00:00:00
This is exactly right. Isn't some far off concept? It's already here. Next starts now.
00:00:33
Hyundai, an official partner of FIFA. Goodbye. When a charming neurosurgeon rode into Frontier Town
00:00:39
selling a persona of confidence and care, patients trusted him. He wore cowboy boots in the operating room
00:00:45
and became sought after by patients. He promised to heal them. Instead, he left a trail of broken bodies.
00:00:51
This is a story of greed, betrayal, and a fight for justice. Listen to Dr. Death the Cowboy wherever you get your podcasts
00:00:58
or binge the entire series right now only with Audible. Goodbye. This episode is brought to you in part by Vital Farms.
00:01:06
Have you noticed that the egg section at the grocery store has gotten very complicated lately?
00:01:10
But Vital Farms makes it simple. Pasture-raised eggs traceable to the farm. Their hens have outdoor access year-round
00:01:16
with fresh air and sunshine and forage on rotated pastures with local grasses. Every carton can be traced back to the farm it came from
00:01:22
so you can see the pasture where the hens live by visiting vitalfarms.com slash farm.
00:01:27
Look for the black carton in the egg aisle and visit vitalfarms.com to learn more.
00:01:31
Vital Farms. Good eggs, no shortcuts. Goodbye. Hello. Hello. And welcome to My Favorite Murder. That's Georgia Hartstark. That's Karen Kilgariff.
00:02:00
Hi. What? You came to us. What? You called. You called me. There's a whole era of things like
00:02:13
that that don't get to happen anymore because nobody makes phone calls on the daily like we
00:02:17
used to. I miss hanging up on people in the middle of them talking as a joke. That used to be my
00:02:23
favorite thing to do. Powerfully, like with the handheld phone and you slam it down or like
00:02:28
quietly. And no, just like mid conversation of someone, you know what I mean? It's like the
00:02:33
second I actually did feel bored and then I knew they would think it was funny. I would only do it
00:02:38
to people who would think it was funny. I would just hang out because it's just like, let's not
00:02:41
be on the phone anymore. Brutal, brutal. Speaking of brutal, how are your holidays going?
00:02:46
Has your mom dropped any overt hints about things she wants you to be doing that you don't want to be doing?
00:02:53
We get it. We hope your holiday is going well. These are our little shorty episodes so that we can have a little holiday break, too.
00:02:59
But guess what? It's all new content. And we're giving a donation for the holidays this week.
00:03:06
Our donation is to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. NAMI, N-A-M-I, works to educate, support, advocate, listen, and lead to improve the lives of people with mental illness and their loved ones.
00:03:19
Their website is NAMI.org. So check them out. We're giving them $10,000. If you have anything to give, do it.
00:03:26
If you need help, go there as well. And yeah, we're happy to do that. Yes, that's exciting.
00:03:31
All right. Well, it's me this week. and George I have a story for you that I'd never heard of but it's kind of like it's an exciting
00:03:41
kind of adventurous kind of a Coen Brothers vibe there's a lot going on in the story I think you're
00:03:50
gonna like it it takes place at the United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth Kansas it's a 30 mile
00:03:57
drive from Kansas City just to clarify because I know you get confused this is the United States
00:04:03
Penitentiary Leavenworth or USP Leavenworth, it's often confused with the nearby military prison,
00:04:09
the United States Disciplinary Barracks. Both of them are shorthanded as Leavenworth.
00:04:14
They're separate institutions. Let's clear this confusion that's just on everyone's minds on a
00:04:21
daily basis. Whose nickname was it first? Because we need to fix that. It's very confusing for us
00:04:26
civilians. Someone write in who knows these answers. But the Leavenworth I'm talking about,
00:04:32
along with Alcatraz, is one of the most famous federal prisons in the United States. So I'm
00:04:36
talking about the famous one. But unlike Alcatraz, Leavenworth is still operational today.
00:04:42
It first opened in the late 1890s. And over the years, it has held some infamous criminals. And
00:04:49
in the 20s and 30s, when America was in its, you know, public enemy era, legendary gangster,
00:04:56
and ex-husband of Megan Fox, Machine Gun Kelly served time in Leavenworth, as did Al Capone's right-hand man, Frank Nitti. In 1931, Leavenworth was the site of one of the
00:05:09
most violent, ambitious, and wildly unsuccessful prison breaks in U.S. history. This is the story
00:05:17
of the 1931 Leavenworth prison break. Ooh, a prison break. That's a good one. Right? So the main source for today's story is the book Leavenworth Seven by author Kenneth
00:05:28
Lemaster. And Maren says that book is very much worth reading. If you like this story and you want
00:05:35
to hear all the details, get the book Leavenworth Seven by Kenneth Lemaster. And the rest of the
00:05:41
sources are in our show notes. So this starts around 9 a.m. on a mid-December morning at
00:05:47
Leavenworth in 1931. It's been an unusually rainy and very cold past few weeks, but despite this
00:05:54
gloomy lazy day weather Leavenworth Prison is buzzing with activity So clearly not a lot of lazy days in prison So over in the administrative offices 50 warden Thomas B White is preparing
00:06:08
to meet with some inmates as he does every morning between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Warden White holds
00:06:14
these office hours so he can hear the prisoners' complaints or suggestions. Oh, sure. I mean,
00:06:20
he was pretty progressive for the 30s, actually. Yeah. But the idea of that where it's like,
00:06:25
could we have a little more salt in the food? Right. Or a suggestion box in a prison. Yeah.
