00:00:00
This is exactly right. Isn't some far off concept? It's already here. Next starts now.
00:00:33
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selling a persona of confidence and care, patients trusted him. He wore cowboy boots in the operating room
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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
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or binge the entire series right now only with Audible. Goodbye. Where does summer take you?
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Find your summer escape today. Visit Pura.com to learn more. Goodbye. My favorite murder
00:01:35
Hello! Hello! And welcome to My Favorite Murder. That's Georgia Hartstark. That's Karen Kilgara.
00:01:49
And we're back, you know, doing this like it's our full-time job. Getting back in the groove.
00:01:55
I still am like a little bit on vacation mode, brain-wise. What are you seeing? What's the behavior?
00:02:02
I forgot how to do this, you know, that kind of thing. Like, what do we say? That sort of thing.
00:02:08
That one goes quickly. It doesn't matter how much time we spent doing it because that thing goes away.
00:02:14
And it really is like the first time every time when we come back. That's true. I feel like every like week to week,
00:02:19
it's the first time I've ever done this. I think it's how we keep it fresh. It's good that we keep it fresh.
00:02:27
I think so too. Can I get in what I think is a life-changing recommendation? Yes, please.
00:02:34
For just to kick this off. Yes. For the glittering, the glimmering, the effervescence, the...
00:02:40
The freshness, really. The freshness, the Mentos freshness. The third season of I Think You Should Leave has come out on Netflix.
00:02:47
Oh, yeah. Tim Robinson. If you haven't watched it and you're feeling even medium, you don't have to feel bad.
00:02:57
Enough feeling bad. But sometimes you just kind of like myself. I lay on the couch at seven o'clock at night.
00:03:03
I'm like, it's time for me to enjoy myself. And then I watch things that are either really heavy or I've seen them before or they're very
00:03:10
sad or I don't know how this is how I've decided I enjoy myself. And I was like, oh, I just saw some clips online.
00:03:16
I'm going to go watch that. I was scream cackling like a lunatic. It's just so helpful.
00:03:24
It's the most absurd show I've ever watched. I can't believe it's on Netflix because it's so...
00:03:30
You'd think it's on like late night, what's it called? Like network TV. What's it called when they used to...
00:03:36
Like sketch TV? No, when they used to have channels in your town that had... Oh, like the cable access?
00:03:45
Yes, cable access. Thank you. It's very cable access-y and it's absurdity, but it's so fucking hilarious.
00:03:51
There's like a Love Island parody thing. Oh my God. Where he's, did you watch it?
00:03:55
With the zipline? The zipline guy that's using Love Island to use the zipline. And at one point when he's pretending he cares
00:04:04
that he's getting kicked off the island, he goes, and he starts just like throwing everyone else under the bus.
00:04:10
And then he goes, whatever the, say the other guy's name was like Dale or something.
00:04:14
He's like, Dale said your face looked like a clock. And like, it broke my brain how hilariously stupid that insult is.
00:04:24
I just, it's just so delightful. Every sketch. Every sketch. I think you should leave on Netflix.
00:04:31
I have a recommendation for a podcast, if we're going down to Recommendations Corner.
00:04:36
Let's rock on through Recommendations Avenue. So I, you know, I like lately haven't been listening to a lot of true crime podcasts.
00:04:44
my brain like just kind of broke on the whole thing, but I was just scrolling to see what else was out there.
00:04:48
And the name of this one totally caught my attention. And so I've been listening to it
00:04:53
and I can't fucking put it down. It's so good. The title is, Why Can't We Talk About Amanda's Mom?
00:04:59
Which I think is such an eerie, like interesting title. But then the podcast is about,
00:05:04
it's hosted by this woman named Sarah Kalin. And she is a criminal behaviorist and investigator.
00:05:12
She's very, very smart. and very good at her job. And she's basically, she's going down a deep rabbit hole
00:05:20
of this 1993 cold case murder of a woman that takes place in Mobile, Alabama. She has the Mobile County Sheriff's Office
00:05:28
like working with her. And she also interviews the detective from then who kind of didn't do,
00:05:35
didn't cross his T's and dot his I's as much as he should have. And she gives him the business.
00:05:38
And it was so impressive the way she fucking kind of shut him down. But in general, it's just this really interesting cold case true crime podcast that I'm digging.
00:05:48
So to kind of get out of the true crime headspace, you went ahead and listened to a true crime podcast.
00:05:54
No I mean lately I haven And then I couldn keep away because my mind is dark as a dark dark place Because this is just the way it works for us Yeah
00:06:05
That sounds really good. Yeah. Why can't we talk about Amanda's mom? Very compelling story.
00:06:11
What did Amanda's mom do? She died. And no one's allowed to talk about her dying.
00:06:15
Yeah. It's like a hush, hush thing because it's a cold case. No one talks about it.
00:06:19
Brilliant. I want to listen to that. Yeah. Well, on the same, if we're going to recommend podcasts,
00:06:25
the one I can't stop listening to. And, you know, sometimes you're so grateful for those ones that you dive into
00:06:31
because then you get your dishes done every morning or every night. Yeah. Like it just, you get to keep all your shit tight
00:06:37
because you just have a goal that you've matched with a fun thing. So it's Michael Hobbs,
00:06:43
who's the same host as Maintenance Phase, which was my old binge podcast. And he has a new podcast called If Books Could Kill.
00:06:51
He and his co-host, Peter Shamsheri, is what I think his last name is pronounced like.
00:06:57
And they go through all the airport books that have actually like hit the culture in a real way.
00:07:02
The first episode is Freakonomics. And then they do The Secret and they do like all those big, big, big titles that have been kind of welcomed into like, oh, this is the way it is.
00:07:13
And they just pull them apart. And it is unbelievable. Unbelievable. Shit talking, shit talking.
00:07:19
But again, just like in maintenance phase, like the way I said it before, Peter Shamsheri is a lawyer
00:07:25
and Michael Hobbs is a journalist and he's done all kinds of political work and he has all this experience.
00:07:30
So they never say the word um or like. You know, sometimes we have those fucking audiograms
00:07:37
where like every other word is me. Yeah. Like there's never a clean thought expressed
00:07:44
within like 25 words. Like I simply can't do it. We're not professionals, you know?
00:07:50
We're like— We're not. We're average Joes. And I like to think that that is like part of our appeal,
00:07:55
is that the audience feels like they're talking to the gal who works at 7-Eleven,
00:08:00
you know, about true crime. I've never loved being described as an average Jo. But like, you know what?
00:08:09
That's what's brought me all my pain in life, is thinking I wasn't an average Jo
00:08:14
and being so bitter and disappointed when I found out, no, I am. It's fine. Yeah, I feel the same way about when I found out
00:08:22
that I was technically actually middle-aged. I was just so disappointed in life.
00:08:28
Did you find that out from me yelling it in your face probably on a stage in a theater in front of 2,000 people?
00:08:33
I did find it from you saying so because Phoebe Bridgers called us two middle-aged women
00:08:39
when she talked to Rolling Stone about liking our podcast. and I was so offended by it.
00:08:44
And I said something to you about it. You're like, you are. I was like, I guess if I live to be 84, 86 now,
00:08:52
I'm technically in the middle of my age, but I don't feel it, man. I feel, I don't feel 60.
00:08:59
You're just, and then kick your leg above your head. Well, you might be younger than middle age
00:09:04
technically because of your grandmother. Yes. So you have actually, I think maybe you're right.
00:09:10
And I was wrong in that moment to throw that in your face so painfully when A, it's an
00:09:16
important thing for you and B, on the technical side, chances are you're going to live to
00:09:22
about 125. That's true. My grandma lived to be 104, which meant middle age for her was 52.
00:09:28
And that was in the right 70s, 80s, 90s? Yeah, that was in 70s and 80s numbers. So now you've got these vitamins, you've got your greens that you love to drink.
00:09:39
That's true. I do. I pet my animals to reduce my stress, that kind of thing. You've read three quarters of almost every self-help book there is.
00:09:47
That's right. You're going to make it. I'm going to make it. Hey, speaking of old people, I met a—
00:09:53
I thought you were going to be like, do you want to do the exactly right? Just transition, left turn.
00:10:00
No, sorry, go ahead. No, no, I actually met a murderina named Cammie. I met her on the flight.
00:10:06
Vince took me to Napa for my birthday. It was very lovely. Nice. Yeah. And I met this murderina named Cammie on the flight, talked to her afterwards. She was such a delight. She had just graduated and got her master's in like geriatric caretaking, essentially.
00:10:23
Wow. Because she wants to be one of the craziest professions I've ever heard of. And I've just heard of it recently, a death doula.
