00:00:00
This is Exactly Right. of Family Secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:00:36
This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. In 2018, the FBI took down a ring of spies
00:00:44
working for China's Ministry of State Security, one of the most mysterious intelligence agencies in the world.
00:00:50
The Sixth Bureau podcast is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.
00:00:58
Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:01:28
therapy for you every day. Open your free iHeartRadio app, search DJ Hester Prince Music
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is Therapy and start listening now. Hello and welcome to My Favorite Murder, the mini-sode.
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That's right. Here we are. Oh, and if you belong to the fan cult, you can see this on video.
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We're videoing this right now. You can feel the video tension in the air and you should see it.
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Yeah. Don't make weird faces. Don't make weird faces. That's what I say to myself.
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Why does that one section of my hair always look unbrushed no matter how much I brush it?
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You want to go first? Sure. Okay. This one's called My Mom Survived a Serial Killer.
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Oh, wow. I know. Hi, Karen in Georgia. you guys rocked. I'll attempt to keep this short and sweet. My mom swears to this day that she
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avoided an attack from serial killer Derek Todd Lee, aka the Baton Rouge serial killer back in
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the early 90s. And that's the serial killer just covered in Baton Rouge. Yeah. Lee was convicted
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and sentenced to death for the murder of two women. DNA evidence was also used to link Lee
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to five additional killings from the mid 90s to 2003. Fear of this guy was crazy throughout the
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state of Louisiana for years as he would enter women's homes when they were alone and rape and
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murder them. Her story goes like this. Back in 1990, before I was born, she and my dad were
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living in an apartment near Baton Rouge. My mom was, and still is, a teacher. It was the summertime,
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so naturally she was home alone most of the day while my dad was at work. She said someone knocked
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on the door, claiming to be a repairman who was there to, quote, check on their hot water heater.
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She didn't open the door, but looked through the people and saw a young man standing on the
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doorstep. He wasn't wearing a uniform and she noticed he was driving a small car, not really
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what a repairman looks like or drives, right? Right. Since she was alone, she told him to come
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back later. He then got very rude with her yelling that, quote, if she didn't let him in,
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she would get in trouble with the landlord. And he would, quote, get in trouble with his boss.
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So consequences for you better open the door. Yeah. But she being the smart badass that she
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is responded with, too bad, come back later. Assuming he left, she went back into the living
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room to watch TV when she saw him walking around the side of the house to the back door.
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She sprinted to the back door and locked it, realizing he was going to try to come in that way.
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When he realized the door was locked, he banged on it again, telling her that, quote,
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the landlord said her hot water heater was broken and it needed to be checked right away.
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There's no hot water heater in the world that's this important. No, it's not broken.
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And why would the landlord know it was? You'd be the person calling the landlord to say something's wrong with a hot water heater.
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Yeah, that's not an outside-in job. It's an inside-out job. Right. He kept trying the door a few more minutes, looking in the back window and yelling at her.
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So she called the police of my dad. The man was obviously gone when the cops got there, and they couldn't really do anything except take my mom's statement.
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My parents moved to the house we live in now shortly after this incident. Over 10 years later in 2003, the news broke that Derek Todd Lee had been arrested for the recent killings in the area.
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I will never forget this moment as my mom was standing in the kitchen listening to the news.
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His picture flashed across the screen and she immediately yelled, oh my God, that's him.
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And started to cry. The crying part is like the visceral, like it definitely was him.
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Yeah. Through her tears, she told me the story of what happened back in 1990 at her apartment.
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I had never seen her that shaken up before. She then told me exactly what you two have said in earlier episodes.
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Don't be afraid to be rude. Go with your gut and be smart. You can always apologize later if you hurt someone's feelings.
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It just goes to show that being rude might just save your life. But there's no doubt in her mind or mine that the man who tried to enter her apartment that day was Derek Todd Lee.
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And with that, thank you for your creativity, wit, and just plain badassery. Stay sexy and don't get murdered, Katie.
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Oh, God. I know that was written to us a long time ago when I was doing research on that story. I found that one.