00:06:30
But straight to the warden's face. So good luck. If you wanted to go have one of these meetings
00:06:35
with Warden White, you would have to leave the more secure part of the prison and enter the
00:06:39
administrative area. And basically all you needed at that time to do that was like a hall pass,
00:06:44
basically. So if you've seen the movie Killers of the Flower Moon, the new Scorsese movie.
00:06:50
Not yet. Yeah. I want to see it so bad. I haven't seen it yet either. So in it, Jesse Plemons, the great actor
00:06:57
and Mr. Kristen Dunst, Jesse Plemons, he plays Warden White in that movie. Oh, interesting.
00:07:04
But in real life, White is a towering six foot four Texan, a former Texas Ranger and a special
00:07:10
agent for various railroad companies. So he was at Pinkerton. Then he joined the FBI,
00:07:16
where he helped crack the unsolved spate of murders of Native Americans in Oklahoma.
00:07:21
That's what Killers of the Flower Moon is all about. So after working the Osage case,
00:07:26
Thomas left the FBI and he joined the U.S. Bureau of Prisons. And he was sent to Leavenworth,
00:07:31
where he was expected to bring a much needed sense of order to the overcrowded prison. And by 1931,
00:07:38
Thomas B. White has been Leavenworth's warden for almost five years. Coincidentally, that's the same amount of time this one group of inmates has been planning a prison break right underneath the warden's nose. So for almost five years, they have been planning to break out of Leavenworth.
00:07:57
I guess even nothing but time, right? Yeah. So three of these men were sent to Leavenworth for the same train robbery.
00:08:05
George Curtis, Grover C. Durrell, and Earl Thayer. The other four men are Will Green, Tom Underwood, Charlie Berta, and Stanley Brown.
00:08:14
They're all doing time for either assaulting or robbing various mail carriers or post offices.
00:08:20
So obviously a federal crime. and because that's so many names to keep track of,
00:08:25
we're basically going to just call these guys the Leavenworth Seven or the Seven.
00:08:30
So each of these men are assigned work duties in the prison. Underwood and Durrell work in...
00:08:34
I immediately don't do that. That's really funny. Underwood and Durrell work in the main hospital.
00:08:42
Green works in the laundry room. Brown is in the plumbing. Berta is on a construction crew.
00:08:48
And Curtis and Thayer work in the prison shoe factory. Which of those jobs would you want if you had to pick one?
00:08:54
Absolutely shoe factory. I'm like, I would like to work in a shoe factory. You want to.
00:08:58
What was the first one again? The first choice was the hospital. I do the hospital.
00:09:03
Hospital, laundry room. You could be a plumber, construction crew, or shoe factory.
00:09:07
I feel like plumber is the worst. A plumber in a prison? No, thank you. Oh, yeah, that's true.
00:09:13
It's like, it's a bunch of drugs down here. That's why your toilet isn't fledging because you are hiding and mewling drugs.
00:09:20
Yeah. So the reason the morning is so busy in Leavenworth is that some inmates are headed off to their job posts while many are leaving their overnight shifts and headed back to their cells.
00:09:31
And then others are just going out to the mess hall for breakfast. As writer and historian Kenneth LeMaster points out, quote, one of the most unsettled times in an institution is when you have a large movement going on.
00:09:43
If you've got thousands of inmates running around the institution, they could move a little unnoticed, end quote.
00:09:50
And that's exactly what the Leavenworth Seven are banking on. So instead of heading to where they're supposed to go, the men take advantage of the morning rush and they head to their stash spots where they've been hiding weapons for the past four years, four to five years.
00:10:05
This arsenal includes a shotgun, a rifle, six pistols, 17 sticks of dynamite, blasting caps and cords and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.
00:10:16
Like I wouldn't even know where to get that today as a civilian. And they figured out how to get that in prison.
00:10:22
You know, it's the bad guy era, right? As we said, and they've been doing it. They've been like stowing it away for so long that it's like if they've gotten, you know, two a year.
00:10:33
Accumulated. It's accumulated. But it would just be so hard to be that patient. Hell no.
00:10:38
It's not easy smuggling this much firepower into a federal prison, obviously. But the Leavenworth Seven have been working on this for five years.
00:10:45
So they've been conspiring with their gangster friends on the outside to get everything they'd need to make a successful prison break.
00:10:52
And they also had help on the inside. Some prison officers for $1 would either send or receive letters from the outside world.
00:11:01
And in these letters, the seven used code words to request certain supplies and to instruct their friends on how to sneak them into the facility undetected.
00:11:11
So according to Kenneth LeMaster, this is how they did it. the weapons were sent in boxes labeled as glue shoe paste and oil right and members of the seven
00:11:23
presumably the ones who worked in the shoe factory they noticed that the shoe repair supplies
00:11:28
usually come with a warning label on the boxes that said things like do not open because quote
00:11:34
doing so could cause the materials to dry out and become unusable smart so it was like a normal
00:11:40
practice to just, oh, these are shoe supplies. Don't open it. Don't inspect it. Just send it
00:11:44
through. So smart. Right. So once the weapons were inside the prison, the seven would intercept them
00:11:51
and stash them away And so in the last few days everything that they requested has finally come in They gotten the last bunch of stuff that they needed So now it time to put their big almost five plan in motion
00:12:05
The original plan would have been that the seven bust out of prison and get picked up on a nearby
00:12:10
road in a getaway car. But the group's go-to guys on the outside have just been involved in a bank
00:12:18
robbery that turned deadly. So they're currently on the run and they can't come and be the getaway
00:12:23
driver. None of them. That happens. Hang around the barbershop. You're going to get a haircut.