00:10:31
Oh, yeah. Have you heard of that? I have heard of it. It's like a midwife or coach like you would have during your pregnancy and labor,
00:10:40
but you assist the dying person and their loved ones before, during, and after. So she's going to work in like a hospice, which I just think is the most incredible
00:10:48
career. And she's just such, she was so lovely. You can tell she's going to be incredible at it.
00:10:53
And so hi, Cammie. Good job. Good job, Cammie. Yeah, hospice work is some of the most, I was going to say the word respectable
00:11:01
because I'm coming from my own point of view, but I mean like kind of noble professions there is,
00:11:06
is people really need, when a hospice worker comes in and kind of takes over, the family needs it so badly.
00:11:12
And it's such an important like lifeline and bridge to a different part of life.
00:11:18
It's a big deal. That's great. Totally, totally. I just think it's such a cool profession
00:11:22
that people should consider more because I don't think it's really like well-known
00:11:27
as a profession, but well, like nurses probably do it all the time, right? Like that's their.
00:11:34
Yeah, I think if you're, I could be wrong about this, but I think you have to kind of,
00:11:37
it has to be like you go into hospice work because it really is huge. Because you know who else did it is Ram Dass,
00:11:46
the member I was always recommending his podcast. And he talks about being basically
00:11:52
the person that comes in to talk to people when they ready to talk about the fact that they ready to die And that was like his end of life work And he talked about if you want to learn about a person that does it
00:12:06
there's a Ram Dass podcast and he talks about it a ton. And it's, I mean, it's just the perfect way to put things into perspective, I think.
00:12:13
Let's do it. Let's do it. Because now that I'm at middle age, I'm thinking about this shit all the time.
00:12:19
Here's the thing. As a person who was around death a lot as a child, it's like, I did it already.
00:12:24
Yeah, yeah. No, I'd rather do the like street fair with corn on a stick. That's a way better way to appreciate life, I think.
00:12:34
I'm there. I'm there for that. Let's do that. I just have one more because it just reminded me.
00:12:39
There's one more and it was a life changer. It's a movie on Prime. I think it's a Finnish movie, although I could be wrong.
00:12:46
It could be any of the other Nordic regions. But it's a movie about during World War II,
00:12:52
the Nazis are all up in Lapland in Northern Finland, kind of roaming free and going crazy.
00:12:58
And there's a gold miner by himself. And it becomes the lone gold miner who actually takes on the Nazis.
00:13:07
Is it like home alone, but for Nazis and a gold miner? Yes. And way more truly violent and so thrilling.
00:13:16
And you're like, this must be based on a true story because this is so crazy. but then it goes like kind of in a Rambo direction
00:13:23
that makes you so excited. I think that's my new list is going to be all the Nazi killing movies
00:13:28
that I've been enjoying on Prime. Love it. Because there's so many good ones. And this one...
00:13:32
What's it called? It's called Sisu, S-I-S-U. Okay. Yeah, I've heard of that. It's on like the main page right now.
00:13:40
Yeah. It's pretty easy to find. It's so good. Okay. It's worth having to pay $20 if you have $20.
00:13:48
Well, you know that I love killing Nazi movies more than anything. Hell yeah. Speaking of Culkins, do you want to do the Exactly Right Corner?
00:13:56
Sure. Okay. We have a podcast network. It's called Exactly Right. We love it. You should love it too. Here's what's on it this week.
00:14:04
So in celebration of the two-year anniversary of Parent Footprint, Dr. Dan is joined by comedian Jordan Carlos.
00:14:10
You know him from Adulting with Michelle Boutot and Jordan Carlos. and they talk about Hall of Fame parenting,
00:14:17
the writer's strike and much, much more. Jordan is a dad himself. So he's really bringing that parenting knowledge,
00:14:24
firsthand information right to the podcast. Love it. And then on Lady to Lady, Tess, Babs and Brandy's guest is my friend, Jackie Johnson.
00:14:33
She's the host of Natch Butte. It's a great listen. Make sure you check it out. Jackie is just a lot of fun.
00:14:38
And over on Buried Bones, Kate and Paul embark on the first episode in a two-part series about the mysterious case
00:14:44
of Bessie Little in 19th century Ohio. And remember how I covered Pearl Hart, this Wild West awesome lady,
00:14:52
and she said this whole quote of, I shall never submit. And we made shirts and pre-ordered them
00:14:57
and you guys loved them. Well, they are back by popular demand. So now you can purchase additional merch,
00:15:02
not just the shirt, everything else from Pearl Hart's I shall never submit quote.
00:15:07
So check that out at myfavoritemurder.com. And overall, if you're in your podcast app
00:15:12
and you're listening to a podcast that you love, always remember that if you're on the actual episode page, you can scroll down just
00:15:18
a little bit and there's those five empty stars. And just hit five stars if you love the podcast
00:15:24
you're listening to. That's for all podcasts across this great genre. This great nation.
00:15:31
This great podcast nation that we now live in, but especially the exactly right ones. If there's
00:15:36
favorites and ones that you love, it's a great way to show your support because even though it's completely crowdsourced and kind of random, people actually really pay
00:15:46
attention to the ratings. So do your best. Give your favorite podcast your vote.
00:15:50
Do it. We appreciate it. When you're young, you don't really buy furniture. You either inherit something from your parents
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Bye. Shit. You're first, right? Yes. Okay. So today I'm going to tell you about a 1971 homicide in Burlington, Vermont,
00:18:57
that for a very long time was known as Vermont's oldest cold case. And that is the murder of Rita Curran.
00:19:07
All right. The main sources used in today's story are a 2021 Burlington Free Press article by journalist Elizabeth Murray.
00:19:16
And that article is heavily cited in this story. Also a 1979 Burlington Free Press article with no byline.
00:19:23
A 2021 Daily Beast article by Pilar Melendez, who actually covered this case a bunch for the Daily Beast.
00:19:30
There's several articles by Pilar. And the Cold Case New England website. And the rest of the sources are in our show notes.
00:19:38
Okay. So this starts in July of 1971 in Burlington, Vermont. And back then, Burlington is considered the state's most lively city.
00:19:47
We would love to know, Vermont, if you have any information on what the liveliest city in Vermont is now.
00:19:53
Who's come up against Burlington since the 70s to really raise those stakes? Who's partying harder?
00:19:59
Who has more vape stores and like, you know, bong huts and that kind of thing now?
00:20:05
Please go out into your city, count the bong huts, get on social media. Let us know as soon as possible, please.
00:20:12
So one of the reasons it was known as such a lively city was because the University of Vermont is located there.
00:20:18
So it's a bustling college town. And among the local student population lives 24-year-old graduate student, Rita Curran.
00:20:26
Rita works by day as a second grade teacher at the local elementary school. Her students absolutely adore her.
00:20:32
And years later, one of them remembers her. They called her Miss Curran. And this student said, quote, she was smiling all the time.
00:20:40
She was so nice. So it's summertime when this story starts. School isn't in session.
00:20:46
So Rita's supplementing her income by working as a hotel maid at the nearby Colonial Motor Inn.
00:20:51
This summer will be the very first time Rita lives apart from her parents. So she went through,
00:20:56
I guess went through all of college living at home and she's finally moved out. She moved in with some roommates
00:21:01
to a ground floor apartment on Brooks Avenue, very close to the University of Vermont campus.
00:21:07
Okay. What do you have a problem with in the sentences that I just read to you? Did I miss something?
00:21:13
Well, I just thought it would stick out to you. Don't move into a ground floor apartment.
00:21:18
Oh, you're right. That's the spot. Definitely. It just, especially if you're three girls
00:21:23
living together for college, whatever, just, there's no need to not wait for third floor and or insist on.
00:21:32
Yeah. Go up high. Just go not on street level. But if you are there right now and you're like, oh shit, I can't break my lease,
00:21:38
lock all your doors. You can get cheapy little alarms that just like go off. They're very easy.
00:21:43
They go off if the window opens. Just lock everything always. Yes. And don't be afraid.
00:21:48
I mean, I feel like our listeners, this is a little bit of a gilding the lily for our listeners who know all of this
00:21:53
and have front door mats that say this and all the rest. But you can also take a,
00:21:59
like a sawed in half broom handle and stick it in your window so people can't slide the window open.
00:22:06
For your sliding glass door, definitely. That's just like such a good trick. Just tricks and things.
00:22:11
Just be careful. Don't be paranoid, but definitely be careful. Yeah. Okay. So Rita, she has these two new roommates.
00:22:18
They were already living in the apartment. She is kind of the new person, the third person who's just moved in.
00:22:23
Their names are Carrie and Beverly. It's not really very comfortable for Rita because she's painfully shy.