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Sometimes we get emails from people who are like, I think my aunt may have almost gone on a date with Ted Bundy. That's a classic one.
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But like this is so real and horrifying because clearly if it was 10 years before he was arrested does it feel like that was in his ramp up toward like he was just starting to
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Yeah. I don't know that it's just so awful. And then also getting the information of how those other women let him in.
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Remember I was saying how they were always very safe. They didn't answer the door to anyone.
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But yeah, like it's the same thing with like the Boston Strangler where it's like, I'm
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here to fix something that your landlord told me to. You know, a lot of people wouldn't give it a second thought, myself included sometimes.
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And if that one doesn't work, he was doing it so long by the time the people you talked
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about were being like stalked. he probably had the perfect line and the perfect tone of voice and the perfect everything.
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Totally. Ugh. Totally. Okay. I'm not going to read you the subject line of my first one.
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It just starts, Hello. I can't even tell this story inside my own family for stupid reasons I won't go into,
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so I'm giving it to you, dear MFM hosts, in all its glorious stupidity. It is the early 90s.
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My then-girlfriend and I had just moved to California after graduated from college on the East Coast.
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We were a scrappy pair. We didn't have a real plan or much money. For us, it was a big yellow
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rider truck across the country and then a tiny studio apartment in a strange place.
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We were both looking for work, but we didn't have any connections. Somehow I thought the one move I
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should make was to contact a local mobster mentioned to me by my uncle and ask him for a job.
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I still don't know why I thought this was a good idea. It had something to do with the fact that
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it was a family referral and thus felt safe. But I was not really paying attention to what I was
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about to walk into. I met the mobster in his spacious office. He was no different than any
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Italian guy I've ever met, with one exception. He was wearing maybe the nicest sweater I've ever
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seen. That's how you can spot him. I assumed it was cashmere or something very expensive.
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His curly chest hair was popping out from the little zip down part. He was tanned and easy
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going and he spoke in a softened California version of the Italian East Coast accent.
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When he said, how can I help you? Right? Don't you think that's a California version of that?
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That's a good one. I realized I had given no thought whatsoever to how I would respond to this question. I actually
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said, maybe you have a job that's not listed in the paper. As soon as these words came out of my
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mouth, there was a rush of panic in my brain as I came to my senses about what I was doing.
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After a pause, he said, well, maybe we have a place for you in our accounting department.
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By that time, the mental fog had lifted and I was shitting a brick. In my mind, I was like, this is not a movie.
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I am not reading from a script. I'm not messing around with characters on the screen.
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I asked a guy for a mob job, and now I want to get the fuck out of here as soon as possible.
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I had to think quick. I said, you know, I'm really looking for something downtown.
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Do you have anything in that area? I was either lucky or smart, and it was a good deflection.
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He shook his head no, and then his face lit up. Hey, you know that place Nordstrom?
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That might be a good place for you to work. That's a really great place. He went on singing the praises of the fancy department store.
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You could buy a shirt and you don't like it. You take it back. You get a new shirt.
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You could work there. And then you could buy clothes for a discount for your lady friend.
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That last part was especially hilarious because my girlfriend, a thrift store diva, who was
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at that moment sitting in the lobby in one of her signature outfits, would not be caught
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dead in Nordstrom. I made it sound like working at the mall was a really great plan for my future,
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and I got out of there pretty quickly. All in all, this was precisely the kind of dumb, bold failure and escape
00:09:32
that you can only get away with when you're young and clueless. I thought the whole thing was over until the phone rang about six weeks later.
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It was him checking up on us to see how we were doing in that sweet way that Italian men do.
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I told him that both of us had jobs, which was true, and thanked him for his concern,
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And that was the last we ever heard from the Nordstrom Don. Stay sexy and wear nice sweaters.
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Big J. He basically asked for an off the record job. One that's not in the newspaper is like a criminal job.
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Like I'm asking you specifically. Yeah. Like chopping up bodies. Like what are you talking about?
00:10:10
One that's not in the paper. Yeah. You're like, can I run drugs for you? Totally.
