't i can't find it now um i think it was like in her
00:47:08
mid-20s in jail and then when she got out all of england was like freaking out they were super pissed
00:47:14
she made money off a book that someone wrote about her again they were like we need to pass laws
00:47:19
you know whatever she got out and then what she ended up becoming a grandmother like a mother and
00:47:26
a grandmother she got pregnant I don't think she got married and then she was did she change her
00:47:34
name there was they passed a thing where they kept her yeah she's she now lives under a pseudonym
00:47:41
right and they like the British people wanted that repeal they wanted to make her live as herself
00:47:48
oh but they they whatever you they continued the ruling that she could live under a pseudonym for
00:47:56
the rest of her life. Okay, wow, we are back. Karen, do you have any updates? I wanted to know, like, where is she now?
00:48:07
So bad. No one knows. It's good that we don't. Yes. However, there's this part of me that wants to know.
00:48:13
I know. I mean, like, that's like the other media training that we have, which is kind of like, this is, now we get the 15-year update,
00:48:19
the 30-year update, like, whatever. But no, the adult Mary Bell and her daughter remain anonymous.
00:48:27
They're protected under an order from the UK's high court. So I think that's all good. I mean, I was talking to Alison Agassi, our writer, about this story and how, like, this child was raised with a mother who was actively trying to kill her all the time and horribly abusing her.
00:48:46
And then it's like, it's just mind-blowing to be like that, if that's your perspective and that's how you get treated.
00:48:53
We can't know. It's hard to imagine because we take for granted that we were picked up and held and cared for and looked in the eyes as children.
00:49:04
And I feel like psychology in the past like 10 years, at least for myself, is learning that the tools you learned as a child that you had to learn that helped you get through that period were actually helpful.
00:49:15
And so in a way, this empathy that Mary Bell was able to turn off completely and have no care about anyone else and not understand other people's feelings was actually beneficial to her because she was being horribly abused.
00:49:30
It just turned into hurting other people as well, you know? Right, which is, I think, kind of a common thread in all these stories.
00:49:38
You can't consistently hurt a child and think that that child should just be resilient.
00:49:44
And hey, they're kids. They'll get over it. Like, it doesn't work that way. Yeah.
00:49:48
The tools that you learn to protect yourself, you know, can turn on you and aren't always positive.
00:49:54
Right. Also, they're tools that you're just getting. Like, and then as you grow up, you later, when you realize that of like, I don't need this anymore.
00:50:03
It can be like shameful or embarrassing. But it's like, but that's just the human experience.
00:50:08
It's like you just do it until you know better. That's what everyone's doing. And you think it's who you are.
00:50:13
It's your personality. I'm talking about myself at this point about like dissociating.
00:50:16
I'm only ever talking about myself. All the time. And that's yours. I'm talking about yourself all the time.
00:50:21
It really helps. It's like you don't realize it isn't your personality. It's just like your learned behavior because it fucking helps.
00:50:27
It helps. Well, also, I had that realization about five years ago where it's like, oh, that's right.
00:50:34
Stand-up comedy and wanting to be a comedian was a coping mechanism. Right. What?
00:50:40
What? I could have just been like a marine biologist like I wanted to. You don't think marine biology is a fucking coping mechanism too?
00:50:46
I think it is. Oh, just staring at whales all day. Oh, you love a whale. Oh, well, I hope your childhood was great.
00:50:53
Oh, I guess. I guess. I guess you can focus on kelp all the time. You're not terrified of the ocean?
00:50:59
Well, congratulations. Must be nice. Must be nice. Okay. Oh, this guy. This story.
00:51:06
Oh. We have to now go into, I think we talked about it at the time. I think we have talked about it multiple times since.
00:51:14
I will say it now. Potentially one of the most nightmarish, horrible human story ever.
00:51:21
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00:53:01
For full offer details, visit BoostMobile.com. What's your favorite murder of the week?
00:53:07
Hi. Mine is also a child murder. Is it really? Yeah. Man, this is the wrong episode for parents.
00:53:14
It is very weird. That's crazy. It's very weird. But this is by, this is a parental murder.