00:22:29
And not long after moving in, she starts getting really homesick. So by July, when the story begins,
00:22:35
Rita's actively thinking about actually moving out and moving back in with her parents.
00:22:39
because she's not sure she fits in with Carrie and Beverly. She's shy, but she loves to sing.
00:22:45
And on the night of July 19th, she had met up with members of her singing group,
00:22:50
a barbershop quartet, and they were practicing until about 10 o'clock that night.
00:22:55
So wholesome. I know, truly. Yeah. And also she must've been a great singer because you can't be a slouch in a barbershop quartet.
00:23:03
No. She must've been really good. So afterwards, Rita heads back to the apartment.
00:23:08
Carrie and Beverly are there when she gets home, along with a man named Paul, who is dating Carrie and often sleeps over.
00:23:15
So around 11.20 p.m., Beverly, Carrie, and Paul decide they're going to go out to eat.
00:23:20
They invite Rita to see if she wants to join. Rita declines. So she goes and gets ready for bed,
00:23:26
and the others head out the door for a late night meal, and they do not lock the front door when they go,
00:23:32
and nobody has locked the back door. And this is, it's 1971, Burlington, Vermont.
00:23:38
Totally standard practice. This is like what everybody in town does. So by most accounts, Beverly, Carrie, and Paul return home around midnight,
00:23:47
but they don't go to bed immediately. They kind of stay up talking in the living room for another hour or so.
00:23:53
And then Carrie and Paul split off from Beverly, and Beverly shares her room with Rita.
00:23:57
So when Beverly goes to bed, she turns... the doorknob on the bedroom door, but it won't open.
00:24:03
It seems to be jammed shut. So Beverly uses some muscle. She finally is able to push the door open
00:24:09
and there she makes a horrific discovery. Sprawled on the floor behind the door is 24-year-old Rita Curran covered in blood.
00:24:18
Beverly screams for her roommate and a roommate's boyfriend. They come, they call the police.
00:24:24
Officers and emergency personnel respond immediately, but unfortunately Rita's pronounced dead at the scene.
00:24:31
It's clear she fought off her attacker with everything she had. She has injuries everywhere and they're brutal.
00:24:37
She has been beaten in the face and head. She's been sexually assaulted and it would later be determined
00:24:43
she was manually strangled to death. Just absolute brutality is horrible. So Rita's purse has been untouched.
00:24:51
All her cash is still in it. So the detectives suspect that maybe the motive is not robbery.
00:24:57
And then they find a cigarette butt near Rita's body. So nobody else in the apartment smokes that brand.
00:25:05
They're smokers, but not that brand. So the investigators collect it along with Rita's robe
00:25:10
and just a few other clues in the bedroom. There's barely any evidence in that bedroom.
00:25:18
Then around the rest of the apartment, everything's in order. There's no signs of forced entry
00:25:22
because the doors were left unlocked. Right. There's no usable fingerprints found anywhere,
00:25:27
although police do find a bloody smear on the back door. So they assumed that was the killer leaving the scene
00:25:34
when he heard Beverly, Carrie, and Paul come back home. Oh my God. That's so scary.
00:25:40
Horrible. Yeah. And this theory will haunt Paul for the rest of his life. He is quoted as saying,
00:25:46
I've always had a question about whether Rita was still alive when we got back into the apartment that night.
00:25:52
End quote. which is just like, it's bad enough that these three young people are so horribly traumatized
00:25:58
that they have to even be anywhere near something this nightmarish. Yeah. And then to even introduce anything, it's like, no, that's not fair.
00:26:07
That you could have done something if you'd known. It's like, no. Yeah, there's just, it's unfathomable.
00:26:12
Just awful. Within hours of finding Rita's body, the police are knocking on doors,
00:26:17
trying to find someone in the apartment building who heard something. and Paul has commented on how thin the apartment's walls are saying,
00:26:24
quote, the idea that nobody heard anything is impossible. I have to believe that someone heard something that night, end quote.
00:26:32
But all of the neighbors said nobody's heard anything unusual, they claim, including a young married couple that live in the apartment directly above Rita Curran's apartment.
00:26:41
That's a couple named William and Michelle DeRuce. And according to reports, quote, Mrs. DeRuce stated that she'd been up around 1 a.m. and heard no unusual noises or anything else.
00:26:54
Weird. So as news breaks about Rita's murder, the residents of Burlington are shocked and terrified, of course.
00:27:01
And overnight, people begin locking their doors. The website Cold Case New England reports, quote, a widespread panic swept across the city, leaving hardware store shelves empty of deadbolts and the women of Burlington devoid of any sense of safety in their own homes, end quote.
00:27:17
Within days, the intense interest in Rita's case leads authorities to put a media blackout into effect, meaning that investigators don't share any information about their investigation with the press.
00:27:28
And that was meant to protect the investigative process, especially while the murder is still at large.
00:27:34
And it ends up lasting until September of 1971. So even though the details about early police investigation are hazy,
00:27:42
we know many women came forward in the weeks after Rita's murder with their own chilling stories about strange encounters with Burlington area men.
00:27:51
Some women report a peeping Tom. Others describe receiving very strange phone calls,
00:27:57
including Rita and Rita's roommates. Their apartment received multiple creepy calls in the lead up to Rita's death.
00:28:04
and the roommate's boyfriend, Paul, would later tell the Daily Beast, quote, we were getting strange calls before Rita's murder.
00:28:11
It was a random occurrence. It wasn't anything that happened every day or a particular time,
00:28:16
but it was only in the evening from what I remember. We were all concerned about the calls.
00:28:21
It was really creepy, end quote. Yikes. The public also learns that multiple Burlington women
00:28:26
have been victims of horrible crimes throughout the past several years. Like in 1968,
00:28:32
which is three years before Rita Curran's murder, an attacker broke into the nearby
00:28:36
Kappa Alpha Theta sorority house in the early morning hours. And the man attacked a 21-year-old student
00:28:43
who was sleeping in her bedroom with a blunt instrument. Oh my God. Unlike Rita, she was not sexually assaulted.
00:28:50
This woman survived the attack, but the assailant was never caught. And later in May of 1971,
00:28:56
which is just two months before Rita's murder, a 20-year-old woman was violently attacked
00:29:00
and sexually assaulted in a department store parking lot at night. The woman screamed so loud that her attacker fled the scene.
00:29:07
He was also never caught. And then just one week before Rita's death, a 20-year-old woman was sexually assaulted in her bedroom by a strange man.
00:29:15
And like the other assailants, he was never caught. And it's unclear if investigators were looking into
00:29:21
or believing that there was any connection between any of these attacks, even though the MO is very similar in most of them.
00:29:28
And also it's an MO that's very similar to who, Georgia? Ted Bundy? Yes, that's right.
00:29:36
Oh my God, did I get it right? Yes, you did. Oh my God. And do you remember where Ted Bundy was born?
00:29:41
He was born in Vermont. Yes, he was born in Burlington, Vermont. Shut your entire face.
00:29:47
Oh my God. Oh, that's crazy. So, okay. So what we know is detectives interview hundreds of people during their investigation and many of these people including Rita roommates Beverly Carrie and Paul are all cleared of any involvement Police end up with 13 suspects
00:30:05
They're all known sex offenders and felons. And this includes the upstairs neighbor
00:30:10
who didn't hear anything that night, William DeRuce. He's cleared? He's cleared.
00:30:14
Okay. Turns out William has an extensive criminal history that includes rape charges.
00:30:20
When police make this discovery, he's questioned again, and he's given a polygraph test.
00:30:24
but William's wife is insistent that they were together on the night of Rita's murder.
00:30:28
And despite their suspicions, police don't have anything to make an arrest. So William DeRuce is one of seven people
00:30:36
who are given lie detector tests in relation to Rita's murder. None of these interrogations or investigations
00:30:41
culminate in bringing any murder charges. So the days turn to weeks and then the weeks turn to years
00:30:47
and all leads dry up. And as her bereaved family begs for justice, Rita Curran's murder case goes cold.
00:30:54
Rita's mother, Mary, tells reporters that, quote, I wish to God there was some kind of settlement to relieve our minds, end quote.
00:31:02
So now we have to go forward seven years later. Okay. And interest in Rita Kern's cold case is revived because it's 1978 and Ted Bundy has just been arrested.
00:31:16
Holy shit. So as the nation reels from the news of Ted Bundy and his serial killings that have been going on for
00:31:23
so long and culminated in such horrifying violence. Oh, my God. People start wondering if Rita could have been one of his victims.
00:31:32
And it's not as far-fetched as it could sound. In fact, the great Anne Rule lays out this theory
00:31:39
in the legendary crime book, A Stranger Beside Me. She points out that Rita Curran resembles Ted Bundy's girlfriend,
00:31:45
Diane Edwards, as do many of his victims. Yeah, you have a type. Wow. center part, long dark hair.