00:10:16
This guy's smart because it sounded probably like a sting operation. And he was like, nope, go to Nordstrom.
00:10:20
Goodbye. Yeah, exactly. Or you can, we have an accounting department, but other than that, there's nothing that's
00:10:25
not in the paper. Oh my God. Joy is essential and it's also elusive. But now there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence.
00:10:38
Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me, Hoda Kotb. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting,
00:10:47
and moving on-air chats. Open your free iHeartRadio app, search Joy 101, and listen now.
00:10:54
Joy 101 with Hoda Kotb is presented by CVS. Every story has a point where it's balanced on a knife's edge.
00:11:03
That's where we begin. For some, it's a confrontation no parent ever expects. They finally admit, we're here to take your children.
00:11:11
The department has taken custody, and we're here to take your kids. It was just shock and horror and desperation.
00:11:18
For others, it's surviving the unthinkable. As they're having this gun battle, thousands of feet up in the air,
00:11:25
many of the bullets start to puncture the aircraft. I thought we were going to die then.
00:11:31
The Knife is a podcast about real people whose lives were upended in an instant.
00:11:36
We talked to the people who lived it, unpacking what happened, how they got through it, and what came next.
00:11:42
And on our off-record episodes, we go even deeper into the reporting and answer the questions you can't stop thinking about.
00:11:49
New episodes drop every Thursday on the Exactly Right Network and the iHeart Podcast Network.
00:11:54
Listen to The Knife on the iHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts This is Special Agent Regal Special Agent Bradley Hall In 2018 the FBI took down a ring of spies
00:12:06
working for China's Ministry of State Security, one of the most mysterious intelligence agencies in the world.
00:12:12
The Sixth Bureau podcast is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.
00:12:21
Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:12:29
This one's called I Stole the Mona Lisa. Hello, MFM crew. Picture this. Summer of 2006, I was home from college in a small town, Brandenburg, Kentucky,
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and visiting with friends when we decided to head to the nearest bar that served liquor.
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Our bars only served beer. Oh. I know. That's like some Blue Laws New England stuff.
00:12:52
Yeah, totally. This watering hole was just across the Ohio River in Mackport, sorry, Indiana, and appropriately named the Hoosier Inn.
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I was surely tipsy from pre-gaming when I spotted the Mona Lisa replica on the wall and decided it would be the perfect gift for our friend Ricky, who had the hangout house where we're always crashing at.
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Speaking of being young and dumb. I want to steal stuff. I'm going to steal it and then put it at my friend's house where we all go all the time.
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Right. I got a few friends involved and we made a plan. First person distracted the bartender.
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Second person slid the painting off the wall and third person took it out the back door to the
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covered pickup truck bed. I think it was like full size. Jesus Christ. We figured the bartender
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would be none the wiser until realizing the wall had a very distinct rectangular outline due to
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nicking stains. Moments later, when I went to the bathroom, the door burst open with a female
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bartender yelling, have y'all seen the Mona Lisa? And it says, please say in a Southern drawl. So
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that's why I did that. That was good. Have y'all seen the Mona Lisa? Hey, have y'all seen the Mona
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Lisa? That guy's back. Everyone's here. He's on the case. He'll help out. My face would have been
00:14:08
a dead giveaway. So thank God I was in the clothes stall. She continued to yell for the missing Mona
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Lisa and made quite the scene. Each of us were questioned, but we just shrugged her off.
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When we got home later and I presented Ricky with this present, he said thanks at first and then
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changed his mind deciding he didn't want the stolen property in his house. Ricky was thinking
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straight. Ricky and the bartender were the two sober people in this scenario. They're like,
00:14:32
yeah, whatever you're doing, stop doing it. No, it's not cute. I guess because his neighbor was
00:14:37
the Meade County Sheriff. Lol. Oh my God. I hope the Meade County Sheriff wasn't on the case too.