00:53:25
And this one has stuck with me. I've read about it for a long time because there's a photograph of the little girl who
00:53:30
gets killed um oh you're not oh you're saying the child is murdered the child murder got a child
00:53:37
murder yes got it so there's a photo of the little girl the day before her death that really fucking
00:53:42
stuck with me i hope that do you hear that yes it sounds like thunder my fucking downstairs
00:53:49
neighbor plays uh some video game world of war call of duty is that a thing yes call of duty Yeah it just so if you hear that I sorry So Lisa Steinberg this poor little angel baby That the one That the one Oh my God It heartbreaking This is the worst story
00:54:07
OK, sorry. It's OK. No, you're right. I'm breathing. Not because I'm OK. So it's in 1981, 45 year old Hedda Nussbaum and 46 year old Joel Steinberg, who was a defense attorney who sometimes handled adoption cases.
00:54:21
Joel was. They took custody of an infant girl named that they named Lisa and they illegally adopted her.
00:54:28
The child's birth mother had paid Steinberg, the attorney, a $500 legal fee to place the child with a Roman Catholic family.
00:54:35
But they just kept her instead. They were Jewish. I don't know. I don't think that matters.
00:54:41
But they whatever. Anyways. So this Hedda and Joel were a well-educated, they were upper class New York couple.
00:54:50
They lived in Greenwich Village in New York City. At school, Lisa's teachers said she was bright and friendly, but they worried about her arriving at school with bruises and chunks of hair missing from her head.
00:55:03
And she would tell them that her little brother, who was also a younger, who was an adopted child, had hit her.
00:55:08
And none of them had ever made reports of abuse, which changed a lot of stuff in the system.
00:55:14
So there's a photo from Halloween the day before this big incident happens that one of the teachers took of Lisa.
00:55:23
And it's just a photo of her at her desk. It's Halloween. All the other children are dressed up and she's wearing her normal clothes and she's just kind of staring off.
00:55:33
And it's this with this sad face, like an empty, sad face. And the next day on November 1st, 1987, Hedda, the mother, calls the police to report that her daughter had choked on food.
00:55:49
That's what she said. And when the police arrived, they found six-year-old Lisa Steinberg unconscious.
00:55:55
And she had multiple bruises on her body. And the mother, Hedda, claimed that she had fallen a lot lately on her roller skates.
00:56:01
um so according to initial reports on november 1st um at around 7 p.m joel steinberg had somehow
00:56:14
rendered lisa unconscious with severe blows to the head and what had later said as the reasoning
00:56:21
was that lisa wanted to go lisa wanted to go to dinner with her father but he did not want to take
00:56:27
her and then he inflicted the head injury because she wouldn't stop bugging him about wanting to go
00:56:31
to dinner before he left the, but before he left the apartment, Lisa wasn't conscious.
00:56:37
So he left and the mother Hedda was alone with the kid who was dying for roughly 10
00:56:43
hours failing to notify police or medical personnel. Um, Joel left and came back many times.
00:56:52
They were free base and cocaine sometimes together because they were also like weird
00:56:55
drug addicts. Yeah. and she says she didn't Hedda said she didn't call authorities because she believed that Joel
00:57:07
had supernatural healing powers and she was waiting for him to come home and fix her
00:57:12
which we'll get into in a bit don't do drugs if you're going to do drugs don't adopt children
00:57:17
stupid motherfuckers don't so around 6 a.m the next morning Lisa stopped breathing and shortly
00:57:24
after steinberg called 9-1-1 at nussbaum's urging um lisa died four days later in the hospital and
00:57:32
it was determined the cause of death was a head injury apparently inflicted by what they say was
00:57:37
a rubber-headed hammer holy shit i know it's heartbreaking um the same vincent doctors this
00:57:44
is according to joyce johnson who wrote a book called what lisa knew the doctor showed a quote
00:57:49
map of pain on her body. Yeah. I know this poor little thing, man. I wish, I wish I,
00:57:56
they also, let's see. Um, the house was filthy and contained large quantities of cocaine and other
00:58:04
drugs. And the couple was arrested on child abuse charges. Um, New York law state stated at the time that if one parent beats a child and
00:58:13
the other stays silent about it, each is equally guilty. But that's good. I know,
00:58:18
but, Hedda was late. I mean, is it because is that giving any understanding to the to the other parent who didn't do it, who was probably abused as well and victimized?
00:58:30
We don't know. We don't know. But here's the here's the. So Hedda was later found to have been abused by Joel throughout their relationship.
00:58:40
She suffered from nine broken ribs, a broken jaw and a broken nose. And if you look at photos of her at this trial and right after this happened, this person is fucking disfigured.
00:58:49
Yes. Like this person's that she had to get cartilage from her, quote, good ear taken out to reconstruct her nose, which had collapsed because he'd punched her so many times.
00:59:01
Yeah. So she wasn't prosecuted due to the belief that years of abuse had rendered her incompetent at the time of the murder.