00:31:53
As Ted Bundy has ties to Burlington, he was actually born there in the Elizabeth Lund home for unwed mothers.
00:32:01
And that home where he was born is just down the street from Rita's apartment building.
00:32:08
So for a while, there's uncertainty about where exactly Ted Bundy spent the summer of 1971
00:32:14
when Rita was murdered, which gives this theory even more weight. And this potential connection makes Rita Curran's case even more high profile, which is kind of the horrible advantage that something like that would take, where suddenly at least somebody's paying attention.
00:32:31
It's the late 70s. The concept of cold cases, murder cases going cold and no one ever caring about them again, it's just not discussed.
00:32:40
So it's good that it was happening. It's reported that Rita's sister even reached out to Ted Bundy
00:32:47
while he was on death row to ask about his potential involvement. I bet a lot of family members of murder victims did that.
00:32:56
Yeah. You know, like, please just tell me. We need to know. Just tell me. It's so awful.
00:33:03
And the saddest part about that is they're asking basically a lizard person. Totally.
00:33:09
To be empathetic. Totally. Horrible. Well, so it's unclear if Ted Bundy ever responds to Rita's sister.
00:33:16
We do know that the police take this lead seriously. They look for any evidence that Ted Bundy could have been responsible.
00:33:22
But according to one detective working Rita's case, no direct connection has ever been made.
00:33:28
What about that cigarette butt? Did he smoke? Did he smoke? I'm sure he did. Everyone did.
00:33:33
But I wonder what kind of cigarettes he smoked back then. And did he smoke at crime scenes?
00:33:39
Right. Or like nearby? Right. I don't remember him being a smoker or that coming into play,
00:33:46
but I could be wrong. I don't either. Yeah. Before his execution, Ted Bundy denies ever committing a murder
00:33:52
in the state of Vermont. Which is like, let's believe that guy with everything he fucking says.
00:33:57
I mean, it so isn't very meaningful in that way. And also, it's basically the inception point of his life
00:34:05
and the problems that he had with his life. Right. Like being born in an unwed mother's home
00:34:10
was probably a big part of his narrative of who he was in his mind and why he had to do the things he did.
00:34:17
So it seems so valid as a theory. Totally. I would have a hard time dropping that
00:34:23
where it's just like he's from right down the street. Yeah, for sure. Investigators continue to hit one brick wall
00:34:30
after another in the Rita Curran murder. Occasionally men call the police department
00:34:35
and turn themselves in for the crime. But according to an article in the Daily Beast,
00:34:39
These confessions, quote, were all later determined to be bogus, the sad result of the case being so high profile, end quote.
00:34:47
So eventually, public interest in Rita's case dwindles once again and again. Her family's forced to wait in agony for meaningful updates from the investigators.
00:34:57
Rita's mother, Mary, says, quote, nothing will bring her back, but we'd like to see justice done.
00:35:02
So despite being what one detective describes as, quote, the most investigated case in Burlington police history, the investigation into Rita Kearns' murder remains cold for decades, until 2019.
00:35:15
Mm-mm. Mm-hmm. And that's when Burlington investigators pour over Rita Kearns' case with a renewed sense of urgency.
00:35:23
A detective named Thomas Chenette tells the Burlington Free Press that, quote, we believe this case is absolutely still solvable,
00:35:31
but time is of the essence. It's ironic. The reality is that evidence and memories degrade over time.
00:35:37
So we decided to give our maximum effort now as many of the witnesses and involved parties
00:35:43
are still with us and can be contacted, end quote. Yes. Which is such a great thing just to see in print
00:35:51
because I think that's the thing where it's just like these cold cases, they just have to be rehashed and gone back over over and over again while the people are still there Yeah And like people memories change People stop having alliances with bad men
00:36:08
You know, you never know what you're going to end up getting out of this that you didn't get out back in the original investigation.
00:36:15
It almost feels like, and maybe there is, maybe this is department to department,
00:36:19
so you can't do it like federally, but it almost feels like cold cases should, if they've been sitting there for X number of years,
00:36:27
just automatically get assigned. Totally. That should be something that goes into.
00:36:31
I could absolutely be naming a real thing that's already happening. Not my good idea.
00:36:36
But if no one else has thought of it, please feel free to use, I call it the every four years plan.
00:36:43
It's the average Joe's. We don't know the laws. It's the average Joe law. Yeah. So instead of just one or two investigators
00:36:52
being assigned to Rita Curran's murder. A dozen detectives, several technicians,
00:36:57
and multiple officers all look at Rita's file. In 2021, Detective Chenette tells reporters that,
00:37:05
quote, we determined that the better way to go about things would be to bring the entire team on as available,
00:37:10
as opposed to one single dedicated investigator. We now have a manageable framework and clear goals
00:37:16
that will hopefully bring us to a resolution. Wow. End quote, right? Isn't that a good plan?
00:37:21
That's so exciting. Just like blitz it. So the department's able to pull this off
00:37:26
because Burlington has a fairly low violent crime rate. So they don't have stacked up cold cases,
00:37:32
you know, like some places do. The police have the bandwidth to spend meaningful time
00:37:36
with these old cold cases. But the same year is actually the 50th anniversary of Rita Curran's murder.
00:37:46
And Rita's mother, Mary, and her father have died without seeing their daughter's killer brought to justice.
00:37:52
I hate that. And they are forced to commemorate the tragic anniversary. So the family releases a statement saying this,
00:37:59
quote, 50 years is a long time to grieve, a long time to hope. The 50 year mark confirms that a resolution in our lifetime
00:38:07
to Rita's murder is not going to happen. As a family in our prayers, we will never give up our deepest private hope.
00:38:14
Rita's story has a home in our family legacy forever. We recognize that over time, memories fade and evidence ages.
00:38:22
The perpetrator may be dead. Interest in this story wanes. For 50 years, the Burlington Police Department has worked every lead that they have ever received,
00:38:31
and they have been very compassionate to our family. We know Rita's death did not happen in a vacuum.
00:38:37
Somebody somewhere knows what happened that night on July 19th, 1971, and they will take that information to their grave.
00:38:44
May God have mercy on their soul. Damn. End quote. So it's the 50th anniversary.
00:38:52
So this family has every reason to be like, look, it's not happening. And we've just like given it up to God
00:38:57
because what are we supposed to do? But it's about to change because the Burlington detectives
00:39:04
are doing what they couldn't do before, which is go all in on forensics. Yeah. They're very aware of all the cold cases
00:39:12
that are being closed across the United States, thanks to advancements in DNA and forensic genealogy,
00:39:18
including, of course, the more than 40-year-old unsolved cold cases involved in the Golden State Killer case.
00:39:25
Shout out, Paul Holes. Good job, Paul Holes. And everybody else, everybody else.
00:39:30
Of course, everyone. And of course, everyone. It's so many people. A lot of people.
00:39:33
They still have this cigarette butt and Rita's robe from the original murder scene evidence.
00:39:40
And so first they decide to send the cigarette off for DNA. analysis and it's determined that the DNA left on the cigarette is from a male, but it doesn't
00:39:49
match any entries in the national felon database. So that's frustrating, except it's also helpful
00:39:56
because it rules out all the convicted felons who were on the suspect list. Right. So next,
00:40:02
they send the cigarette to another lab to extract a DNA sample that can be used for further analysis
00:40:08
So to like preserve that DNA. So like to preserve that DNA so they can keep on testing it.
00:40:16
So when they get that sample back, they send that DNA sample to a genealogy company.
00:40:21
And the hope there is that professional genealogists can find familial DNA match in the consumer database,
00:40:27
which is now so much more gigantic than the national felon database once was. Right.
00:40:34
And it's with this second test that genealogists find a match. Then they send off the DNA sample from Rita's robe to be like just triple sure.
00:40:44
And it corroborates the genealogist findings from the cigarette. But detectives believe that now after 52 years, they have found Rita Curran's killer.
00:40:54
And on January 20th, 2023, the Burlington police hold a press conference where they announce that they have identified that the man responsible for Rita Curran's murder,
00:41:04
in the most frustrating non-twist of all time is the upstairs neighbor, William DeRuce.
00:41:11
Son of a fucking bitch, man. So it's kind of exactly what you said, which is somebody was providing an alibi
00:41:20
that shouldn't have been providing an alibi. Totally. And it's like, if the walls were thin
00:41:25
and no one heard anything, that is suspicious in itself. Yes, it makes no sense.
00:41:30
Yeah. Oh, God. Now, the other gut punch is William DeRuce has been dead for 37 years.
00:41:38
Fuck, man. He died in 1986 from a drug overdose, but investigators still go talk to his ex-wife, Michelle.