00:14:43
The Meade County Sheriff is like literally standing behind you while you're like,
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guess what I'm going to do. I took it back from his ungrateful ass and have kept the Mona Lisa
00:14:54
with me proudly displayed on the walls of my various homes ever since. They got away with it.
00:14:59
It is hilarious to me that the real Mona Lisa was missing from a museum for days without notice,
00:15:04
but the Hoosier Inn bartender spotted it in a heartbeat. The Hoosier Inn no longer exists and or has changed ownership.
00:15:12
So I felt almost 20 years later, it was finally safe to tell this story. SSDGM, Eliza.
00:15:18
Eliza. Here comes the sheriff. I hope the bartender's listening right now and is like, I fucking knew it.
00:15:26
I knew it, those bitches. You need to write to us immediately. Also that kind of thing where like, it's such a drunken idea.
00:15:32
Yeah, that's how I spend all my drunken time. Would it be like looking around getting a little
00:15:38
Excited inspiration it'd be like come on we have to do it and it's the worst dumbest idea
00:15:44
Just like needing some adventure. Yeah, and kind of thinking like the world is now as drunk as you are
00:15:49
So everyone's perception is fucked up and you're gonna be able to get away with shit
00:15:54
You know what we need bartender stories. Oh, yes Are you, have you been a bartender?
00:16:01
Any part in your life, we need the wildest stories, the stupidest stories. Please, we beg you.
00:16:07
We beg you. No, no story too small. Also, like somebody was talking, oh, it was a TikTok that I saw where somebody was like,
00:16:15
hey, if you're a regular at a bar, not only are you not beloved, we hate you. Oh no.
00:16:22
Oh no. It was hilarious. But I mean, you think about it where it's just like, yeah, these are people that come to your job and get shit faced in front of you.
00:16:31
Right. And try to talk to you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, my God. So funny. I mean, yeah, it's a little it's a little harsh, but I like the idea of it.
00:16:39
OK. The subject line of this email is traumatic Girl Scout camping trip. And it just gets right into it.
00:16:46
It just starts. I'm the same age as Karen. and aside from the awesome storytelling, one of my favorite parts of MFM is reminiscing on the
00:16:52
mayhem that was the 1970s and 80s childhood. I just finished listening to the mini-sode with
00:16:57
the story of the dad who invented Greasy Pete to scare his kids from wandering off into the woods
00:17:03
while camping. I forgot about that. I've wanted to tell you this story for a while, but Greasy
00:17:09
Pete was the sign I needed to write to you about my first and only Girl Scout camping trip. I was
00:17:15
in the third grade, the year we got to go on the real Girl Scout camping trip in the actual woods
00:17:20
with tents and campfires and everything a suburban kid who never camped before could imagine.
00:17:26
I had already completed the prerequisite first and second grade camping trips, which consisted
00:17:30
of a one night sleepover on the cold, hard, probably asbestos tiled floor in the basement
00:17:36
of the town's Presbyterian church. We did something similar to that. It's like they're breaking in, camping to you. Like first, you're going to be away from your
00:17:45
house, then you're going to be in a sleeping bag. Here's some pine needles we can put in the church
00:17:50
floor In the time building up to the trip the excitement was profound When arrived at camp we got our tent assignments did some outdoorsy stuff to earn badges And when night fell the chaperones lit a campfire and we of course got to hear some spooky stories They were fairly benign except for the last one the story of Lefty Louie
00:18:10
a madman who lived in these woods, had a hook where his left hand should be, and of course,
00:18:15
eight little girls. It was a scary story, but everyone seemed pretty okay when story time was
00:18:19
over, and it was time for bed. We lined up, flashlights in hand, and started down the short
00:18:23
wooded trail to the restroom building to wash up. A few minutes into our walk, out of a pile of
00:18:29
leaves beside the trail, jumped a full grown hook handed bearded man who shouted in a low, low
00:18:36
spooky voice. I'm Lefty Louie. Why do you need to traumatize children, adults? I guess it was like
00:18:45
they were all stoned listening to like Led Zeppelin and like, you know what would be cool?