00:12:29
You know what I'm saying? Can I tell you my new favorite saying? Yes. Play stupid games,
00:12:34
win stupid prizes. Where'd you get that? You know Housewives of Orange County? Something like that. I don't know. It's like, I fucking love it.
00:12:42
It's true. So even though they don't have a solid getaway plan, the Leavenworth Seven decide
00:12:49
they're just going to wing it. They cannot wait another minute. It is officially go time.
00:12:53
If you spend all day waiting to take your bra off, it might be time for Third Love.
00:12:59
If you're looking for breathable, lightweight comfort this summer, you're going to love Third Love.
00:13:03
Third Love is built around getting the fit right instead of expecting you to put up with something that doesn't work.
00:13:08
And Third Love offers a full range of sizes from AA to H, including their exclusive half cup sizes,
00:13:14
so you can find a fit that feels just right instead of close enough. Stop settling for bad bras.
00:13:19
Whether you're looking for more lift, back smoothing, or straps that stay put, Third Love
00:13:24
can find your fit fast. Their virtual fitting room gets you in the right size and matches you with
00:13:28
the best styles for your shape. If you've ever been fitted for the right size bra, you are in
00:13:33
for a treat. It actually changes the whole game with bras. I thought I was like a something,
00:13:38
something A cup. I'm a something, something B cup, and it's just changed my bra game. I thought
00:13:43
I just hated bras, but I was wearing the wrong size. And with Third Love, like they're so
00:13:47
comfortable that it doesn't even feel like I'm wearing a bra. Use code MFM15 for $15 off your
00:13:52
first purchase at thirdlove.com. Goodbye. While the world watches the stars at the FIFA World Cup
00:13:59
this summer, Hyundai has its eyes on the next generation of talent. The future soccer stars
00:14:03
who are already turning heads at age 14. Making plays that end up on everyone's feed, scoring
00:14:08
from angles that don't make sense, rewriting record books that barely had time to gather dust.
00:14:13
Because Next doesn't wait for an invitation and Hyundai doesn't either. Hyundai has always moved the future within reach.
00:14:19
Hyundai did it by making advanced safety standard on every vehicle. Hyundai did it by engineering EVs with ultra-fast charging capability.
00:14:26
And Hyundai continues doing it every day. From robotics that change how people live to young athletes changing the game,
00:14:33
the future isn't some far-off concept. It's already here. Next starts now. Hyundai, an official partner of FIFA.
00:14:39
Goodbye. Peace of mind can be hard to come by. Especially at 2 a.m. when your house suddenly makes a weird noise.
00:14:45
That's why so many people trust SimpliSafe to help keep their home secure. Traditional home security only alerts you after a break-in has already happened, and that's too late.
00:14:54
SimpliSafe is changing that. The system is customizable so you can build the one that fits your home and your specific needs.
00:15:00
The 24-7 professional monitoring is effective and affordable and won't lock you into a long-term contract.
00:15:07
Listen, Cookie is a really good watchdog, but she's not going to tell me what is actually going on,
00:15:11
if it's a raccoon or if it's a person looking through my windows. like you have to get this level of safety if you want to feel as safe as possible.
00:15:19
So you know what's going on. So I just feel safer with actually having something like SimpliSafe around.
00:15:24
There's a whole staff at SimpliSafe that's waiting to talk to you and help you out and tell you, no, you're fine.
00:15:29
It's a raccoon. Right now you can get 50% off your new system by visiting simplisafe.com slash MFM.
00:15:35
That's half off at simplisafe.com slash MFM. There's no safe like SimpliSafe. Goodbye.
00:15:40
Goodbye. So to kick things off, Darrell, Curtis, and Underwood head toward the warden's office with a forged warden's hall pass, right?
00:15:51
Pretending that they're going to go make some suggestions. Got it. We'd love a nice pasta every couple nights.
00:15:58
How about Tuesday taco night? Hey, it would be fun. It would uplift the prisoners.
00:16:03
Right. Bring us all together. Come on. Everyone loves a buffet. I'll shred the cheese.
00:16:08
Okay. So they present this fake hall pass to the gate officer. The gate officer thinks it's legit.
00:16:15
He lets the inmates into the main corridor, and he assumes that they're just going to head off into the direction of Warden White's office.
00:16:22
Instead, as the three men pass through the gate, George Curtis pulls out a pistol that he's hidden in his clothing.
00:16:27
He shoves it into the officer's back, and he demands the officer hand over his gate keys.
00:16:33
Once he has those keys, Curtis unlocks the gate behind them so that the other four members of the Leavenworth Seven can join them.
00:16:40
And then they take that officer hostage. They pull out their weapons and they push him down the hallway toward the warden's office.
00:16:47
So it's on big time. They immediately have a hostage of one of the prison officers.