00:59:10
And that makes sense. Yeah. And yeah, let's we'll talk about fucking culpability, man.
00:59:17
Instead, she was sent to a psychiatric hospital in exchange for her testimony against Joel.
00:59:23
Hedda was not prosecuted and Joel was charged with first degree manslaughter. So the trial.
00:59:33
Okay. Go ahead. Why not murder? I don't know. I don't need it. Okay. Oh, you know why?
00:59:43
because later it was said that if Hedda had called the ambulance at that moment,
00:59:50
Lisa would have survived for sure. So, so it wasn his intent to murder her when he did kill her Right Jesus Christ Breathing breathing breathing breathing
01:00:05
What's around us right now? Seafoam green wall. We're here in 2016 and not in 80s New York in this horrible apartment.
01:00:13
What do you feel under your hand? I just remembered as you were describing her appearance, there was an amazing article in Oprah's magazine that she, Hedon Nussbaum, wrote.
01:00:24
Well, she wrote a book. Did she? Yeah. I bet that was just publicity then. And it was just an excerpt from the book.
01:00:30
I bet it was. It was unbelievable. She wrote a book about, she does like talks and about being abusive relationships.
01:00:38
And she wrote a book about it that I didn't really want to include because I don't want
01:00:41
to make this about, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we, you know, I'm not, she wrote a book.
01:00:46
It's just the side by side of her when she was young, when she first met him. And when she was arrested is, she looks like an old witch.
01:00:53
Yeah. And she was this gorgeous young New York woman. Yeah. When she met him. I mean, this is the problem is I've never been, it's not a problem.
01:01:02
This is great. I've never been in an abusive relationship before. So I don't know that fucking the head games and the, the, and the, um, the way you have
01:01:13
to rationalize things in your head because this person you care about, you know, is doing
01:01:21
these things and you want to believe that they, that they have no control over that.
01:01:24
They're not doing it on purpose, that they would never hurt you. Otherwise your whole fucking world is just shattered and that's right.
01:01:29
Insane. And on top of that, they're using strong, they're freebasing at this point.
01:01:33
I mean, freebasing cocaine is like, you're, you're doing crack. You're a crackhead.
01:01:38
You're a psychopath. Yeah. Okay. Um, and they were, there was also some weird like cult stuff and they had been convincing
01:01:45
her that she like mind games with her, that she had been, um, sleeping around and had
01:01:50
been um hypnotized and there was just some very fucked up mind games with the schedule so
01:01:57
so all right so the trial so this is actually the first trial which made new york which turned new york into the 44th state to allow television cameras in the courtroom
01:02:09
oh hell yeah fucking watch like people tuned in constantly for this so during the trial they said
01:02:16
that Lisa's injuries were severe, but she would have almost certainly survived if given
01:02:20
prompt medical treatment. So this is probably why he had manslaughter. So the jury wanted
01:02:27
to convict Steinberg on the more serious charge of second degree murder, but they couldn't
01:02:33
because, so they could only convict him of the, of the second, of the second most serious
01:02:39
charge, which is first degree manslaughter. So the judge then sentenced him to the maximum
01:02:44
penalty then available. Guess, guess what, guess how long that is, Karen? God, is it seven years?
01:02:51
Eight and one third to 25 years in prison. And he's a lawyer, right? Yeah. Yeah.
01:02:57
Yeah. So on two occasions, so Steinberg served his time. On two occasions, he was denied discretionary
01:03:04
parole because he never expressed any remorse for the killing. He never said he was, he hit
01:03:10
her. He was always an argument that something must have happened with Hedda. Yeah. But on June 30th,
01:03:19
2004, he was paroled under the state's quote, good time law, meaning he did good time. He was a good
01:03:26
inmate. Congratulations. You killed a kid. He wasn't a good father. He was a rotten father and
01:03:33
husband. That's insane. All right. Okay. It mandates the release of inmates who exhibit good
01:03:40
behavior while incarcerated after having served as little as two thirds of the maximum possible
01:03:44
sentence. After his release, he moved to Harlem and he works in the construction industry.
01:03:52
He continues to maintain his innocence, but there was this really great New York magazine article
01:03:57
where this journalist, I don't have his name, was like, clearly like this guy's full of shit. He was
01:04:03
interviewing his attorney, who's like just a fucking dick lick motherfucker. Excuse me.