00:18:50
Yeah, let's scare the shit out of the children. Out of third graders. Shrieks ensued, pants were peed, tears were shed,
00:18:57
and all at once the adults realized that they had misjudged the age rating for this prank.
00:19:03
I don't remember how long it took. Yeah, that's actually a perfect seventh grade prank.
00:19:07
Yes, totally. Third grade, go to hell. I'm the third grade lawyer and I say go to hell.
00:19:12
I don't remember how long it took to get the group calmed down, but I do remember the next morning
00:19:17
when our parents rolled up in their wood-paneled station wagons to take us home.
00:19:21
One or two girls must have told their parents about Lefty Louie because there was a good amount
00:19:25
of yelling, frantic hand-waving, and what were you thinking directed at the troop leader
00:19:29
and her husband, a.k.a. Lefty Louie. I've never camped again, and to this day, I only hike if I'm guaranteed
00:19:37
to be the fuck out of the woods while the sun is still high in the sky. Thank you for keeping us
00:19:41
all entertained, bringing back so many Gen X memories, and of course, advocating for those
00:19:46
who need it. Stay sexy and maybe don't hide in leaf piles to traumatize third grade Girl Scouts,
00:19:52
Robin, she, her. Robin is such a 70s, 80s name too. That's hilarious. Oh yeah, that's so true.
00:19:58
Oh my God, no. No, it's like scary enough to be in the woods without a fucking monster jumping out at you.
00:20:06
I have anxiety right now from that email of just like, oh, that's gonna, now they have to get into bed.
00:20:12
No one's sleeping. No. And imagine if you did pee your pants, how embarrassing that would be.
00:20:17
And like, oh. But you were right to pee your pants. Yeah, it was a pee your pants situation.
00:20:23
By any means necessary, get away from lefty Louie. Fuck. In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins,
00:20:35
but the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test twice, Ms. Owens, correct?
00:20:41
I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern.
00:20:46
Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Gillespie and Michael Mancini.
00:20:52
My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. Laura, Scottsdale Police.
00:20:58
As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:21:10
Every story has a point where it's balanced on a knife's edge. That's where we begin.
00:21:15
For some, it's a confrontation no parent ever expects. They finally admit, we're here to take your children.
00:21:22
The department has taken custody and we're here to take your kids. It was just shock and horror and desperation.
00:21:28
For others, it's surviving the unthinkable. As they're having this gun battle, thousands of feet up in the air,
00:21:36
many of the bullets start to puncture the aircraft. I thought we were going to die then.
00:21:40
The Knife is a podcast about real people whose lives were upended in an instant.
00:21:47
We talk to the people who lived it, unpacking what happened, how they got through it, and what came next.
00:21:53
And on our off-record episodes, we go even deeper into the reporting and answer the questions you can't stop thinking about.
00:22:00
New episodes drop every Thursday on the Exactly Right Network and the iHeart Podcast Network.
00:22:04
Listen to The Knife on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:22:09
Before NXIVM, Nancy Solzman wanted to help people. Being able to help somebody, it's probably the biggest motivator of my entire life.
00:22:17
She trained in something called neuro-linguistic programming. People loved our training.
00:22:22
Then, everything changed. Yeah, and they called it a cult. How does a method designed to improve lives end up in a cult?
00:22:30
A knife in the hands of a surgeon is an amazing tool. A knife in the hands of a murderer is a weapon.
00:22:36
Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:22:46
Okay, here's my last one. Antique Roadshow Hometown, an OG declaration of independence.
00:22:53
Greetings, Murderino royalty. Listening to the latest minisode, I heard your request for great thrift finds.
00:23:00
And I knew I had to write in about this one because it's almost unbelievable. Several years ago, my husband was working a job you can probably only be hired for in LA, New York, or Nashville.
00:23:10
He was a cartage driver. You know what that is? Cartage? Uh-huh. Is it something like on sets?
00:23:17
Kind of. You're basically a moving guy, but you work exclusively with famous musicians, moving instruments and gear around to venues and studios across town all day long.
00:23:28
They're like moving guys that don't fuck up because you can't fuck up like Paul McCartney's one guitar.