00:16:53
Like, there's no going back. Too easy. It was. When they get to the warden's office door, they push their way inside and they take two clerks and the warden's secretary hostage.
00:17:04
So there's like the inner office and then the warden's office is the inner inner office.
00:17:09
So they grab those people. Meanwhile, Warden White, he's in his office just beyond the second set of doors.
00:17:15
So he's meeting with his first inmate of the day who just so happens to be another famous criminal.
00:17:21
It's Fred Barker, the son of Ma Barker of the Barker-Karpus gang. Is that just a coincidence?
00:17:27
If you want to go re-listen to episode 364, the B.I., where I tell you the story of Ma Barker, that's where he got sent after he was arrested. So he was, I mean, it's not a coincidence only in that he's also a famous guy.
00:17:40
Yeah, that's all I mean, is like a coincidence that someone we know is in the office at that very moment.
00:17:44
It just storytelling magic is what it is So when Warden White hears that there a commotion outside of the office he immediately assumes it an attempted prison break And he immediately knows the one thing escapees want most of all and that a getaway car So he takes his car keys out of his pocket and he really quickly hides them under the rug
00:18:05
So this guy's, like, on it. Yeah. He's been a Pinkerton. He's, like, he knows his stuff.
00:18:09
No bullshit. Then he looks at Fred Barker, he tells him to sit tight, and then he walks over to the office door,
00:18:15
throws it open, and sees the barrel of a gun pointing in his face. Warden White immediately submits to the Leavenworth Seven
00:18:21
and becomes another hostage in this growing group of hostages. It turns out the warden was right.
00:18:28
His car is, in fact, what the group is after. So they plan to take his keys, walk to the warden's nearby residence,
00:18:35
which is seemingly right next door from the descriptions I've read. And they're going to steal his Buick,
00:18:42
which sits on the front lawn of Leavenworth, so they know that his car is out there.
00:18:46
The group leaves Fred Barker behind, but they grab a construction foreman and two typewriter repairmen who just happened to be on site that day.
00:18:54
So now there's even more hostages. That's too many. It's so many. You can't keep track of that many hostages.
00:19:00
And also, I'm just trying to picture how they're moving. Like, is there an inner circle of like 10 hostages as the seven are on the outside?
00:19:08
Taking tiny steps. I just imagine it's like the three stooges, you know. Yes. They have to move en masse or not at all.
00:19:15
Right, right. Okay. So the group heads to the front door. when they reach the front door,
00:19:20
they see an officer named J.H. Dempsey and they order him to open it. Dempsey refuses.
00:19:27
So George Curtis pulls out several sticks of dynamite that have been tied together and yells,
00:19:31
quote, if this gate isn't open by the time I light this fuse, I'll blow us all to hell.
00:19:36
To which Officer Dempsey responds, quote, I guess we'll all see each other in hell then.
00:19:42
Fuck. Hey. Hey, guy. And that's not just bluster. officer Dempsey is actually following protocol but at the same time Warden White is convinced
00:19:52
that George Curtis along with these other members of the Leavenworth Seven have nothing to lose
00:19:57
they really might be willing to blow themselves up versus bungling their escape plan and with the
00:20:03
lives of these hostages now on the line including himself Warden White is trying to determine what
00:20:09
action will cause the least amount of damage yeah if the dynamite's lit Warden White knows
00:20:14
multiple innocent people could die right here in Leavenworth's main corridor. If that's not dire
00:20:19
enough, the entire front of the prison could become blown off basically if he really does it.
00:20:24
And that would lead to even more inmates escaping. So the warden orders Officer Dempsey to open the
00:20:30
front door and let them pass. So as the group moves outside, the seven take Officer Dempsey hostage.
00:20:36
And now there's like around a dozen or so hostages being led by seven armed inmates
00:20:42
down this long staircase that leads from Leavenworth's front entrance onto its lawn.
00:20:48
Meanwhile, two guards that are up in the nearby guard tower see all this go down,
00:20:53
and one of them removes the tarp from the machine gun and whirls it around to prepare to fire.
00:21:00
And the Leavenworth Seven see them do this, and Stanley Brown yells out, quote, if he fires, we'll kill you all.
00:21:07
Warden White calls out to the tower guards, quote, we've made it this far, no reason for bloodshed now.
00:21:13
End quote. When the group hits the lawn, the seven release all the hostages except for Warden White.
00:21:21
They push him toward his nearby residence. And once they're there, they all pile into his Buick.
00:21:26
But when they demand for him to give them his car keys, he honestly tells them, hey, sorry, they're back in my office.
00:21:33
I feel like it's like when you get robbed at a bank or whatever, like just go with what they're demanding
00:21:39
and nobody gets hurt, hopefully. But also, if you're going to make a plan like this,
00:21:44
make sure you have the keys before you get outside. Don't just assume. They're doing things you just can't go backwards on.
00:21:49
It's like, sorry, I'll run back in. Right. So they climb out of the Buick. They get him into the Buick.
00:21:56
They realize there's no keys. They all have to get out of the Buick. They grab the warden,
00:22:00
and then they head towards the main road that runs in front of Leavenworth Metropolitan Avenue.
00:22:05
And as they do that, a car comes down the street So the seven draw their weapons, they force the car to stop, and they tell everyone inside to get out.
00:22:15
Now, it just so happens that this car is filled with soldiers from the nearby military base coming back from having gone rabbit hunting.