01:04:10
why now what why now say fuck every five seconds why excuse myself excuse me excuse me for that
01:04:20
something about dick lick motherfucker was a little more you that was that was one step too
01:04:25
far weirdly that's something i say on the regular dick lick motherfucker learn it um in the magazine
01:04:32
article he like needled joel and finally steinberg finally admitted that he quote pushed his daughter
01:04:38
a little quote with the soft pad, you know, on your palm, he finally kind of gave in.
01:04:46
Cause the whole article they were trying to, the lawyer was trying to make it seem like
01:04:50
Joel was the victim of this like media slander to make, had to look innocent and him look
01:04:56
guilty. And it's like, just what a piece of shit. Yeah. In 2003, Steinberg was ordered to pay Lisa's biological mother, the one who gave her up
01:05:06
for adoption 15 million for the quote heinous outrageous crime of murdering lisa wow i'm a
01:05:12
little bit like do you deserve that money no but still i like the idea he has to pay
01:05:20
and then but then a civil suit heda um was wanted to collect 3.6 million from joel for eight years of beatings she said she endured
01:05:32
and the permanent disfigurement she has suffered, which at that point I'm a little like,
01:05:38
this child died. You need to walk the fuck away. Yeah. Or am I being insensitive to abuse victims?
01:05:45
I mean, there's a lot of ways that we can offend people in this, but this is my stance because I remember-
01:05:52
The wanting money is like such- The wanting money is bullshit because you I understand that she was in an abusive relationship I also understand that she was a drug addict which is a lot of people don have empathy for that I do And I understand
01:06:08
that you go into a place that is inexplicable and indefensible a lot of the time. Yes.
01:06:15
You don't ask for money for doing that. You make reparations, you fix your life,
01:06:20
You make your amends. You clear away the wreckage of your past. You don't ask to be paid for the thing you fucked up.
01:06:27
The thing about it is, is like you were an adult in this relationship as mind fucked as you were, as victimized as you were.
01:06:37
You stayed in it. You chose to stay in it until this awful thing happened. If that hadn't happened, you would have stayed in it and the children would have still been abused.
01:06:47
it just so happens that that Lisa died that you got out of it and there's so many examples
01:06:55
I'm sure listeners too who have figured out a way to get out of abusive relationships and how fucking difficult it is
01:07:01
and awful it is but you fucking do it and that's your choice as an adult okay we're back yeah it's hard to listen
01:07:11
to us talk about and debate even with ourselves and our own conscience like who deserves what and why,
01:07:21
as you know, when it comes to justice and reparations. And, you know, it's just such a different,
01:07:27
it's such a different mindset back in 2016 than it is today. Well, it's just ignorance.
01:07:32
I mean, like, it's not, I don't think you and I have ever pretended to be anything or not.
01:07:37
And so when we were having those kinds of conversations, it's literally just, and I think why people like this podcast,
01:07:44
we're just regular people that are like, sharing our kind of like, oh, I guess this is what I think about this. And I think that's why
01:07:52
listeners like it because then they literally can be like, here's what I think about it. And here's
01:07:56
why your answer either delights me or disgusts me. And then it's like, oh, right. What are we doing?
01:08:02
Like we're doing critical thinking together. Yeah. I mean, we got, I remember us getting
01:08:06
follow-up stuff about Hedda Nussbaum and really good information that was like, it really did feel like the beginning of bigger picture, more to consider. It's not just you and
01:08:19
I sitting in your apartment chatting. Totally. And you know, what's interesting to me about this is
01:08:24
I am in the middle of J.C. Dugard's memoir, A Stolen Life. And it is harrowing and difficult and
01:08:32
mirrors this story in a lot of ways and is really even now in 2025, opening my eyes to
01:08:39
the abuse that victims endure. And JC just goes through this thing that is mind-blowing and I will
01:08:46
never understand. And you can never understand unless you've been through it. And just the space
01:08:50
you need to leave open for people who have been in abusive relationships and that just the
01:08:56
understanding that you will never understand. Yes. So I'm trying to wrap my brain around that
01:08:59
and looking at the story from that angle as well. Yeah. It was really eye-opening to me.
01:09:03
Really quick. Did I ever tell you about Adrian's mother-in-law and JC Dugard? No.
01:09:08
Okay. I'll try to make this as fast as possible. Adrienne, my sister's friend, Adrienne.
01:09:13
Yeah. Who, she's also my friend. That's now the longer title that she has. Her mother-in-law, Pushpa, is this brilliant woman who—
01:09:24
She's the teacher? She is. No, that's my sister. No, no. Your English teacher. Wasn't Adrienne's mom the English teacher?