00:23:34
Right. And Paul McCartney doesn't want to throw it in his trunk and head there. So he needs some of that.
00:23:39
And it's probably like insured and specialized. Yeah. Oh, my God. That'd be terrifying.
00:23:44
If you don't mind manual labor and you're chill around famous people, it's the job for you.
00:23:50
He totally had the energy of a UPS driver that marries Jennifer Coolidge in Legally Blonde.
00:23:56
Not exactly what you're talking about. Calm, cool, and collected. The kind of vibe that comes from someone who doesn't worry too much.
00:24:03
Sounds nice. I mean, how? I mean, have you looked around lately? Things aren't great.
00:24:09
No, things are not great. It's time to worry. It's time to worry. He probably was so chill because 10 years before,
00:24:15
he happened upon one of the greatest thrift finds of maybe all time. At a local Nashville thrift store,
00:24:21
he picked up a replica of the Declaration of Independence for $2.48. Thinking it was pretty cool and looked old.
00:24:29
That's something I would never look twice at. You know what I mean? I don't care about that shit.
00:24:33
Because also, you would know for a fact it's not, it can't be real. It's not like some secret painter.
00:24:37
No, it's from the Cracker Barrel fucking gift store. Like, no. Oh, no. Yeah. It's your, that aunt that really loves America that was like, no, I want my own copy.
00:24:48
Oh, my God. It's like she got everyone one for Christmas that year. And okay. Well, this particular replica was one of only 200 commissioned by John Quincy Adams.
00:24:57
No. Handwritten by William Stone in 1823. Holy shit. Shows us. Literal national treasure.
00:25:05
Literally. His copy was one of 36 surviving copies and was in pretty good condition.
00:25:11
At auction, it sold for $400,077,650. Oh, half a million dollars. He paid $2.48 for it.
00:25:23
Okay, so he grossed. Roast. So it says, wait, wait, wait. But to an investment firm in Salt Lake City in 2007, which in today's money is over $600,000.
00:25:33
Oh, beautiful. Mikey said he used the money to buy a used car, help his parents, tith to his church.
00:25:42
That's tithe. Tithe. Tithe is the money you give every Sunday. Got it. And built a sun porch on his house.
00:25:49
Thought you would all love this ultimate thrifting success story. stay sexy and find valuable treasures so you can coast into retirement. Rochelle.
00:25:57
Rochelle, I absolutely love that story. It is epic. It touches something in me that was opened up
00:26:07
around 1990 when I started going in Sacramento to thrift stores and realizing the potential
00:26:14
treasure that was in front of me. But you don't really hear like you hear the ones that are like,
00:26:19
oh this purse was actually a real Chanel and I redid it and it sold for four thousand dollars or
00:26:24
something but six hundred thousand dollars do you remember what I was thinking about I always think
00:26:29
about this what was thrifting like in the 70s like all you found was 1920s gorgeous art deco
00:26:37
shit and turn of the century fucking yes tchotchkes like my dream also you know I think about that
00:26:44
because there's a Charles Dickens I think it's bleak house where one of the characters owns like
00:26:49
what they call a curiosity shop which is a basically a vintage store but in victorian times
00:26:55
for like antiques and i like i know it just a set but it so realistically done and it because everything like candle lit and in like dusty corners like i would absolutely kill I think that would be like if you could make a wish the wish to walk through that store and see what actually in there
00:27:13
Yeah. Okay. Here's my last one. And it's kind of long, but I think it's worth it. Okay. I'm not going
00:27:19
to read you the subject line. So it says, hi, me again. You asked for a follow-up from my previous
00:27:25
email and I'm finally getting around to it. So this was someone that sent in something and at
00:27:30
the end wrote, I'll tell you about my coffee date with Ann Rule a different time. And then we
00:27:35
I believe. Yeah. So it says you wanted an update on my coffee with Ann Rule as well as my great,
00:27:41
maybe not so great grandmother who was most likely a black widow. So here goes about 20 or so years
00:27:47
ago. And rule had a book signing in my city. I just recently become acquainted with her books.