00:41:46
She walks back her alibi that she provided for William, saying that he was not in their apartment for a span of several hours
00:41:53
on the night that Rita was killed and that he was a violent man The couple had only been married for a couple of weeks at the time of Rita Curran murder And they had gotten into a fight that night
00:42:05
and William stormed off. And later, after they'd made up, when news of Rita's murder had begun to circulate,
00:42:13
William begged his wife to lie to the police, saying that he had this criminal past
00:42:18
that would put a target on his back. So he begged her to say that they had been together
00:42:22
for the entire night. let's say she was scared of him too and scared of what he would do if she told the truth.
00:42:30
And let's hope it's not that she just didn't care, you know? I think the idea that this man manually strangled
00:42:40
a young woman that lived in the apartment below, this woman was married to a psychopath and a monster
00:42:48
and she was doing what he told her to do. Totally. It's tough that she wouldn't break that silence after he died.
00:42:57
That's the tough part for me. But maybe she was going through her own stuff. That direct action could have relieved that family so much sooner.
00:43:06
Yeah, it's mind-boggling. And hopefully we'll never experience anything while we understand what was coming through her head.
00:43:11
I wonder if something about the idea that, what's it called when you lie to cops or lie in court?
00:43:19
Oh, perjury? Yeah. If she was seeing it as that she could somehow get arrested or get in trouble for something, knowing it was so big.
00:43:27
Right. Lying to the cops, yeah. I mean, yeah, who knows? Yeah. She claims that she didn't suspect his involvement
00:43:35
whatsoever in the murder. She truly believed that this idea that the cops would just like not leave him alone because of his past.
00:43:44
Right. Was the reason. So another wrench in that thinking is William DeRuce leaves his wife
00:43:51
shortly after the murder takes place. So she kind of didn't have a lot of reason
00:43:57
to stand by and be faithful or even keep the lie going. Yeah. That's a hard one.
00:44:05
Yeah. You got to think maybe she just truly didn't think he did it or was capable of it.
00:44:10
Maybe she didn't know. If he was a psychopath, he was probably a really good liar too.
00:44:15
Yes, for sure. Charming and charismatic. and how could he ever do something like that?
00:44:20
And he's misunderstood and all this bullshit. It could be that. It could be he scared the living shit out of her.
00:44:26
She wanted him gone and never to interact with him again. And if she turned him in while he was still alive,
00:44:32
she's at risk. I mean, who knows? Who knows? Tough. Yeah. So Darus travels to Thailand and becomes a monk
00:44:41
and nothing is really known about his whereabouts until three years later when he shows up in San Francisco in 1974
00:44:50
and reportedly he's become, quote, a fairly well-known guru. The fuck? Yeah. Around the same time he remarries,
00:44:59
his second wife, Sarah, will later tell the police that yes, William was violent and abusive.
00:45:05
So essentially it's just, it's like any of these stories, especially with a cold case
00:45:11
that has this kind of buildup where it just turns out to be like Occam's razor, It was the guy upstairs.
00:45:17
They were lying. He's a monster. Then he just died of a drug overdose. And here we are, like all this pain,
00:45:24
all of this kind of mystery for nothing. But then you got to ask the question, of course,
00:45:28
like, are there other victims that he left behind? Yes. Because it doesn't seem likely to any of us
00:45:34
who listen to True Crying Podcast that there was one victim and that's it, you know?
00:45:40
Not in a manual strangulation case where you are staring at a person's face as you kill them.
00:45:46
Totally. So at the police press conference that named Rita's killer, Rita's brother, Tom, said this, quote,
00:45:53
I don't think so much about the guy who did this as I do about Rita and my parents
00:45:57
and what they went through. I pray to my parents and I pray to Rita. My wife, Nancy, tells me that we will get through this.
00:46:05
We are Curran strong. Wow. And that's the story of the tragic murder of Rita Curran,
00:46:10
at one time, Vermont's oldest cold case that has finally been solved. Wow. 52 years. So that's a lifetime to live with that.
00:46:21
Horrible. Haunting you. Yeah. Wow. Good job. Look at you doing a fucking cold case.
00:46:28
Look at me stepping into your area. I love it. But of course, mine have to be ones that have solutions or I stay up at night wringing my
00:46:37
hands like an otter. Well, I think everyone appreciates that. While the world watches the stars at the FIFA World Cup this summer,
00:46:47
Hyundai has its eyes on the next generation of talent. The future soccer stars who are
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It's already here. Next starts now. Hyundai, an official partner of FIFA. Goodbye.
00:47:27
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00:49:06
Goodbye. I'm going to go in a totally different direction. Great. We're going to space.
00:49:13
So maybe it is a little, you did my shit and I'm doing your shit. Okay, great. We are going to space.
00:49:19
My shit is space. You did what's her face, Sally Ride. Oh man, I fucked that one up so bad.
00:49:27
You did? Remember I did it because I called her by the wrong name. Oh, right. That's kind of how this podcast
00:49:34
has always propelled itself forward. Just, you know, two average Joes fucking up basic information that can be Googled easily.
00:49:44
We're Joe-ing it up. We're average Joe-ing it up over here. All right. So today I am going to tell you a story
00:49:51
that's only gotten more mysterious over time. It takes place during the Cold War space race of the 1960s.
00:49:59
This is the story of the man who fell from space, cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov. Isn't the man who fell from space
00:50:07
like the creepiest fucking title to have? It really isn't. But it also reminds me of David Bowie.
00:50:13
The man who fell to earth. Yeah. What's going on? Lots, lots. The sources used in today's story include an all that's interesting article written by Marco Margarita off called Inside the Brutal Death of Vladimir Komarov, the cosmonaut whose space capsule smashed into Earth.
00:50:30
Two NPR articles, both written by Robert Krolwich. Two articles in Space News, one by historian Robert Z. Perlman and one by space historian and author Piers Morgan.
00:50:44
Piers Bozzoni. Great. and the rest of the sources are all listed in today's show notes.
00:50:51
Now, Karen, it's homework time. Oh, no. I'm going to tell you. No, no, you don't have to do anything.
00:50:56
I'm going to go smoke in the girl's bathroom. I'm going to tell you my homework that I did and researched and told you.
00:51:03
Oh, perfect. I'm going to tell you that. Let's talk about some historical context.
00:51:06
Let's talk about the Cold War space race. So the launch of the Soviet spacecraft, Soyuz 1,
00:51:12
takes place in 1967 right in the middle of the Cold War. When World War II ended in 1945,
00:51:19
tensions bubbled up between the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc, led by their superpower, the Soviet Union.
00:51:26
While no direct war is ever fought during the Cold War, there are lots of proxy wars.
00:51:30
It's basically like two powerful nations trying to show each other up. And like, I have bigger toys than you have,
00:51:38
kind of a thing. You know what I mean? Right. Oh yeah, I watched it on TV as a child.
00:51:42
It was very scary. Oh yeah. So they're building up their militaries to show off who has more military might
00:51:47
and competition between the US and the Soviet Union. They really want to see who can get to outer space first
00:51:52
and who can accomplish the most impressive space-related feats. So now they want to show off in fucking space.
00:51:59
Earth's not enough. They have to show off in space. Meanwhile, children don't have lunch to eat.
00:52:05
That's right. I hate space. Fuck, are you anti-space? Well, just for that reason, I think it's important.
00:52:12
Like, you know, I was thrilled when we got that tour of JPL. I love the work that really those people are doing in that way.
00:52:19
But this idea that it is a goal to be set that supersedes these humanistic goals,
00:52:24
we're blowing it on Earth with each other. But then it's like, look, I'm at Venus, where it's just like, it's not helping anything.
00:52:32
Yeah. And the fact that it's like, the goal is to beat another team. It's not even like to better humanity.
00:52:40
It's not. No. So it's disappointing. And also it's like, they're going to figure something out
00:52:45
and get some information. They're not going to tell us. Right. Because they don't trust like the American people
00:52:50
or like the average person with any kind of actual revelatory information that they dig up out there.
00:52:57
No, because we lose our minds pretty easily. Okay, so the space race kicks off on July 29th, 1955,
00:53:03
when the U.S. announces its plan to launch the world's first artificial satellite.
00:53:08
a few days later on August 2nd, 1955, the Soviet Union announces, we're going to do it too.