01:09:31
That's Adrienne's mom, Judy. Oh, who are you talking about? Her mother-in-law. Oh, got it.
01:09:35
Okay. Pushpa. Pushpa. And Pushpa was a parole officer in that area. And that's a big deal in the story.
01:09:43
It's a big deal because Pushpa got sent to that house. And she went back and said,
01:09:51
something's not right. They wouldn't let me in the front door. She actually tried to look over their shoulder.
01:09:56
He was like at the front door, wouldn't let her look inside. Then she went around,
01:10:00
even though he was like, no, no, it's all fine. So then she went around and peeked over the fence.
01:10:05
Yes. saw the tarps, went back to work and was like, you got to go in there. Something's wrong there.
01:10:12
Blah, blah, blah. And they were like, we don't have any cause. They basically didn't listen to
01:10:16
her. And, you know, you've got to be a nosy neighbor. Well, and also like that kind of thing
01:10:22
where it's like, especially that specific situation where she was held there for so long. It's so
01:10:27
awful. And like the idea of at any point something could have changed. And it was just like somebody
01:10:33
on the other end being like, it's not that big of a deal. Right. Is so frustrating.
01:10:37
That's a huge part of the story is like in her mind, it's like no one cared. Yeah.
01:10:42
No one was looking. And it was just, it was just a peek over the fence away because they didn't realize
01:10:49
that the backyard went on further than it did. Right. There's like a false. Just where she was being kept.
01:10:55
Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. That's incredible. I mean, be the nosy neighbor, you guys.
01:11:01
That's the, Pushpa's the one where when Nora was like five years old, Pushpa asked her what she wanted to be for what she wanted to
01:11:09
be when she grew up and Pushpa's Sri Lankan. And Nora was like, I want to be a cheerleader.
01:11:15
And Pushpa goes, don't be a cheerleader, be a doctor. So we say that to Nora all the time.
01:11:21
She will be. You fucking know it. I think it worked. I think it worked on her. I think like just being able to accept that you have blind spots, not that you're bad for them,
01:11:32
Not that it means anything, except for that you're a human being. But just like the humility of going, yeah, I must.
01:11:39
And I know I do. And the way I see the world is just that. The way I see the world is from my own experiences.
01:11:45
And that's a very singular experience. It's a very, and also, you know, having the internet suddenly,
01:11:53
like the world was like, there's more than your experience. And here it is right here.
01:11:57
And now you should have known this already. And like, It really was this very insane dividing line of like, all of a sudden there were people snapping their fingers being like, you should be smarter than this.
01:12:07
And it's like, I know I should be smarter than this. Like, it's crazy. So, yeah, those kinds of like, I could never imagine.
01:12:15
Therefore, I don't even know. You don't know what you don't know. You don't know what you don't know.
01:12:20
Okay. I have a couple case updates. The baby from the story, Baby Mitchell, Lisa's adopted younger brother, was returned to his birth mom.
01:12:28
He was given a new name and he eventually graduated with honors from his high school, earned a college degree, got married and pursued a career in banking.
01:12:37
So beautiful. Thank God for that. Thank God. Around the time Joel was being released from prison, which fucking Jesus Christ, Hedda Nussbaum changed her name and moved out of New York so he wouldn't be able to find her.
01:12:49
Her exact whereabouts are unknown. And, you know, you heard us talking about abusive relationships.
01:12:54
relationships. So if you or anyone you know is struggling to leave an abusive partner,
01:12:58
we wanted to give you a few resources. Yeah, the National Domestic Violence Hotline
01:13:03
is free, confidential, available 24 hours a day, and it's 1-800-799-SAFE, 7233. So that's
01:13:12
1-800-799-SAFE. And their website is thehotline.org, where you can find resources and also get
01:13:20
involved in supporting survivors, either through volunteering or, hey, donation.
01:13:25
Oh, we do those. Shall we? Let's please. $10,000 to the hotline.org, the National Domestic Violence Hotline.
01:13:32
Yeah. And if you have anything to give this New Year's, that would be amazing. I think that's an
01:13:37
incredibly helpful charity to support. Definitely. Well, that was a heavy episode.
01:13:44
Sure was. At least we ended it on a donation We ended it on donation and a happy New Year That right Hey happy new year everybody Stay sexy And don get murdered Goodbye
01:13:56
Elvis, do you want a cookie? Hey, everyone. It's Kel Penn. I'm inviting you to join the best sounding book club you've ever heard with my podcast,
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