00:27:52
Remember the black and white photos that were always in the middle. Turn to those immediately
00:27:57
first and I wouldn't know what was going on in the story totally that's how I saw that picture
00:28:02
in the John Wayne Gacy book that my cousin Marty had right that haunted me forever and landed me
00:28:08
here on the podcast my favorite murder how fortuitous it really has been quite fortuitous
00:28:16
okay so I was thrilled that she was going to be in town the day of her signing was pretty crappy
00:28:22
lots of sleet, maybe some snow. I can't remember all the meteorological nightmare that was that day,
00:28:28
but it was bad. But not for this fledgling murderino. The bookstore that she was at wasn't
00:28:33
too far from my office, so I made the short drive over. When I got there, I was sort of thrilled that
00:28:39
there weren't a lot of people. And then in parentheses it says, I'm sure Miss Rule didn't
00:28:42
have the same opinion. Anyway, she signed several books for me, and since there was hardly anyone
00:28:47
around, we just started talking. And then she asked if I'd like to get a coffee, which I did.
00:28:52
I can't remember if there was a coffee shop attached to the bookstore or just one next door.
00:28:56
But we sat with our cups and just talked like old friends. Oh, my God. For some reason, it's making me want to cry.
00:29:03
Also, like, I mean, it's just like strange. How do you meet people like that? That sounds so lovely.
00:29:07
And I feel like she had, you know, she's one of those people I feel like I know her when I'm remembering.
00:29:13
It's like, that's my mom's friend. But it's not. It's somebody you don't know. but I feel like the breadth of the her life and the different work she did she's like an interested
00:29:22
person interested and has a great knack for making people comfortable immediately around her yeah
00:29:29
journalists you know all these things serial killers killers I mean she was good yeah okay
00:29:36
so sorry to be honest I can't remember what we discussed but I just remember thinking what a
00:29:40
wonderful wonderful person she is she was very warm but you knew she had a bit of toughness to
00:29:45
in a good way, in a way that many of us should emulate. So that's it. Just a nice conversation
00:29:50
between two women. On the flip side, there's my great grandmother. My dear great grandma came to
00:29:55
a small town in Wisconsin from Paris, where she married my great grandfather who owned a bar in
00:30:00
town. They had four children relatively quickly, although one child passed at a young age.
00:30:05
One of the bar patrons was a young man who as my family history tells it took a fancy to my grandmother He was much younger than she was and she had small children but apparently that didn stop them At this point I also like to interject that it was during this period that my great
00:30:19
grandmother took up gardening, like a lot of gardening, and she fenced in that garden so
00:30:24
nobody could get to it but her. It wasn't long after this man entered her life and the gardening
00:30:30
was blooming that my great-grandfather passed away from an alleged heart attack. He was 42.
00:30:36
My grandmother sold the bar for a decent amount of money. She then married this young man.
00:30:40
She kept gardening and he worked for the railroad. And in those days, that made for quite a good living.
00:30:45
Plus, there was always the railroad pension. Apparently, the marriage was not the happiest.
00:30:50
And as luck would have it, husband number two suddenly passed away from a heart attack.
00:30:55
He was 30. Oh, my God. So great-grandma now had inheritance number two. At some point, she turned her home into a boarding house.
00:31:04
And that's where husband number three comes in. He was allegedly a renter at her home.
00:31:08
He was older than she was and, gasp, worked for the railroad. Holy shit. Oh, my God.
00:31:15
He also had a much bigger pension than husband number two because he had been with the railroad company longer.
00:31:21
They got and stayed married for about 10 years. And then he suddenly passed away from, do you see where I'm going here?
00:31:28
A goddamn heart attack. Did they write, do you see where I'm going here? Yep, yep.
00:31:32
Love it. You would think people would be questioning all these deaths, but they lived in a small Wisconsin town, and this was about 100 years or so ago.
00:31:41
Maybe the whole autopsy thing didn't happen frequently. I do know that both within the small community and the family, there are several, including my 88-year-old mother, who think that this woman had something to do with all the deaths.