00:53:15
You know what I mean? Like one of those. They end up beating the U.S. to the chase
00:53:19
on October 4th, 1957 with the successful launch of Sputnik 1. And then fucking the U.S. catches up,
00:53:26
blah, blah, blah, with the Explorer 1. NASA is established soon after on October 1st, 1958
00:53:32
so we can beat the bad guys. This is basically the start of a 20-year back and forth
00:53:38
between US and Soviet achievements in motherfucking space travel. It finally ends on July 15th, 1975,
00:53:46
when the competitive nature of the two countries dies down and they complete a joint Apollo-Soyuz mission,
00:53:53
which maybe you remember watching I think you were like five Could be You know that was when people would gather around the TV in the 70s It was like a big console that took up a big part of the front room Oh yes You all just kind of sat there
00:54:05
and watched the news together. Yeah, and then you were the little sister, so you had to get up to change the fucking channel
00:54:10
because there was no... Like, because we could go to the moon, but we can't have a remote control.
00:54:14
There's remote controls were too much to ask. But also, I realized, as I said, that dramatic thing when you were talking about that,
00:54:20
it's like, I wasn't there for the beginning of the space release. I wasn't there when Khrushchev and, you know, whoever it was.
00:54:29
Yuri Gagarin. Yeah, I was absolutely not born yet at all. So basically, one American on the Apollo and one Soviet on the Soyuz meet in space,
00:54:42
and then they like shake hands or whatever, and everything is fine now. So that's when the Cold War ends.
00:54:47
Everything gets solved in space. Because you have to shake hands in space. You can't just fucking meet up at like Applebee's and be like,
00:54:54
this is bad. Everything's fine. Let's stop being assholes, you know? No, it has to be gravity-free handshaking with big gloves.
00:55:01
Come on. So let's talk about this dude, Vladimir Komarov. He is born in Moscow in Russia on March 16th, 1927.
00:55:10
Super, super smart. He excels in math. Then World War II starts and the Germans invade the Soviet Union in 1941.
00:55:18
So at just 14 years old, he has to leave school and become a laborer on a communal farm.
00:55:23
But he never lets go of his love for math and science. Me too, you know. Oh my God, it's been your passion.
00:55:30
He becomes obsessed with aircrafts, collecting aviation magazines, building model aircrafts.
00:55:36
He wants to be a pilot when he grows up. So, and he's just 15 years old in 1942.
00:55:41
He joins the Soviet Air Force, graduates from flight school with honors in 1945,
00:55:46
and then continues his training. I mean, he like does all these military aviation college things.
00:55:52
He earns his wings. He just keeps climbing the ranks because he's so smart. He's commissioned as a lieutenant in the Soviet Air Force by 22 years old.
00:56:00
Wow. Which, man, I was just getting started at 22 years old. I was not graduating anything.
00:56:06
I could not stop falling off my shoes when I was 22 years old. I just saw like their Bring You Back platform.
00:56:15
Yes. Like those kind of platform shoes. and I'll never forget getting a pair of what were essentially,
00:56:20
my sister used to call them my Frankenstein shoes because they were like platform Mary Jane.
00:56:24
Yes. And walking home from a bar one night in San Francisco and just falling down like,
00:56:29
because the shoes were too high. I mean, they're just flat. I was just like, how come I fell down?
00:56:34
It's like- Oh my God. Because you can't drink nine beers. The amount of times my ankle would give out
00:56:40
because I had the big flat, like the big like cork rubber sandals, sandals on in the 90s.
00:56:47
And I would just be walking down the street. I'm sure I made so many people laugh in their cars
00:56:51
and my ankle would just go like, this isn't, nope, this isn't right. This isn't right.
00:56:55
Oh my God. The slightest dent in the sidewalk and you are on your face. Yeah. Horrifying.
00:57:01
Yeah. Where were we? Da-da-da-da-da. He was 22 doing constructive things. 22 is hard.
00:57:09
That same year, 1949, he falls in love with a woman named Valentina Yakalevna Kiselyova. Let's pretend that's right. They get married in October of 1950. They have a
00:57:21
daughter named Irina and one son named Yevgeny. You know, two names that I can't pronounce.
00:57:29
Now based in Grozny, which is the capital of Chechnya, Russia, Vladimir has a successful
00:57:35
piloting career. He climbs the ranks, senior lieutenant, the second fighter aviation regiment
00:57:41
of the, you know, all these numbers. So by age 25, he's just like already has this big career.
00:57:46
He still wants to challenge himself though. So he enrolls in engineering courses at an academy.
00:57:51
He graduates earning himself the rank of senior engineering lieutenant at the age of 32.
00:57:56
Okay, like he just keeps getting promoted. He's very, very fucking smart, right?
00:57:59
And he eventually sets his sights on becoming a cosmonaut, which is just Russian for astronaut.
00:58:04
Got you. But sounds cooler, doesn't it? It really does. Cosmonaut. So in 1960, he enters an invite-only cosmonaut selection process.
00:58:13
He's just one of 18 pilots chosen out of 3,000 people who have been invited to try out.
00:58:19
Men, it's probably been. Yeah, so he's, you know, he's on top. In 1961, before he is deemed spaceflight ready,
00:58:25
his fellow cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, becomes the first person ever to enter space.
00:58:32
And then Vladimir becomes the third highest paid cosmonaut by 1962. So he's like top three.
00:58:38
Yeah. Which is pretty impressive. Finally, in April 1964, Vladimir is ready to take on his first spaceflight mission.
00:58:45
After some internal debate, he's named the commander of the primary flight crew for spacecraft Vosad 1.
00:58:52
Vladimir and two civilian crewmen launched the Vosad 1 on October 11th, 1964. The flight lasts a little more than a day.
00:59:00
They perform various fucking tests and shit. They see the aurora borealis. It's beautiful, et cetera, et cetera.
00:59:06
And it's the first space flight with more than one person on board, marking another space race achievement for the Soviets.
00:59:13
So he becomes, you know, a national hero as well. Yeah. And he wins two awards. And the next year in 1965, Vladimir teams up with Yuri Gagarin,
00:59:25
who's like a fucking celebrity over there. And they supervise the country's next space mission, the flight Voshad 2.
00:59:33
it's safe to say at this point Vladimir has reached an all-time high in his career.
00:59:38
So Vladimir then gets his next assignment, the Soviet Soyuz program in 1966. And this is where
00:59:47
facts get a little hazy, but here's what we know for sure. The Soviet Union's government officials,
00:59:53
specifically General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Leonid Brezhnev They want to hold a spectacular space event just to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Communist Revolution
01:00:06
So like, you know, again, Applebee's is not enough. They have to fucking- They gotta go big.
01:00:11
You know, get a bammer out in space. They gotta get some tanks going. They gotta, everybody has to march perfectly in line.
01:00:18
Mm-hmm, go communism. Space, communism and space. Share space. So their plan is to have Vladimir fly one spacecraft, the Soyuz 1, into low Earth orbit,
01:00:32
while a separate crew of two other cosmonauts flies the second space capsule, Soyuz 2.
01:00:38
They meet up. They fucking basically high-five each other as they cross between the two vessels trading places.
01:00:45
They drive the other ones home, essentially. Got it. You know what I mean? You get it.
01:00:49
I think so. So on April 23rd, 1967, the Soyuz 1 launches with Vladimir at the helm.
01:00:55
He's alone in this space capsule. But soon after the launch, once the Soyuz 1 made its way into orbit, one of the solar panels failed to deploy.
01:01:06
This makes it so that some of the Soyuz 1 systems, including part of the navigational system, didn't have enough power to work properly.
01:01:14
And we all know how important a navigational system is in life. I hate to be, you know, 20-20 vision after the fact.
01:01:22
Yeah. You don't have a couple backup panels. Absolutely. If the one goes out. Totally.
01:01:28
I mean, if it's that important, back it up. Back that shit up. Back it up. So Vlad radios down to ground control.
01:01:36
He's like, what's up? Conditions are poor. The cabin parameters are normal. Solar panel didn't deploy, blah, you know, says all the things.
01:01:44
He spends the next five hours trying to orient the spacecraft, but problems with the orientation detectors
01:01:49
make it next to impossible. Can you imagine trying to fucking orient yourself for five hours?
01:01:54
I don't even know what that means, but it sounds stressful. It sounds like I would get very bad nausea
01:01:59
because you just kind of don't know which way is up. You're in space. Well, it reminds me of like when pilots
01:02:06
are doing loop-de-loops and they lose sight of the horizon and they don't know what is sky and what is ground.
01:02:12
And that's like when a lot of crashes happen. Obviously, I'm not, this is very amateur hour,
01:02:17
but it seems like that, but in space. Hold on. Hold on a second. Are you a pilot?
01:02:23
Because if you're a pilot, you can't be an average Joe with me. I can't have it.
01:02:27
Legally, I have to tell you if I'm a pilot. You have to disclose all pilot tubes.