00:22:23
But they are no match for the desperate and overly armed escapees. The seven overtake the vehicle, they throw Warden White inside, and they drive away.
00:22:34
And when they do, they find this car is filled with hunting equipment, including several more guns.
00:22:40
Oh, dear. Yeah. But if it seems like the Leavenworth Seven's plan is off to a great start, that's not going to last very long.
00:22:48
So Charlie Berta is driving this stolen car, and he actually asks the warden which direction he should go to make a clean escape, which is kind of funny.
00:22:57
And then the warden gives him a straight answer. He says, you should take the road that leads toward Missouri.
00:23:02
and that way they can disappear like on back roads before anyone can pick up their trail
00:23:07
but then charlie is like wait a second you're trying to trick me so he does the opposite
00:23:14
and he immediately makes a hard turn onto a dirt road but because of all the recent rain
00:23:20
the road is incredibly muddy so before the men can put really any distance between themselves
00:23:27
and Leavenworth. Berta drives the car into a ditch and it gets stuck in the mud.
00:23:32
Fucking Berta. He's always... They have brakes. Jeez. Why do we have him drive? Yeah.
00:23:38
So meanwhile, the alarms are blaring at Leavenworth, signaling that there's been a prison break
00:23:43
and word is out. So the seven are forced to abandon the car that's stuck in the mud.
00:23:48
They grab the warden and they grab their weapons and they just start running down this muddy road.
00:23:53
And as luck would have it, another car is coming up the road toward them. This one's smaller than the soldiers,
00:24:00
car that they had just abandoned, but beggar escapees can't be chooser escapees. So again,
00:24:06
they basically carjack this next vehicle and they leave the driver who turns out to be a
00:24:11
Leavenworth officer who's headed into work. They leave him on the side of the road and then eight
00:24:17
people try to climb into a car that's designed to hold five passengers. I've done that after a night
00:24:24
out, you get a small Uber and you're like, we're just going to share a seatbelt. You were probably
00:24:29
always the one that laid across the top because you were the smallest. So this car is so packed
00:24:34
that two of the inmates are forced to actually stay outside and ride on the running boards.
00:24:40
Now, this is, remember, 1931. So it is a little bit of a, oh, brother, where art thou situation
00:24:46
where I was like, back then they had much wider side running boards. But I just want to say really
00:24:52
quick, that was a fun thing that my dad, he would come and pick me and my sister up at school in the
00:24:56
Volkswagen. And the Volkswagen had very small running boards on the side. And he rolled both
00:25:03
windows up and then let my sister and I hang on the side of the car while he drove around the
00:25:07
playground. And it was the most fun. And he'd be like, you cannot tell your mother. And we didn't
00:25:13
tell her until we were like in our 20s. Oh, I love it. Oh, that's so dangerous, but so rad.
00:25:19
So dangerous, but so fun. So fun. Really, I'm going to call him and thank him for that.
00:25:24
So now the getaway car is moving extremely slow under all this extra weight that it can't carry, right?
00:25:30
And it's actually dragging on the muddy ground. So the seven know they can't escape in this slow-moving car.
00:25:37
So they start looking for another car to steal. They spot one sitting outside of a one-room schoolhouse.
00:25:43
So good old Charlie Berta pulls to the side of the road and three of the seven bust into the schoolhouse.
00:25:50
The children start screaming and crying as the escapees demand that the young teacher, a woman named Anna Meyer, give them her car keys.
00:25:58
This is my favorite. Anna reportedly tells them, quote, you go on about your business, boys.
00:26:04
That car out there is the only thing I have. Go on and steal one from one of the farmers.
00:26:08
I'm just a poor school teacher. So she fucking sasses them immediately. after a tense back and forth one of the inmates walks to Anna's desk picks up her purse and takes
00:26:19
her keys and they rush back outside oh my god when they get into her car and turn the ignition
00:26:25
it doesn't start it turns out the car has ignition problems Anna had to have a button installed under
00:26:31
the dashboard to start the car holy shit and of course they don't know this she obviously wasn't
00:26:37
going to tell him. So the seven have to give up. They have to get back into the little five-seater.
00:26:44
They make it three more miles down the road. Then Charlie pulls onto what he thinks is a dirt back
00:26:50
road, but it turns out it's just a bumpy driveway that dead ends into some farmhouses. And the same
00:26:56
scene plays out for a second time. The car struggles, then basically sinks in the mud.
00:27:01
They all have to get out. They grab the warden. They're trying to figure out their next move
00:27:06
literally on their feet. They're still close enough to Leavenworth that they can hear the
00:27:11
prison alarms going off. So they haven't gotten away very far at all. They make it to a small
00:27:17
farmhouse. They force their way inside. The escapees demand the homeowners give them a phone
00:27:23
and a car. The family says, we don't have either. Like, we don't have any money. We don't have a
00:27:29
car. We don't have a phone. They're like, God damn it. So the seven decide to keep moving,
00:27:34
but they take a few family members hostage on the way out. Just grab a few family members.
00:27:40
There's no plan at this point. They're scrambling. Also, seven people trying to do anything.
00:27:45
Like, have you ever tried to go to dinner with seven people? No. No. Nightmare. Everyone's like, it's the person with the plan, the bossy person.