00:31:53
It turns out that in that fenced garden were quite a few native Wisconsin plants that can cause heart attacks or simulate the effects of a heart attack when ingested.
00:32:02
I did want to end with this. I am in my sixth decade on this planet, and I've often thought that I've lived a very ordinary life. But I've come to realize that within every so-called ordinary life are extraordinary moments. After writing this, I realized that I've had some pretty interesting experiences. Anne Rule, hidden room, Black Widow, relative. Nobody is ever just ordinary. Nobody. We need to remember that about ourselves.
00:32:28
Stay sexy and don't ever think that you're anything less than extraordinary, Lori.
00:32:33
Oh my God, Lori. What a perfect fucking email. What a beautiful, rich tapestry of an email.
00:32:41
You know what I, my mind goes to the last husband was real true love. 10 years. It's a long time not to kill someone when you killed the other ones.
00:32:50
And he actually died of a heart attack. Almost like it was her karma that the one she actually loved.
00:32:58
died of a real heart attack. Do you know what you just did is you wrote an incredible screenplay
00:33:02
right there. That is like, right? Isn't that irony? Isn't that like a bunch of paradox or whatever,
00:33:09
like a bunch of those big vocabulary words you can slap on there But like then she would be like no no the one I wanted all along That beautiful Let write it Let write it Don kill people with weeds or plants
00:33:23
Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it. That's it. Thank you guys. Amazing emails.
00:33:29
Bartenders, please send your emails to myfavoritemurder at gmail.com. We're going to need it.
00:33:34
Bartender stories, yes. Bartender stories, please. and what you think is the ultimate thrift store victory story.
00:33:42
Yeah. Or even a medium. It doesn't have to be ultimate. Did I once tell you that I bought a really cute jacket from a thrift store,
00:33:48
like an old 60s like sailor jacket? And inside was a little piece of paper with the word victory on it.
00:33:54
Really? So I got the victory that you were just talking about. The thrift store victory.
00:33:58
That is crazy. I think I still have it somewhere. We both die tonight. No, I can't leave the house.
00:34:07
Stay sexy. And don't get murdered for 24 hours. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie?
00:34:16
Ah. and Facebook at MyFavoriteMurder and on Twitter at MyFaveMurder. Goodbye! Your husband is not who you think he is.
00:34:49
Your body is not what you thought it was. Your identity is formed by a secret history.
00:34:54
I'm Dani Shapiro, and these are just a few of the stunning stories I'll be exploring on the 14th season of Family Secrets.
00:35:02
He kind of shoved me out of the way and said, move, and he went out the front door
00:35:06
and he jumped in a car and drove off, and that was the last time I saw him. Listen to Season 14 of Family Secrets
00:35:11
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Will Ferrell's Big Money Players
00:35:18
and iHeart Podcast presents Soccer Moms. So I'm Leanne. Yeah. This is my best friend, Janet.
00:35:23
Hey. And we have been joined at the hip since high school. Absolutely. A redacted amount of years later,
00:35:29
we're still joined at the hip. Just a little bit bigger hips. This is a podcast.
00:35:32
We're recording it as we tailgate our youth soccer games in the back of my Honda Odyssey
00:35:36
with all the snacks and drinks. Why did you get hard seltzer instead of beer? Oh, they had a BOGO.
00:35:42
Well, then you got them. Listen to Soccer Moms on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:35:49
If you live in L.A., you already spend about 89% of your life in a car. So we turned it into a podcast.
00:35:55
On Do You Need a Ride, we pick up our comedian friends, drive around Los Angeles,
00:35:59
and discuss what's happening in the world around us. Cars are very rude to bicyclists,
00:36:04
But in this case, it's a bicyclist going out of his way to get in the way of traffic.
00:36:08
All you did was roll your window down. He almost hit that. It's like a talk show, but going 30 miles an hour.
00:36:14
New episodes every Monday on the Exactly Right Network. Listen to Do You Need a Ride on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.