01:02:32
Please. Five hours doing that shit. So he goes around 13 orbits. Then the automatic stabilization system dies
01:02:41
and the little control Vladimir had on the Soyuz one dwindles even further. Then the high-frequency transmitter
01:02:48
temporarily loses radio contact, and he and ground control lose communication for two more orbits of the fucking spacecraft.
01:02:57
Now, instead of the spacewalk, the crew of the Soyuz 2 decide to use their flight
01:03:01
to fix the solar panel. They're going to, instead of high-fiving, they're going to go up and fix that shit,
01:03:05
bring Vlad back down. Unfortunately, thunderstorms roll in before they can take off,
01:03:11
and their mission is aborted altogether. So he's on his own up there. No, God. Eventually, Vladimir regains radio contact.
01:03:20
And by his 18th orbit, ground control orders him back down to Earth. And so there's like some technical maneuvering.
01:03:28
Vlad manages to manually position himself properly, fires his re-rocketers to reenter Earth's atmosphere.
01:03:34
Crisis is seemingly averted. Vladimir's on his way back home. And as he descends,
01:03:40
he has a quick exchange with his bro, cosmonaut Yuri Gergarian, saying that the lunar orientation is about to begin.
01:03:48
I'm feeling great. Everything is fine. And he starts to, you know, come back down to Earth.
01:03:54
But then more trouble strikes. At about 23,000 feet of altitude, Vladimir deploys the Soyuz 1's parachute.
01:04:04
But the first parachute doesn't deploy properly. And the main parachute doesn't deploy at all.
01:04:10
So this is like some skydiving. Your fucking parachutes don't work. Shit. but at 23,000 feet of altitude.
01:04:17
Vlad tries deploying his reserve parachute as a backup and that one does release,
01:04:21
but gets tangled up with the other parachutes, rendering them both ineffective. Horrifying.
01:04:27
So without any parachutes to slow him down, the Soyuz one comes plummeting to earth
01:04:32
at about 89 miles per hour. So Vladimir Komarov tragically dies on impact. His body is charred beyond recognition
01:04:40
and reduced to just 12 inches in diameter and 31 inches long in the crashes resulting fire.
01:04:48
And this is a photo you might've seen, like one of those historical photos where it looks like these Soviet military people
01:04:55
are looking at something on a gurney, essentially. And it looks like it could just be
01:05:02
a charred remnants of a fire, like a bonfire. It doesn't look like anything, but it's so, when you know what it is, it's so creepy.
01:05:09
That's horrible. I'm sure you've seen this photo before. The only part of him left identifiable is his heel bone.
01:05:15
So he's obliterated completely. The entire mission lasted one day, two hours, 47 minutes, and 52 seconds,
01:05:23
with Vladimir having completed 18 orbits around Earth before his descent and tragic death.
01:05:30
Horrible. This, of course, is a super bad look for the Soviet Union and their cherished space race.
01:05:36
His death rocks the Soviet Union and the space science community at large. His remains are cremated, and then a state funeral ceremony is held bearing him at the Kremlin wall on August 26, 1967.
01:05:49
And that's a huge honor for a fallen Soviet at the time. He posthumously awarded a second gold star for heroism and even American astronauts send their condolences to the Soviet cosmonauts But in 2011 we cutting forward to 2011
01:06:07
authors and space historians Piers Bozzoni and Jamie Doran write a book entitled Starman,
01:06:14
The Truth Behind the Legend of Yuri Gagarin. Okay, so they write this book. In it, they describe an even more horrifying account
01:06:21
of how and why the Soyuz One mission went wrong. So they're like, we're going to come out with the facts now.
01:06:29
When Vladimir is first assigned the Soyuz One program, he allegedly blabs a little too much about the program
01:06:35
during a conference in Japan in July 1966. He gets reprimanded by his superior, the Nikolai Kaminin,
01:06:42
a man who already seems not to like Vladimir very much. And after the Voshad One mission,
01:06:49
General Kaminin remarks that while the rest of the crew seemed like he just kind of starts talking
01:06:54
shit on Vladimir and while he's praising the other cosmonauts and it's like kind of weird and there's
01:07:00
no reason for him to be doing this in the press but he does it anyways. All of these comments and
01:07:05
interactions raise questions about whether or not the general had a personal problem with Vladimir.
01:07:11
And according to Bozzoni and Doran, Vladimir and Yuri Gagarian, who is assigned as the backup
01:07:17
cosmonaut for the mission that Vladimir died on are wildly overworked, putting in 12 to 14 hours a
01:07:25
day. They constantly are fighting with the engineers about the Soyuz 1's design flaws.
01:07:31
Like they know something's wrong with this craft. And all of Vladimir and Yuri named 203 structural
01:07:38
problems that they feel need addressing before the launch. And so Vlad gives one of his buddies,
01:07:44
a KGB officer named Vayemin Ruzov, this like list to give to the higher ups, which is Brezhnev.
01:07:54
But of course, like you don't just go to a fucking Soviet higher up and be like,
01:07:58
this thing is wrong and I'm not fucking doing it. No, you're gonna get sent to Siberia, you know?
01:08:03
Yes. And so even people who had heard about this list got sent to Siberia and demoted.
01:08:09
Like it was not okay to have problems with the aircraft. Yeah. Which is like super bad.
01:08:15
And so Vlad basically knows that it's a suicide mission, essentially, according to this book, Spaceman.
01:08:21
But if he refuses to do it, then the next person behind him, his really good friend, Yuri Gagarin,
01:08:29
is going to have to take his place. They're not going to shut the mission down. Right.
01:08:33
So Vlad refuses to say no, refuses to let his friend die, and does the mission himself knowing his fate.
01:08:41
Can you imagine how scary? It's like, I don't understand how astronauts... I'm sorry I said I hated space.
01:08:48
I don't understand how astronauts do their job. It's really unbelievable that they're that brave.
01:08:54
Because it truly is the unknown. And it truly is such advanced engineering and planning and everything.
01:09:01
It's not the scientists and the astronauts we're talking shit on. It's the money spent by the government.
01:09:06
Thank you. That's all I mean. That's all I mean is, can't we please, please admit that our common man needs to get tended to before we just send millions of dollars into space?
01:09:18
But the idea that you would know when that fucking thing is, the booster rockets are turning on, you're faced upward and you're like, well, this is it.
01:09:28
That's horrifying. But then you think about all the schooling he went through that he's been wanting to do this since he was at least 14.
01:09:35
This means so much to him. This is a brand new historical thing happening. His best friend Yuri Gagarin is now a hero.
01:09:44
He kind of knows that like, like if you're going to go out, this is the way you're going to want to go out.
01:09:49
But he has children and a wife and he's young. So that sucks, but maybe, you know.
01:09:54
Yeah. It's a silver lining on a complete shit pie. Definitely. Definitely. So scary.
01:10:03
I'm just thinking about being at the county fair and going on the zipper. Have you ever been on the zipper?
01:10:08
I don't go on rides. I don't go on county fair rides. I don't go on, you know, professional fucking rollercoaster rides.
01:10:15
Absolutely not. Ever? Oh. I have as a kid, but not since I was like 12. The anxiety started and it's never stopped.
01:10:23
I will not go on a fucking ride. Okay, so tell me about the zipper. Well, I was just going to say,
01:10:27
and I think you're right to not do that because I just saw on TikTok a lady who was,
01:10:32
did you see it? The lawyer who was like the thing I would never do. knowing what I know now as a lawyer.
01:10:37
And she's like, never, ever get onto those carnivals that roll into your town and they just pop up in a parking lot.
01:10:43
Did you see the video of one of the like legs and feet of one of those carnival rides
01:10:48
jumping like off the ground? Not, I mean, yeah, we saw the same type of thing. Yes, it's a real, like the 70s carny era
01:10:59
where it's just like, who's actually in charge? The 90s, I feel like I fucking saw that shit.
01:11:04
Yes. I don't think they've updated it too much, but we got on the zipper one time and I was probably 10.
01:11:12
And it's just the one where the guy, you get in and it's a little cage. It's like a seated cage.
01:11:18
And they just spin it and then it goes around on a spinning thing. So you spend three to five minutes just totally disoriented, like your inner ear is fucked.
01:11:29
And my friend who wanted to go on it is like, I want to be an astronaut when I grew up.
01:11:33
and I was just like, I never want to do anything like this again, ever even close.
01:11:38
Like their willingness to risk your body and brain and everything for this pursuit of science
01:11:46
and discovery and all that stuff is really noble. But at the same time, it's like, how are you even doing that?
01:11:54
Did she become an astronaut? We're all holding our breaths, dying to know. God, wouldn't that be amazing if...
01:12:00
It's like, I didn't realize that I went to camp with a girl that was now like a NASA scientist.
01:12:07
That would be amazing. That would be so beautiful. And she tells this story too, but it's from the other way of you being a pussy.