00:27:52
Then there's the contradictor. Then there's the person that wants to give up. Like, nightmare.
00:27:57
I'm the bossy one. I'm the bossy one, too. Party of seven, please. And everyone, sit down.
00:28:02
Sit down. I'm going to order for it. So you do love to order for the table. It's one of my talents ordering for the table.
00:28:10
So now the 11 War 7 and their hostages are walking through the nearby woods. And as they do, they have to be really careful because now a large local posse has formed to find them.
00:28:21
There's airplanes overhead and searchers are combing the fields nearby. So they're kind of surrounded and they're very desperate.
00:28:29
And then they come upon another farmhouse. And once again, they force their way inside.
00:28:34
and only to discover once again, the family has neither a phone nor a car. It's like 1931, right?
00:28:41
It's 1931. It's like, I think Dust Bowl, right? Yeah. Definitely like the depression.
00:28:45
It's depression. It's not crappening. Yeah. Sorry. Goodbye. The escapees who seem committed to repeating the same actions over and over
00:28:53
snag a few more hostages from this farmhouse and start walking toward the nearby road to of course hijack another car So within moments A Chevy Coupe Which is a four seater This is an even smaller car And also this is a time where cars are pretty big And this is like getting all the compact cars
00:29:13
in the area. So Chevy Coupe comes down the road. Some of the Leavenworth seven hide in nearby brush
00:29:20
with the hostages and the rest of the game, force the car to stop. They approach the four passengers
00:29:26
inside are all young people who are in their late teens, early 20s, who heard about the prison break
00:29:31
and are driving around to check out what's happening. Oh my God, you guys. Right? So now
00:29:38
they're a part of what's happening. Sure. So the escaped inmates pull the passengers from the car.
00:29:43
They give them careful instructions to go walk down that road, not look back even for a second
00:29:49
until they've gone over the hill that's in the distance. Right? So it's like, walk that way,
00:29:53
keep walking, don't look back. The group of teens walk away, leaving the escapees to discuss what
00:29:59
they're going to do next. They know this four-seater isn't going to get all of these
00:30:03
hostages and all of the seven out of there. They're getting more and more stressed.
00:30:08
And during this conversation, Earl Thayer looks toward the four young people and sees one of them, of course a dude, turn around and look at them. So Earl raises his rifle.
00:30:18
No. Warden White sees this. He immediately reacts, yelling for the other hostages to run as fast as they can,
00:30:26
while he manages to grab a gun from the Seven's arsenal. The hostages run, but as they do, one of the Seven bashes Warden White over the head with the butt of a gun,
00:30:36
and then Will Green fires his shotgun directly at the warden, blowing him into a ditch.
00:30:42
Oh, my God. So now the escapees are panicking. They're in the middle of the road.
00:30:48
They don't have a getaway car that can fit all of them. Their hostages are gone.
00:30:52
And they think they've just murdered the warden of Leavenworth Prison. While the world watches the stars at the FIFA World Cup this summer, Hyundai has its eyes on the next generation of talent.
00:31:03
The future soccer stars who are already turning heads at age 14. Making plays that end up on everyone's feed, scoring from angles that don't make sense, rewriting record books that barely had time to gather dust.
00:31:14
Because Next doesn't wait for an invitation, and Hyundai doesn't either. Hyundai has always moved the future within reach.
00:31:20
Hyundai did it by making advanced safety standard on every vehicle. Hyundai did it by engineering EVs with ultra-fast charging capability.
00:31:27
And Hyundai continues doing it every day. From robotics that change how people live to young athletes changing the game,
00:31:33
the future isn't some far-off concept. It's already here. Next starts now. Hyundai, an official partner of FIFA.
00:31:40
Goodbye. Peace of mind can be hard to come by. Especially at 2 a.m. when your house suddenly makes a weird noise.
00:31:46
That's why so many people trust SimpliSafe to help keep their home secure. Traditional home security only alerts you after a break and has already happened, and that's too late.
00:31:55
SimpliSafe is changing that. The system is customizable so you can build the one that fits your home and your specific needs.
00:32:01
The 24-7 professional monitoring is effective and affordable and won't lock you into a long-term contract.
00:32:07
Listen, Cookie is a really good watchdog, but she's not going to tell me what is actually going on,
00:32:12
if it's a raccoon or if it's a person looking through my windows. Like you have to get this level of safety if you want to feel as safe as possible.
00:32:20
So you know what's going on. So I just feel safer with actually having something like SimpliSafe around.
00:32:25
There's a whole staff at SimpliSafe that's waiting to talk to you and help you out and tell you, no, you're fine.
00:32:30
It's a raccoon. Right now you can get 50% off your new system by visiting SimpliSafe.com slash MFM.
00:32:36
That's half off at SimpliSafe.com slash MFM. There's no safe like SimpliSafe. Goodbye.
00:32:41
Goodbye. Pandora Jewelry brings the sparkle to summer, now with even better prices.
00:32:46
Shop now for up to 50% off select jewelry featuring personalized pieces to must-have summer favorites.
00:32:52
Timeless jewelry made to move with you through every moment. Shop in-store or online now through July 5th.
00:32:58
Terms and conditions apply. See Pandora.net for more details. Goodbye. Charlie Berta, Stanley Brown, and Tom Underwood take off running through the nearby woods.