01:12:13
And she's just like... She's like, this fucking 10-year-old hated spinning in a circle in four different ways.
01:12:22
Her stupid head off. And I was like, this is what I knew. She's on her astronaut podcast.
01:12:28
It was like one of those super old-fashioned, just a silver aluminum bar that got closed over in front of the two of us.
01:12:35
And midway through, I was holding onto that bar with both arms, like just trying to keep myself.
01:12:42
It was total insanity. Quick reminder, send us your horror stories from amusement parks
01:12:48
for our minisodes. We love them. Yes, please. We love them. Okay, anyway. And if you're a fucking astronaut,
01:12:56
tell us about it. Do we have astronaut murderinos? That would be wild. That would be.
01:13:01
Well, we have our friends at JPL. That's true. Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Yeah. Yeah.
01:13:06
That took Stephen and I and Scotty Landis on a tour. That was amazing. So basically, according to this book and their sources,
01:13:16
Yuri Gregarian tries to suit up and take Vladimir's place because he's like, I don't want my bro to die either.
01:13:24
But Vladimir's like, hell no. and gets on. Like, I can't let the nation, I almost said America's hero,
01:13:31
no, die. Okay. So Vlad beat him to the chase. And while in orbit, things started looking dire for Vladimir.
01:13:39
You know, he's allegedly a lot more frantic than what was initially described. Because of course, in the press,
01:13:43
he's just this like hero who like kept calm under pressure. Right. But the Starman authors
01:13:49
claim the US National Security Agency intelligence listens in on the radio communications
01:13:56
from the Air Force Base near Istanbul. So they're fucking tapping into that shit KGB style.
01:14:02
Of course. They claim to hear Vladimir telling Soviet ground control that he knows he's going to die
01:14:06
and that the Soviet officials respond calling Vlad. They like let him know he's a hero.
01:14:13
They allegedly also get Vladimir's wife, Valentina, to get on the phone with him
01:14:17
so he can be like, goodbye, I love you and all this shit. No. Yeah. and give a final message to his kids.
01:14:23
And their story is that he's actually panicking and knows what's going on, which if you knew over 200 things were wrong
01:14:31
with your spaceship that wasn't gonna be fixed, then that seems likely, right? Yes, for sure.
01:14:37
Yeah, and then once the spacecraft starts hurtling towards the ground, Vladimir allegedly claims, quote,
01:14:43
this devil ship nothing I lay my hands on works properly And at that he plummets to the ground Ugh Yeah Soon after the book Starman release
01:14:55
space historians start sounding the alarm bells. They say this version of the story can't be true.
01:15:00
There's not enough evidence to support it. There's just basically people point out a lot of points about this
01:15:05
and why it wouldn't be true. One of which is that, you know, these cosmonauts and astronauts are taught to be so stoic.
01:15:12
So one of them like crying and carrying on is just like an insult to him. So it's like not true.
01:15:19
And arguing that there's no transcripts of what we said we listened and what we heard on the intelligence radio communications.
01:15:26
So, you know, a bunch of nays on that. And then the authors admit that they made some factual errors throughout their book
01:15:33
and that the account of the NSA member who allegedly heard Vladimir screaming with rage as the craft went down
01:15:39
was based on a rumor and not actual written transcripts. So, you know, let's hope that he wasn't fucking
01:15:46
screaming and crying on his way down because that's so tragic. It's such a good point though
01:15:50
that astronauts are essentially pilots in just in a different form. And just imagine any pilot you have ever heard speaking
01:16:00
on a flight that you've had, that is their personality. They are handling shit all over the place.
01:16:06
So like it wouldn't be, all that kind of reactivity is, trained out of them. Totally. From what I've seen, because I watched the right stuff in 1985. But
01:16:15
you know, that's the idea is that you are driving a ship that almost no one on the planet can drive.
01:16:22
You're the one that knows and you've got it all handled. Yeah. Yeah. The stoicism involved,
01:16:26
I think, is pretty high level on that, which I don't possess a fucking inch of. I mean, it's the only reason I'm not an astronaut. It's because it's so mouthy.
01:16:38
That's all. Yeah, that and the zip ride. So no matter what happened leading up to the Soyuz 1 mission
01:16:44
or what Vladimir may or may not have said during his final moments alive, it's clear that he was a man dedicated to exploring
01:16:51
Karen's favorite part, the far reaches of space and knowing about space travel. His work and legacy as a brilliant, accomplished pilot
01:17:00
and cosmonaut outshines any arguments over what actually happened and any scandals.
01:17:05
And he's still like a fucking hero. in that world. On April 25th, 1968, the day before Vladimir's funeral,
01:17:13
a memorial service held at his crash site near Oresk-Orenburg Oblast, Russia, drew more than 10,000 attendees
01:17:22
to honor his memory. And in addition to his posthumous Soviet awards, Neil Armstrong himself,
01:17:28
our fucking cosmonaut hero, he left a package of memorial items on the moon during his historic 1969 moon landing in honor of Vladimir as well as others So that pretty huge to be honored that way
01:17:43
Yes. In that same year, in 1971, another memorial, a plaque and small sculpture called Fallen Astronaut
01:17:50
is left during another moon landing in honor of Vladimir and every other astronaut and cosmonaut
01:17:56
who died during space missions. So I think that the astronauts and the cosmonauts probably had
01:18:01
kind of an understanding of each other and that they're all similarly heroic. And the knowledge you have to possess
01:18:09
to become an astronaut is so huge that maybe they add some respect for each other.
01:18:15
Absolutely. I mean, I think that's their way of saying these political factions can space race all they want,
01:18:23
but we're the ones actually doing it and we care about... Because that guy that happened to that's from Russia,
01:18:29
the only difference is he's from Russia. Totally. So like he sacrificed, is the ultimate sacrifice
01:18:34
for everybody else being able to get there. That's right. And that is the story of Soviet cosmonaut
01:18:39
Vladimir Komarov, the man who fell from space. I mean, God. It's just, well, first of all,
01:18:49
it immediately makes me want to tell everybody, if you haven't seen the movie Hidden Figures.
01:18:54
What's that? It's one of the greats. It's about, I believe her name was Katherine Johnson
01:18:58
and she was a Black engineer. Oh, yes. And I think her specialty was like statistics or whatever
01:19:07
that was crucial in the space race, in like all of it, and yet still being treated like a second-class citizen.
01:19:18
It's an amazing story. But it also reminds me of the story of the Russian serial killer Chikatilo,
01:19:25
where they knew there was a serial killer out there and they wouldn't do anything
01:19:30
because it would lead to bad press. Right, right. Remember that? And wasn't he involved in it too,
01:19:37
a little like the press as well, or is that someone else? Oh, I don't know. I don't think he like,
01:19:42
but I think it was the kind of thing where it's, if you can't admit you did something wrong
01:19:46
to fix it and go forward, then you just will, then therefore you have a serial killer
01:19:51
that has what, 300 victims or some crazy out of the park number that's like, how did it get this bad?
01:19:59
And it's like, because we couldn't admit it was happening in the first place. And it sounds similar.
01:20:04
It's unchecked egotistical-ism, you know? Yes. When people are unchecked in their power,
01:20:11
bad things fucking happen. And if somebody gives you a list of 200 things being wrong,
01:20:16
just have somebody take a look at it. That's a lot. I wouldn drive my car if 10 things were wrong if I got a list of 10 things you know Oh man it so hopeless Like then they just have to do it anyway That rough I mean he had to know He had to know
01:20:31
Well, good story. Thank you. I mean, that's really compelling. I'd never heard of that.
01:20:35
I had no idea. Wait till you see this photo. Oh, I don't want to. So creepy. Horrible.
01:20:41
Well, good job. Good job to you. Thank you. This week's episode really covered a lot of ground.
01:20:49
It did. I feel like we're back in the post-vacation groove. Yeah, I think so too.
01:20:54
This just means every time we show up, we don't remember what we're doing. Yeah, just keep it fresh.
01:21:00
Wing it. Keep it blank. Wing it, as they say in the cosmonaut world. Oh, you know what else they say in the cosmonaut world?
01:21:07
Stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an Exactly Right production.
01:21:23
Our producer is Alejandra Keck. Our senior producer is Hannah Kyle Creighton. This episode was engineered and mixed by Stephen Ray Morris.
01:21:30
Our researcher is Maren McClashen. Email your hometowns and fucking hoorays to myfavoritemurder at gmail.com.
01:21:37
Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at My Favorite Murder and Twitter at My Fave Murder.
01:21:42
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Goodbye. This episode is brought to you in part by Vital Farms. Have you noticed that the egg section at the grocery store has gotten very complicated lately?
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