00:33:08
and meanwhile, Will Green gets behind the wheel of the Chevy Coupe. Grover Durrell, Charlie Curtis,
00:33:14
and Earl Thayer hop in beside him. As Green scrambles to start the vehicle, the men see a car
00:33:19
speeding toward them and it's the warden's Buick that they didn't have the keys for before.
00:33:24
Inside are the deputy warden, two prison officers, and the mayor of a nearby town
00:33:31
called McLeuth, Kansas. There's a note for me from Maren that says, I don't have a great explanation as to why a random mayor is involved here.
00:33:40
I bet you anything he was up for re-election and he wanted to be one of the people who caught the
00:33:45
seven. How do you live near Leavenworth and when the prison break alarm goes off, you don't go,
00:33:50
well, I'm heading over there to see what's going down and what's needed. Definitely.
00:33:55
So now a shootout erupts in the middle of the road between these two vehicles. The passengers in the warden's car have a submachine gun,
00:34:04
while the Leavenworth Seven fire back with their shotguns and their rifles The inmates getaway car is riddled with bullets and people on both sides are getting shot
00:34:15
An officer in the warden's car is shot in the neck and the arm. And on the Leavenworth Seven's side,
00:34:20
driver Will Green is shot in the head, and he's temporarily blinded. But amazingly, nobody dies in this gunfight.
00:34:27
Holy shit. It's like, it was such a different time. Yeah. The bullets were different, I think, too, right?
00:34:33
And the guns, I think. So somehow Green manages to drive away from the warden's vehicle because the warden's vehicle has been damaged in the shootout.
00:34:42
So even though they have a small bad car, it's not as bad as the warden's at this point.
00:34:48
And he's able to take a sharp turn on what he thinks is a country road. They keep thinking these are country roads.
00:34:54
When will they learn? Yeah. How city are these people? Because, again, it's another driveway to a farmhouse.
00:35:01
And like every other road we've encountered so far, it's extremely muddy. This makes the third getaway car that sinks and gets stuck in the mud.
00:35:10
So the remaining prisoners abandon that car. They start running up this mud road with a new level of urgency, except for Earl Thayer.
00:35:19
Thayer does not want to go into another farmhouse just to have this exact same scene play out again.
00:35:25
No car, no phone. So he tells Green, Durrell, and Curtis that, quote, we have a one in a million chance of escape if we enter that house.
00:35:33
Yeah. So Earl Thayer breaks off from the group as the other men continue up the road.
00:35:38
The farmhouse is owned by 73-year-old Emerson Salisbury. He lives there alone, and he maybe can't hear the prison alarms going off
00:35:47
because as Green, Durrell, and Curtis approach his home, Salisbury asks, howdy boys, you going hunting?
00:35:55
Old Salis. Salis just never gets it. He never catches onto the plot. And he's never met a stranger.
00:36:01
It's like, even if you're carrying a large shotgun, he's like, what's up? Oh my God.
00:36:06
Get over here. The three men push past old Sal's into his house. They draw their weapons
00:36:12
and they wait for the posse to show up. It only takes a few minutes before Salisbury's home is showered with bullets,
00:36:19
bombs and tear gas. Holy. Luckily, Emerson Salisbury somehow manages to escape unscathed.
00:36:26
And he will later say, quote, There was so much tear gas, I thought I was going to suffocate. So a 73-year-old got to look back on the time that he was involved in a prison break. It's amazing.
00:36:38
Okay, so this shootout at the Salisbury home lasts for hours. Finally, when the gunfire coming from inside the house stops, a member of the posse carefully approaches, goes inside, and finds the bodies of George Curtis, Grover C. Durrell, and Will Green all shot to death.
00:36:57
A later investigation will reveal that these men took their own lives. So basically it was like they knew there was no hope and they weren't going to go back to prison.
00:37:05
The three members of the Leavenworth Seven who tore off into the woods, Tom Underwood, Stanley Brown, and Charlie Berta, are tracked down before the day is through.
00:37:14
They're spotted hiding in a ditch. And when the officers approach, Brown pulls a Hail Mary move.
00:37:19
He pulls a stick of dynamite out of his pocket and says, we all might as well go up to see St. Peter.
00:37:25
but then because of the rain the fuse is too wet to light because that's a great line too
00:37:33
and then what a you know i'm gonna blow us all up and then just like lighter lighter lighter lighter
00:37:40
yeah yeah and then the prison official walks up and snaps the dynamite out of his hand yeah
00:37:45
so the escapees are brought back to leavenworth and as tom underwood is put into a cell he pulls
00:37:52
another stick of dynamite out of his coat. Nobody patted him down. No, no, they did. He hands it to
00:37:59
the officer saying matter of factly, quote, I won't have any use for this anymore. I don't
00:38:03
understand how this wasn't found. I've been searched three different times. Wow, that is a
00:38:11
that is a burn. And also just like, I don't know, it feels like that was a different time. Like he
00:38:16
just gave up. He gave up fair and square and was like, here, I'm not going to squirrel this away
00:38:21
for a future plan. You can just have it. He called uncle. He really, really did. Earl Thayer is finally
00:38:27
captured a couple days later after approaching two men in a garage and asking if he could exchange
00:38:32
his rifle for some coffee. Ooh, that's desperate times. Yep. Of course, the men are local. They
00:38:39
know who Thayer is and they restrain him and Earl doesn't fight back. He's taken back to Leavenworth
00:38:45
and he's treated for pneumonia. While we're covering, he tells his doctor, quote, I didn't do so bad for
00:38:51
an old man. He was 63. Not bad. The four surviving members of the Leavenworth Seven are handed additional charges and additional
00:38:58
prison time, of course. In the wake of this event, Leavenworth's prison protocol changes
00:39:03
entirely. Security measures are beefed up, more gates are added throughout, and new protocols
00:39:08
are put into place regarding hostage situations Fortunately every single one of the Leavenworth Seven many many hostages escape unharmed although poor Emerson Salisbury home was seriously damaged from all the bullets
00:39:23
and the bombs. I know. What a bummer. What about the warden? Well, let me tell you this. Okay.
00:39:27
When warden Thomas B. White's body is found lying in the ditch where he landed after he was shot
00:39:33
with a shotgun, incredibly, he's alive. Despite severe injuries, he survived being hit with a
00:39:42
shotgun blast and makes a miraculous recovery, although he never fully regains the full use of
00:39:48
his left arm. Once he's healed, Warden White is transferred to a quieter job in his native Texas
00:39:54
at the Latuna Federal Correctional Institution. This prison is brand new. And according to Kenneth
00:40:00
the master, quote, the institution was the Federal Bureau of Prisons' first meaningful effort
00:40:05
at the rehabilitative side of corrections as opposed to the punitive side, end quote.
00:40:11
At the age of 70, White leaves Latuna and joins the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole in Austin.
00:40:17
And after six years, he finally retires and lives a quiet life with his wife, Bessie.
00:40:23
Thomas B. White, Warden White, passes away in 1971 at the age of 90. Wow. Yeah. As for the four surviving members of the Leavenworth Seven, Earl Thayer dies in Leavenworth three years after the escape attempt. Tom Underwood and Stanley Brown finish out their sentences and are released and fade from public view.
00:40:44
Charlie Berta would actually go on to serve time at Alcatraz before being paroled in 1949.
00:40:50
And once he's released, he works at a local bar, which reportedly has direct views of Alcatraz.
00:40:57
And he's often spotted riding his bike across the Golden Gate Bridge. So he just becomes like a city guy.
00:41:04
And I'm trying to think, like, there's several bars that it could be. But I was thinking of, what's that bar that's famous for the Irish coffee?
00:41:12
that's right there in Fisherman's Wharf. Is it the Buena Vista? The Buena Vista, yes.
00:41:18
Thank you. It just would be cool if it was like a super tourist bar that's like super famous.
00:41:24
And he's just like, it's me. Much later, Warden White's FBI agent's son, who was also named Thomas,
00:41:30
is told by another agent that, quote, Charlie Berta asks about your dad all the time
00:41:35
and considers him one of the greatest men ever to live. Wow. And that is the story of the spectacular failure of the 1931 Leavenworth 7 prison break.
00:41:48
Holy shit. That was a caper. Right? Yeah. That was wild. That was great job. Great holiday story.
00:41:56
Thank you. That was kind of a fun one. Yeah. But then also with shotgun blasts and sticks of dynamite.
00:42:02
Totally. Totally. Oh, man. What a mess. Yeah. We hope your prison break goes better than that.
00:42:08
And your holidays too. The prison break, the holiday prison break of leaving your parents' house and going to a bar to meet people you went to high school with.
00:42:16
Oh, God. Enjoy. Yeah. Enjoy that. Thanks for listening, guys. Thanks for staying with us.
00:42:24
We love you. We appreciate you. Stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie?
00:42:35
This has been an Exactly Right production. Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck.
00:42:44
Our managing producer is Hannah Kyle Creighton. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo.
00:42:48
This episode was mixed by Liana Squalache. Our researchers are Maren McClashen and Allie Elkin.
00:42:54
Email your hometowns to myfavoritemurder at gmail.com. Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at myfavoritemurder and Twitter at myfavemurder.
00:43:02
Goodbye. Cheap Caribbean Summer Savings Event is here. Right now, get $100 instant savings on vacation packages to Cancun, Jamaica, and the Dominican Republic.
00:43:16
Whether you're chasing poolside drinks, white sand beaches, or endless all-inclusive fun,
00:43:21
Cheap Caribbean helps you get more beach for less money. Book your summer vacay today at CheapCaribbean.com.
00:43:27
Goodbye. Pandora Jewelry brings the sparkle to summer, now with even better prices.
00:43:32
Shop now for up to 50% off select jewelry featuring personalized pieces to must-have summer favorites.
00:43:38
Timeless jewelry made to move with you through every moment. Shop in-store or online now through July 5th.
00:43:43
Terms and conditions apply. See pandora.net for more details. Goodbye. While the world watches the stars at the FIFA World Cup, Hyundai has its eyes on the next generation of talent.
00:43:54
The future soccer stars who are already turning heads at age 14. Because next doesn't wait for an invitation.
00:43:59
And Hyundai doesn't either. Hyundai has always moved the future within reach. Hyundai did it by making advanced safety standard on every vehicle.
00:44:06
And by engineering EVs with ultra-fast charging capability. And Hyundai continues doing it every day because the future isn't some far-off concept.
00:44:13
It's already here. Next starts now. Hyundai, an official partner of FIFA. Goodbye.